STEP BY STEP & COLOR ANALYSIS - "Stranger Things" Fan Art - Chrissy🌲🎀

Hi Everyone!

Hope you had a lovely weekend 🧡 Today I’m sharing with you a Step by Step process of drawing Chrissy from Stranger Things 4.

Movies, series and animations are an endless source of inspiration for me. After watching my favorite shows, I often feel nostalgic for the characters and that is why I like to draw them then. Relive their stories a little longer.

I love to capture subtle facial expressions. In the portraits of Chrissy and Max one can see fear but also different shades of this emotion. Each of the characters dealt with fear in a different way, had different experiences and types of support. Both of these stories touched me very much and I wanted to combine them into a study of difficult emotions.

I used vibrant colors of colored pencils to show the beautiful vibe of the 80s 🛼

~ Chrissy Cunningham

Chrissy is a very sweet and innocent character from the latest season of Stranger Things. Chrissy, portrayed by Grace Van Dien, was formerly the head cheerleader at Hawkins High School and known as the "Queen of Hawkins High". Despite her cheery appearance, Chrissy was struggling with her mental health and home situation, and attended counselling at Hawkins High.
I chose these two references: first for the expression and position of the head. Second for hairstyle and a bit more vivid colors. 

~ Initial Sketch

Recently I like to use few different hues for the initial sketch. Before I liked to use monochromatic or analogous schemes (for example Orange with Dark Orange). Now I like to combine colors that aren’t so close on the color wheel (e.g. Light blue, Pink and Red). These lines are quite visible on the final piece and make the drawing even more playful.

I spent quite a lot of time on drawing her eyes, eyebrows, lips and gaze because they were essential to capture her subtle expression.

This stage is very important because it’s the construction of the whole painting. Make sure your sketch looks correct before applying the layers of colors. If you’re not sure, take a break and see your sketch with a pair of fresh eyes. You can also take a photo and flip it horizontally 📸 

~ Hues of the Skin

I started to paint with applying the local color of the skin (Light Peach) and reddish tinge to the cheek, nose, eyelids and lips. Chrissy had a blue eyeshadows so I added also a bit of light blue there. Even though the blushes aren’t visible on the reference photo I think they match her girly essence and subtle personality 🎀

~ Values and Contrast

Values and contrast are essential in painting because they hold the whole picture together. If the values are correct you can get away even with very fun and unexpected color combinations 🎨 

It’s very important to darken the values gradually from very light to the darkest and control the whole picture more or less at the same time. 

Here you can see how the light and shadow start to show the dimensional form of the hair. I kept the highlights blank and added darker values to the bangs. 

~ Background 

It was pretty difficult for me to control the shadows on the face so I decided to add the background and make Chrissie’s face smoothly appear from the darkest values (on the left) to the lightest (on the right).  I think it emphasizes the mood of this unsettling scene.
I rarely use strong backgrounds in my colored pencil portraits but here I think it was a great idea 💡 The Green Background is a paid actor of this portrait 👌🏼 

⬆️ This picture wouldn’t look so good on the photo - it was very textured and muddy. I scanned it to show its true colors ✨

Complementary Colors

If you'd like to read about Color Theory - check this post: LINK 🍓 

This is the final spread and I absolutely love it! I feel so inspired to draw and relaxed lately ☀️ The pressure of preparing Domestika Course is gone and I can draw whatever I want! Best feeling ever 🥰 I hope you enjoyed the process!

Hugs 🧡 Gaby