ARTpost: SPN_J2_BigBang 2017

[beelikej]

I've played in the spn_j2_bigbang since 2010; including pinchhits that makes 12 BigBang collaborations! Every year I try to pick a story that offers me something different and even after this many years, authors still manage to surprise me:)
This year I managed to claim a very intriguing vampire story! I chose to illustrate it with papercuttings and watercolours. May I present...



Title: Blues in the Night
Author: oobydooby67 [compo67 on AO3]
Artist: beelikej
Medium: Papercutting & Watercolours
Pairing: Jensen/Jared | Genre: RPS Vampire AU
Story Rating: NC17 | Wordcount: 33034
ART Rating: G, and contains no spoilers for story!

Summary: The search for a missing elder leads Jensen to Los Angeles, California. It is his responsibility to question contacts and connections about Tyman, who has not been heard from or seen in a year.
Frustrated with the search, Jensen meets a human who claims to have had a casual relationship with Tyman. Jared trades information for two pastrami sandwiches and ten thousand dollars. Unfortunately, after the trade, Jensen is no closer to finding Tyman, and a lot closer to Jared than he ever thought possible.


Artist's Notes: So I didn't make a lot of pieces, but I put a lot of thought into them *grins* Let me give you a peek inside my head by explaining the colours I used:)
I chose purples and blues for the backgrounds to represent the night, since Jensen experiences the world either at dusk or dawn. Imagine the colours in the sunset (see my photo of clouds in Making Of!)

Vampire!Jensen prefers not be noticed. I put him in soft purples and blues so he blends in. I also cut him all neat with tight lines to fit his personality

For Jared I picked greens to counter Jensen's night colours. For me this visualizes how he fills up Jensen's dark world with colours you can only really see in daytime; nature's green, like a garden (you'll figure that one out when you read the story;). Jared's style is more sloppy, without straight lines.

Dividers
I don't know, after imagining Jensen's teeth and Jared's lip piercing, I couldn't resist play with their mouths:)





This is Jensen's mantra: "Loyalty, duty, respect, selfless service, honor, integrity, and personal courage."

Chapterheaders
Okay, there are a lot of these, but I wanted to show the variety in backgrounds, so I'll put up thumbnails of the bulk of them. (There are actually 27 chapters, but I made more because the story was still being written when I had already set the deadline for my art;)
Click to see them all up close (or Read the story!:)

















THE MAKING OF
Due to lack of time I had to resist babbling.
I hope the pictures tell you all you want to know about the work in progress:)

1. Set up pencil & paper sketches for author









2. Background watercolours















3. Papercutting

















Credits & Thanks
Fonts: Keyboard Plaque (names) & Axaxax (title)
References: For the fedora is used old photos of Frank Sinatra; Jensen's suit was based on the one Ranveer Singh is wearing on this cover of Forbes India:)
For Jared I found examples of a biker holding a helmet on Shutterstock.com. To get the shapes of Jensen & Jared's bodies and the details of their faces, I studied several Supernatural screencaps, for example S8Ep11 LARP and the Real Girl for Jared's ponytail *grins*



Of course this art wouldn't have happened without an inspiring story, so thank you, oobydooby67 [compo67] for creating pouty Vampire!Jensen and bouncy Biker!Jared:)
Also thanks to Wendy for running the spn_j2_bigbang, it's always a memorable event on the SPN fandom calendar!
Last but not least: thank you for stopping by to take a look! (Comments, questions and concrit are all welcome:)

J.


For more of my fanart, check out My masterlist of artsy fiddling:)