Conan - Lake Monster_Underpainting

This is the preliminary underpainting for a watercolor painting of Conan fighting some kind of nasty, tentacled monster. (I have a thng about tentacles and one-eyed monsters, it seems, as they are recurring elements in my fantasy and sci-fi illustrations.) I scanned my original pen and ink sketch and reduced the curves to make 100% equal 15% in photoshop and then printed directly onto 120lb watercolor paper. This saves loads and loads of time because I do not have to re-draw the picture on the H2O paper before painting. The intent here is to go over this with washes of color to complete the painting. I have found that by doing this, I get much more contrast in my paintings… rather than trying to add shadows after the color. True, I think this one works well as a grayscale - and I am tempted to leave it as such - but part of me just cannot wait to see it in color! Artwork ©2010 Christopher Saghy.