Ouryuu

Also known as the Yellow Dragon 黄龍

In East Asian culture, there's sometimes a fifth Guardian Beast of the Four Symbols. This deity is the guardian of the center and it represents the element Earth, the Chinese quintessence, as well as the changing of the seasons.

A fifth Symbol and no Suzaku, yet again. But that's for another time This was supposed to be a surprise deviation for when I finished the Four Symbols series, but no such luck. I wasn't planning on painting him in the first place. I just happened to get inspired and a practice doodle on my new tablet turned into this.

This wasn't easy for me to finish and there were again a lot of moments where I almost abandoned the entire thing -which I fortunately didn't. This time you can see my struggles! I always paint in one layer so I had a million save files of my progress lying around. I figured somebody might be interested in how it came to be: [link] The BG killed me, because of my inability to paint Chinese looking mountains and so did his claws/talons. It's not perfect, but I'm finally satisfied Oh and again apologies if he looks a bit too Western again.

Just a tidbit more about Huang Long (thanks again Wikipedia): Huang Long is a hornless dragon who once emerged from the River Luo and presented the legendary Emperor Fu Xi with the elements of writing. According to legend, when it appeared before Fu Xi, it filled a hole in the sky made by the monster Kung Kung. Its waking, sleeping and breathing determined day and night, season and weather. Huang Long doesn't appear in Japanese mythology: the fifth element in the Japanese elemental system is Void. So there cannot be an animal representing it. Because of this, Huang Long is often forgotten. However, some consider the Ouryu (Ōryū, yellow dragon) as the Japanese counterpart of Huang Long since they share some similarities.

Huang Long is awesome and deserves a lot more love. I hope I did him some justice! Also, listen to this wonderful song which inspired me to finish it [link] I love it so much!

~Vyrilien

Medium: Painter 2, PS (for the dodge tool), Wacom Tablet Intuos 2

Time taken: No idea. Loads of hours, but less than my Okami piece. Fifteen hours?

Other parts of the Series:

Byakko: [link]
Genbu: [link]
Seiryuu: [link]
Suzaku: [link]