This year, I chose Sir Gawain and the Green Knight to carry my best wishes for the new year around the world. The original idea for the card showed up months ago in one of my notebooks…

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight ballpoint pen sketch
Gawain and the Green Knight: original sketch (ballpoint pen)

I hoped that because the concept was already established, this would be really quick! But it wasn’t :). Instead of retracing the sketch, as I had planned to do, I redrew the image. I added holly to the Green Knight’s hair, simplified Gawain’s cloak and added his pentangle emblem to it.

As you can see, I also toyed with two Latin mottos, but left them out in the end.

This is, once more, inked with a ballpoint pen, a tool that I find myself enjoying more and more. It is pretty much my preferred drawing tool these days.

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight Christmas card design
Gawain and the Green Knight: tight inks (ballpoint pen)

The next stage was trickier: I wanted to colour my image with watercolours. I am not very good with colours, and though I adore watercolour paint, I rarely get good results with them. It’s a one-sided love affair, I’m afraid…

Fortunately, this time I was cautious and decided to do a colour test before painting my definitive image. This is the test, done in a Moleskine watercolour notebook. I really loved these colours (Gawain isn’t as yellow in reality – my scanner didn’t pick up the real colour), and for once made notes of them.

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight watercolour test
Gawain and the Green Knight: watercolour test

Of course, once I started the actual painting, the colours didn’t look the same XD. I guess I didn’t dare to go all-out because I was heedful of my lines…

Usually, I ink and then paint in. This time I tried to be more painterly and did my lines with pencils only. (Yes, that counts as painterly for me! Don’t say it.)

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight watercolour card
Gawain and the Green Knight: watercolour version

Lastly, I added a texture in Photoshop. I think I probably use them too often, but I love the parchment and old paper textures they get me. After all, I’m drawing medieval characters…

So this is the finished card. I like to think of these as little gifts to people who care about the comic, so every year I ask who wants one on my tumblr, my Twitter or Instagram accounts, and I send them anywhere in the world.

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight Christmas card
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight