Jenny Dolfen

Inktober #30: Drizzt Do'Urden

Added 2017-10-29 20:13:49 +0000 UTC

The finishing stretch!

If you have known me since less than 2004, no, I didn't fall on my keyboard! Drizzt Do'Urden is a Drow (Dark Elf) from R. A. Salvatore's Forgotten Realms books, and among this number of my heroes of page and screen, he is definitely the one least likely to ever be revisited. The reason why I decided to include him after all is that I owe him a lot.

My Drizzt phase was short. Incredibly short for the amount of attention it garnered. Even though I only drew Dark Elves excessively for a few months between 2002 and 2003, I had that label for years. It was the year I joined Elfwood (does anyone still remember that?) and DeviantArt, and my Drow art somehow catapulted to top spots there, giving me a lot of views and popularity on those sites. On forums where I hung out (back then, kids, you still posted your art on forums), I was "that Drow artist". Still, a lot of good came of it - I talked online to R. A. Salvatore and even Todd Lockwood, who gave me valuable critique on my work, and found a lasting friend in comic artist Alice Picard. It was the year I was able to turn my art into a fledgling business, and the year I consciously started to improve, with my huge goal being to work for RPG companies or be a comic artist (until I realised that working for RPG companies often wasn't as glamourous as I thought, and that comics just aren't my thing). But the Dark Elf phase marks a turning point in my art, and the conscious decision to be more than a teacher who draws a bit on the side. And uploads pretty boy Drow on Elfwood.