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Painting by Numbers

"Final Fling"

This one I would regard as one of the best of these Star Wars paintings I've done. That is probably because I managed to put in more effort to resolve it's problems and finished it to a higher degree than most. It doesn't have as much of the 'sketchy' quality that most of the others do, basically because they are more like sketches and quickly done. The painting is obviously of part of the final fight between Anakin and Obi-Wan from Episode III.

1. Is the start of the painting. A small shot of Anakin laying on his back on top of a table. 

1a. Is another photo I had which provided me with some of the details for some of the elements. This photo is the one that made me put Anakin's saber in Obi-Wan's hands. The highlighted inset in that photo shows that the saber on the table is Obi-Wan's - which means Obi-Wan has Anakin's. So if you've noticed the saber in Obi-Wan's hands and wondered why, it all came from this photo. I don't think this saber switch made it into the film in the end. 

1b. Is one of the other images used to get details of the room for the painting. There were several images like this that came from a site called http://massassi.yavin4.com. Those computer generated fan images were a great help. 

2. Are some of the sketches of the picture. You can see three sketches of variations of Obi-Wan's pose - different leg positions and side-on. You can also see the basic composition in the small black and white bordered drawing - roughly center - with a different background. The more side-on pose of Obi-Wan with the bent right leg made his momentum appear to be going away from Anakin, so the more form behind pose was used. That pose is far more direct and strong and leaves you in no doubt who is the better swordsman. The side-on pose had more movement but looked a bit like a lucky strike rather than a skilled win to me. On this page there is a scaled full-colour composition study. This is what I mean when this painting had more effort put into it than most. With these Star Wars paintings that is something that I almost never did - I'm lazy. The pose of the figures was finalized by the time I did that - by the pencil sketch below it.

3. Is the final painting. You can see the figures follow closely the pencil sketch. The composition is simple, with the sloping walls of the corner of the room leading your gaze directly to Anakin's face. This also give the feeling of immense weight or pressure on Anakin. The weight of his worries, his fears? I noticed at the time that Anakin's face reminded me of a Goya style painting. That wasn't intentional, but it feels similarly expressive. Anakin's gloved hand is stiff and almost twisted too far to emphasize it's mechanical nature. Did this lost part of himself contribute to him losing the fight? Or was it something else he lost?

4. Is a photo of the scene I found long after doing the painting. If I remember rightly these shots were cut from the movie.

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