Image resolution: 3200 x 4600
6/1/2024

A few months back,  I was really inspired by Mika Pikazo’s art. Her use of vibrant, bold colours always struck me as so lively and unique. I decided to try her style, so I sketched out a girl with her hair flowing in the wind, thinking it would be a great subject for a colourful piece. I went a bit overboard with colours, slapping a bunch of them on the screen in a rather haphazard way. At the time, I wasn’t thrilled with how it looked and ended up putting the piece aside, thinking I wouldn’t continue it in the future. It was one of those moments where I just didn’t feel it was turning out the way I’d hoped. Well, I guess I just wasn’t that adept in handling colours back then (and I still am). There were way more secondary colours in the original drawing, that may be why it didn’t look as good.

Fast forward to when I started building my website. I noticed I didn’t have much artwork to display. So, I took the liberty of going through my gallery of old art again. I saw this piece and I decided it was time to give it another shot. I went back to the piece, reworked the colours, and added a bunch of effects to make it pop. I also experimented with different blender modes to add some depth and texture.

When it came to the eyes, I fully embraced Mika’s style. I replicated her signature look. The eyes ended up being one of my favourite parts of the entire piece. As for the hair, I completely redid the colour scheme. I still used the primary colours as a base but incorporated the secondary hues more subtly. This time, I kept the secondary colours more to the edges, which I wanted to remain the focal point. For the effects, I just used a lot of halftone and some texture brushes on the hair. Then, I put in some sort of rainbow glowing splashes around her. Oh, and I added some paint strokes on her face, I don’t know why? Maybe because I felt the face was a bit too plain.

I decided it would be best for the background colour to be a solid colour, since it would be way too much if it weren’t. I was contemplating between black and white, neutral colours, because any other colour would clash with the character itself. But then, I thought it would’ve looked blank if it were white, so I went with black. I could also make her seem like she’s glowing in the dark. 

The final result turned out pretty decent. While it might not reach the level of Mika Pikazo’s art, I’m happy with how it turned out. It’s sort of like a Wallmart version of her style, but definitely a fun and colourful piece. It feels good to have finished it up and added a bit more to my art collection for the site.

Fun fact:
This piece only took around 4 hours to complete.

I just had a lot of fun messing around with colours and effects.