Narmaya

She is one of those characters Ive had on my to draw list for years, and the release of Granblue Fantasy Relink was the final push I needed to finally get it done (although my favorite character and "main" in Relink ended up being Zeta, so shes next on the list now).

Anyway Narmaya ticks a lot of boxes of things I like so she was an obvious choice as a character Id enjoy drawing, though I thought for her a portrait/bust would be plenty since its really where all the appeal is, lol.

I went with the summer skin look here since I thought it looked pretty cute, though I did change the hairstyle a bit just because her hair is normally so big/long that it wouldnt fit in a pic like this, so I had to find some way to make it work and after trying a bunch of things this was the best I could come up with.

The one thing I couldnt get right despite how long I spent on it was her face/expression. I think I would have liked her to be smiling more or just having a warmer expression in general but I couldnt find the look I wanted without it looking weird/off and after messing around with it for so long I just gave up and moved on. Its one of those frustrations you have to deal with as an artist, some times things just dont work no matter how hard you try and you have to let it go.

That said to make up for it, I do love how it turned out on a technical level, especially the shading/lighting which has been my main focus lately (and I think youll be noticing it more and more with some upcoming pics). I also always like this minimal look when it comes to portraits, with just the hint of a background and strong depth of field, which makes it a bit more "artistic" I think, so I did it again here. It works very well with the light hitting her from the right and giving her that warm glow.

I also had some fun with gradients as usual, specifically hair and nails. Similar to what I did with Kokomi, these gradients of pink to purple or blue always look so satisfying. Especially with her eyes and hair "clip" already being blue by default.

So yeah another character I can finally tick off my list, and its a long list, lol. No idea if there are any Granblue fans here but I hope you like my version of her regardless.