雨降る夜(translates to rainy night) by 永地(eichi)

A masterclass in value and the language of the brush

Eichi is yet another amazing artist that I discovered on Pixiv, and that I will be working with directly from time to time. I’ve linked to both his Pixiv and the art piece in the caption under the image and here you can find his Twitter. I do wish to note, that although I am a huge fan of his style, he does a fair amount of NSFW so if you do visit his pages, please keep this in mind and swim at your own risk.

Jumping in, one of the things that really made me fall in love with Eichi’s style, is his very distinct and elegant brush technique. If you even simply glance at the upper right of the piece or the lower portion of Whisperain’s clothing you’ll quickly spot his strokes. While in some pieces the strokes used being visible can somewhat detract from the composition, here I’d say it very clearly is used to enhance the work. The strokes used throughout this picture, work to create the dreamy effect of fog and showcase an interpretation of how light plays with it. It almost looks as if the umbrella is a part of the foggy environment rather than the object that reflects the atmosphere of the piece. Something that I absolutely adore about this artwork is that each of the elements work to sort of juxtapose a surreal element with a more realistic element. When you look at the character’s face you see the most details and a more realistic feel, and then when we look at say the area behind her it looks almost like a dream.

I’d be remiss not to mention the excellent use of value in the work. To the left and behind Whisperain, we can plainly see little splotches of color with a gradient that ranges from white and light gray to darker gray and black. While in some ways this may seem relatively simple, the execution of this approach is done exceptionally well. It really captures the dreaminess of fog, without losing the shape and form of some of the objects obscured by it. If we look to the top left corner, we can just begin to infer some buildings or the presence of some geometric shapes off in the distance, which again pulls us out of the dream and anchors us to a real setting.

Something else I wanna point out in this work, is some of the common elements you’ll see from Eichi that I think make his work really stand out, especially among users of a more anime-eque stylized technique. One thing he does really well to my eye, is giving volume and detail to the hair of his characters. His brush strokes build the shape of the hair and accentuate Whisperain’s beautiful curls, while Eichi’s masterful use of contrast and in particular the use of highlights really makes the hair shine (quite literally). The details he places in the eyes and lips of his characters should be noted as well, but one area where he really excels, shown more so in his other works, is in giving skin a very detailed look. The skin of a character and the blending of various colors can be the difference between a more flat manga look, and an exquisite, high-detail, 3d looking character. Of course I love manga and it’s style, so no shade being thrown there, but it has a very different function and feel than this sort of art.

Finally, the most important part of this art, is rightfully so, the cat. Okay, not actually, but he certainly gets extra points for adding one. I would argue however, that the story of Whisperain sheltering a cat from the rain helps to develop her character and build the lore of this piece in a meaningful way. As this piece is called “Rainy Night” which I believe is a fair translation, the cat further supports the theme of a mysterious girl taking a late night stroll on a rainy and foggy evening. Surely I could find more to say about perhaps the clothing or some other auxiliary details, but this time, I think I’ll allow the piece to tell its own story.