12 Months of Dogs Of War - October (Veronica) 02

To begin with, Veronica was named 'Sharon', but was later changed when I felt I had too many characters with names starting with 'S' (In addition to 'Stylene' and 'Sledge', I also had 'Scott' and 'Scope' - a couple of discontinued characters). I had also played around with the idea of her surname being 'Black' but given her appearance it felt too literal. Unlike most of the other characters, I didn't really have a  dog breed in mind when I designed Veronica. Maybe a kelpie, but to be honest it's up in the air.

For this picture I've used my new Cintiq drawing tablet. A Cintiq is something I've wanted to get my hands on for a while. Most of the drawings I've done have been created with a mouse. Not ideal, but it got the job done. I do have a regular Wacom tablet, but the reason I don't use it much is that I do my creative work on my laptop - my work space is nomadic and having more devices plugged in makes it more awkward when I'm moving things around (not that having the Cintiq solves this issue). I like the Cintiqs as you're drawing directly onto the screen - it's more tactile and I can create drawings more quickly. With a Wacom, the angle you have the tablet set up can be critical. I find there can be a slight mental disconnect between the angle you might think you're drawing and what appears on the work space. Still a bit of a teething process with the Cintiq, mind you. The line work may be faster and looser, but has ended up more 'sketchy' than I'd like. The other issue is that the screen on the Cintiq isn't as bright as on my computer monitor so when it came to colouring, spotting the gaps wasn't as easy. Though colouring such a dark character may not have helped.