It's me! Hadley4, bringing you blazing art to kick off 2025 with energy!🔥

Hello friends, I’m on my resurrection number 56,272,537,262 because I always disappear and come back to life around here. How have you been? What have you been up to these past months? What’s been happening on Hive?

As for me, let me tell you, I moved to a new town, and now I have a steady job at a supermarket where they exploit me for a salary that doesn’t stretch far enough, but at least it’s steady from month to month. I’ve had the idea of drawing every day, but I either run out of time or I’m too tired to do it. However, I had planned to draw all the dragons from Holozing, and that’s what has pushed me to paint in my free time until I finally finished this fiery friend.

And here’s my version of the fire dragon from Holozing. It’s a version very close to the original, but I made it a bit fiercer and more skilled at attacking. You know I like there to be action in my art.

Tools:

Gaomon S620
Photoshop
Brushes courtesy of Imad Awan: Download here

🔰Process🔰

_Reference

-Step 1:

I wanted the dragon to be engulfed in flames, but with its head as the main focal point. So, I tried to center it as much as possible on the canvas, ensuring your gaze would meet its. Later, I shifted the composition slightly to the right of the workspace to add a bit more dynamism.

-Step 2:

The next step might already be familiar to you: separating each element of the character into different layers. This allows me to have greater control when painting, modifying, or moving any element wherever I want. For me, this is what I love most about digital painting—nothing is irreversible, and everything can always be adjusted as much as needed.

-Step 3:

And of course, it was time to add details. I went straight to shading the dragon's head, aiming to give it volume and make it immediately stand out from the rest of the setting. All my attention was focused on the area around its brow and its beautiful blue eye, as that’s where I wanted to direct the viewer’s gaze.

-Step 4:

Since the dragon was completely red, I didn’t want the fire to be red as well. That’s why I chose to give the flames around it cooler tones. Plus, light purple flames look incredible—I felt they were brimming with magic!

-Step 5:

Then, all I had left was to fully render the piece. Well, it’s not like I spent hours and hours detailing every inch of the painting. As I’ve mentioned before, I come home tired from work, so I paint little by little during my free moments. In fact, what you’ll see next isn’t even the final version, because right before writing this post, I added a few tiny details to the illustration. But I’m sure you noticed them when you opened the post. If not, I invite you to scroll back to the top of the post to check out the final final art—or, as I almost named the file on my computer, dragonfirefinishedfinalnowreallyfinal.psd.