This started off as a speedpaint to get back some much-needed motivation to do other art (sculpture in this case) which will help me actually get paid, but I ended up liking the way it was coming out so much I decided to finish it. It took about 4.5 hours. The background is rather crappy but I have other things to do today than fiddle with this, so there you go.

I've been doing a lot of gardening lately. A whole lot. Thinking about it, the joy I feel from gardening is probably similar to that of other nurturing activities, such as parenting. There's something here, something beautiful, and it wouldn't be there if it wasn't for me. It requires my care to stay healthy. So I got this mental image of the treecelot, gently licking a seedling as a cat might lick it's kittens, urging it to grow and be healthy.

I'm pretty pleased with how this came out. I am not really too great at foreshortening, but I think I did okay here. I don't think the wings look like they are coming out of the neck (at least I hope not!) and the green glowing bits seem suitably glowy to me.

Critique welcome, as even though my focus is on sculpture and not digital art anymore, I still would like to improve. About the only thing I would change is to make the figure a bit more shadowy to look less out of place in the forest, but I tried to highlight the ground as though she's sitting in a patch of dappled sun.