Armadillo Kat’s Illustration Process on the Wacom One 12 Pen Display

This Pride month, we’re celebrating LGBTQ+ artists across the creative spectrum. We highlighted some LGBTQ+ comics creators, learned more about the work of Translatin@ Coalition‘s graphic designer Kevin Cortez, and looked deeper into the art of photographer and installation artist Yulissa Mendoza.

Today, we’re looking at Armadillo Kat‘s illustration process on the Wacom One 12 pen display. We were introduced to their work via recommendation from one of their friends, who let us know that Kat was known in their friend group for illustrating all of their player characters for their Dungeons & Dragons campaigns!

Despite their dynamic, fantastical work, Kat isn’t an artist, per se, as they actually just graduated from college with a degree in engineering! We wanted to see what they’d do with the broad theme of “LGBTQ+ Pride,” and boy did they deliver. They created a tender, cute scene with two of their characters on a beach date. We love the details – the Pride flag allusions, the cups and used plates showing the aftermath of their meal – as well as the overall color story as the sun sets.

Watch below to learn more about their inspiration and process, or read on for an overview.

Theme, Inspiration, and Initial Sketches 

We asked Armadillo Kat to draw something featuring LGBTQ+ characters for Pride Month – and that was all of the guidelines we gave! “My preferred subject matter for my artwork is fantasy characters,” they said. They have a variety of OCs to choose from, but struggled to decide which of their characters to feature for this piece. But then, they realized: “What better option for this theme than some seafaring sapphics on a cute, little beach date?”

The work features two of their original characters, who “originated from a pirate themed Dungeons & Dragons campaign, where they were childhood friends, then captain and first mate, and then finally ended up falling for each other … I knew I wanted it to be a sweet, tender moment on a beach,” they said. So they drew a number of sketches and poses before landing on a picnic scene, which features the friends-to-coworkers-to-lovers romantics enjoying some quality time, presumably in between adventures out on the high seas.

Linework 

“For the linework of this piece I focused a lot on line weight, varying the weight to be heavier where the shadows would naturally pool,” they said, which is something they’ve been working on in their art. They don’t use any special brushes or anything, instead choosing to go with default brushes included in Clip Studio Paint software (a six-month trial of which is included with any Wacom One purchase).

“I specifically use the ‘SU-Cream Pencil’ by user Yuriky, with the pen pressure settings modified based on the purpose. For inking, I use a version with a very low pressure curve so that I can get nice thin lines that taper off at the end,” they explain further.

Colors 

“Part way through, I decided that a sunset would look more romantic,” they said, so they based the colors on that idea. This also made them think about the specific design for each of the characters: “Since these two were not in their normal outfits, I had to play around with the colors some to ensure the value and saturation composition were balanced. It took a few tries to get it right.” 

After the character base colors were done, they refined the background colors. “I tried to use colors in a similar realm to those on the figures so it would all be cohesive. It was honestly a fun challenge to work on the water. I started with a gradient of blues to make the water seem deeper as the distance increases. Then I added some sea foam with a soft brush, and made the sand look like it was damp from the water.”

To further incorporate the theme, they added a few extra details, like including homages to the Pride flag colors in different aspects of the illustration: “The picnic blanket includes colors from the lesbian flag. The sunset and clouds include the pansexual flag. And the picnic basket includes an homage to the sapphic flag.”

Shading and final details 

“With the shading, I followed my normal process with two multiply layers and an overlay layer,” they explain. “However, I used much warmer colors to fit the sunset lighting. For my shading, to make it more lively, I use a brush with a color jitter to slightly randomize the hue, saturation, and value throughout the stroke and for each new stroke. In this piece I also add a warm peachy overlay and multiply layer atop the whole illustration to both unify the colors and make it more sunset like. All in all, it came out as such a cute, tender scene.” 

Their thoughts on the Wacom One 12 

“The tablet was very intuitive to use,” Kat explains. “It fit nicely on my desk and had little grippy pads on the bottom so it didn’t slide around while drawing.” The pen has two buttons that can be customized, and you can even do on-screen menus for further customization. “You can even color code the shortcut menu and pick and label all the symbols,” they add. “I, of course, went with my favorite color, purple.” The feel of the pen impressed them: “The pen is also really lightweight and comes with plenty of extra pen nibs. Additionally, it fits with my Ergo pen grip which was a pleasant surprise. The tablet itself was also very responsive about where my pen was, even if it was just hovering above the screen.” They like the simple connectivity, as well: “I appreciated that the tablet uses a USB-C cable rather than a USB-A cable as my laptop only has one USB port.” 

Overall, they liked using the Wacom One 12 pen display. “Throughout the whole process, I enjoyed working with the Wacom One 12-inch pen display tablet. The pen had a very paper like feel on the tablet screen. Additionally, the screen had little to no glare and did not collect fingerprints. In theory, one would not even need to use a drawing glove, although I still did because that is my personal preference. It was a pleasure to try out this tablet for this illustration and I think it is an excellent entry level tablet for aspiring digital artists.”

The final illustration: