Studio Deen Studio Jigoku Shoujo Series Ai Enma Character School Uniforms

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First & foremost, this part (of the partial face) is related to my previous one in Avenger Messenger. It may be not precisely (both are done separately) ^_^', but may fit well to portray fully Enma Ai's portrait. :)

For this doujinshi, I used 'combination' style, as opposed to my former one which focuses on 'symbolisms'.

The title [Sakasama no Chou], which means 'Inverted Butterfly', is taken from Jigoku Shoujo first season's OP song, sung by SNoW.

Enma Ai's 2 commonly-seen outfits are the Japanese female school uniform 'Sailor fuku' (as daily attire) & flower kimono (during her execution duty). To strengthen the point of her eerieness behind innocence, I've create a part of her in flowery kimono within the Jigoku crest. For that crest, I referred to this picture >>>crest tatoo from Maedrol @ DeviantArt. This way is akin to an image of ghost reflected in the mirror by a normal-looking person.

The crest is positioned and enlarged to provide spaces for the hell scenery. In additional, within the crest shows the sea roadway to hell's gateway but was drew in a different angle of picturesque. (A check in Japanese culture shows that floating lanterns represent dead souls [other than shown here as leading the dark way to hell's gateway]).

Attention is given to the 'quality of lines'; that is, the thickness & thinness of lines, depending on the textures and shadow shades besides giving a 2-D image.

Moreover, the title is written in quarter circle with a pen-like Japanese brush (Tombo brand) in a thin scratchy style. The background on the right are bundles of straws that are used as materials for Voodoo dolls. For this, as one of the main featured item in this anime, I decided to use an indirect representation of this doll. Other than that, in parallel with the title, a transparent butterfly is added on the upper right, as opposed to the ordinary butterfly on the left. A unique feature for this butterfly is blending with the dark (negative), where black lines cross into her dark hair as contrast colour.

The main problem I faced during the process is determining Enma Ai's size & shape of her head. However, the most troublesome is her eyes (not the bigger one), as the way eyes are drawn concludes the character's expression. Here, her expression is passive, while the partially-shown face has her eye in innocence.

Time spent: 1 hour in planning & sketching; 7 hours & a 1/2 in completion
Materials used: Art block paper, graphite 6b pencil, 2B pencil, tissue (for smudging & tone-shadings), Tombo brand pen-like Japanese brush (small size), eraser (for glowing white lines within darkness)
Credits to: Japan Aniplex's ANI-COM 2005 special autumn issue magazine, screen-shots from Jigoku shoujo (first season), & Jigoku crest tatoo by Maedrol @ DeviantArt

Comments are welcome! :D Hope you'll love it. Domo arigato gozaimasu!

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