The Kangaroo and the Binturong

This is the 7th and final postcard that I designed for the collection. It is also one of the longer ones, measuring 4" x 8".


This postcard includes the unusual Binturong, an animal that I had to research prior to beginning the sketches. 


On his journey, whilst trekking through South East Asia, the Kangaroo passes through the garden of Buddhas, where he meets the Binturong, stuffing her face with popcorn.

After looking at pictures of the Binturong on the internet, this is the first sketch that I came up with.


Feedback:
'With the Binturong I had just imagined it more relaxed like this'


(the attached image Richard included is below)

'If this Binturong was lying on the Buddha statue.
But otherwise, I like it!'

The first step was to combine the original brush pen sketches with the watercolour layers, again using Photoshop.  The plants for the Buddha garden came first, with some being inspired from images on the internet of the various Buddha gardens located around the world.

The next step was to obtain images of Buddhas and to then translate them into my own hand.  The above are the outcomes.

Then came the Kangaroo himself, and the picture-taking Tourists.

The above is the the new sketch for the Binturong, using the web image that Richard provided.  I added the watercolour layers and again, found that the black paint when scanned in, appeared brown. I made some adjustments and added in the finer details like speckles of white fur to make it look closer to the real thing.

Other elements were added to the image, such as the bright blue sky and the pebbles in the garden, which were layered up and combined into groups. The original image of the sky had to be tilted slightly to fit in better with the design.

With all of these separate parts being placed together in one single image, the outcome is shown below.

Feedback:

'The image is too busy. The red flowers and background Buddhas make it hard to see the Kangaroo. I'd suggest cropping the left side making the main Buddha left of the frame then the Kangaroo can be more prominent and for the right side of the frame you can add extra details. Kangaroo on left, extras on right!

Good luck!'

Unfortunately I was unable to make these desired changes, but time permitting I would have done so. I still intend to work on this design until the requirements have been met.

Please note that the order in which the postcards have been published is not the order in which they appear in the story.