The Elephant Graveyard (Disney’s “The Lion King” (1994)) – 30th Anniversary
Digital drawing, 1700 x 1080 We're back to Disney fan art! However, this is not one of the Disney fan art pieces painted in watercolor, so we're going to be taking it in a different approach, just for a special occasion. This month is the 30th annive…
We're back to Disney fan art! However, this is not one of the Disney fan art pieces painted in watercolor, so we're going to be taking it in a different approach, just for a special occasion. This month is the 30th anniversary celebration of the theatrical release of Disney's animated film, The Lion King (1994). In honoring the film's 30th anniversary celebration this year, I thought I would share a full fan artwork to illustrate one of the iconic scenes in today's topic.
This drawing was done as a special request, so I would like to give a special shout out to my good friend, Sez, who asked me to work on this drawing for her. So, shout out to Sez! 😁 You guys should check out her YouTube channel, and in her channel, she talks about her life as an autistic individual, autism advocacy, and autism education, and also, she has a podcast called Social Wave Project. Not only that, Sez is also an historian on Titanic, and her second YouTube channel she runs is called History Inside A Nutshell, so if you are a Titanic fanatic, like her, go check out her History Inside A Nutshell channel in the link at the end of this post.
The Lion King is the thirty-second Disney animated film, released by Walt Disney Pictures on June 24, 1994, and it became the highest-grossing film of all time in the year, as well as the highest-grossing animated film. The story is about Simba, a young lion cub, who is excited to become king, while learning the lessons from his father, Mufasa. Unfortunately, Mufasa's brother and Simba's uncle, Scar is jealous and wanted to be the ruler of the Pride Lands in Africa, so along with the hyenas, he murders his brother, and frames Simba for the death of his father. As Simba grows up, with the help of his friends Nala, Timon the meerkat, and Pumba the warthog, he has to overcome his fears to stop Scar, and returning to take the throne that he is meant to be. It's directed by Roger Allers and Rob Minkoff, inspired by William Shakespeare's Hamlet, with songs by popstar Elton John and Tim Rice (who worked on the songs for Aladdin (1992) and music composed by Hans Zimmer, and features the voice cast of top actors, such as Matthew Broadrick (Simba), Jonathan Taylor Thomas (Young Simba), James Earl Jones (Mufasa), Jeremy Irons (Scar), Moria Kelly (Nala), Nathan Lane (Timon), and Ernie Sabella (Pumbaa).
It's one of my favorite Disney animated movies, I grew up watching it on the VHS copy, and I remember we used to own the soundtrack, when I was little, and we would listen to it in my mom's car all the time. The animation is so incredible, even seeing the realistic animation and designs for the animals is so good, the artistry is absolutely amazing, awesome characters with best voice cast, music by Hans Zimmer is breathtaking, gives you goosebumps, especially with the "Circle of Life" song, which I always get goosebumps every time, and the songs are iconic.
I also find this movie a very special meaning, because I was born in the same year, when The Lion King came out to the movie theaters, but I came about nearly six months later. It's very special for my mom too, because she went to see it with my aunt and her kids, my cousins, while she was pregnant with me, so that's very meaningful to her. It's definitely hard to believe that I'll be the same age as The Lion King! 😆 Going on thirty by November! Now that's the Circle of Life!
The 30th anniversary fan artwork of The Lion King was worked on Autodesk SketchBook in digital drawing at 1700 x 1080. The drawing illustrates a scary sequence of the Elephant Graveyard, where Simba and Nala wanted to explore there to get away from Zazu the bird, in spite that Mufasa told his son not to go there, but Simba wanted to be brave just like his dad. Then suddenly, with a warning, the cubs and Zazu encountered with the three hyenas Shenzi, Banzai, and Ed. Throughout the dangers both Simba and Nala were facing with the hyenas, during the chase, they get rescued by Mufasa.
Believe it or not, this is actually my very first Lion King fan art drawing I ever did, so it was a pretty cool to work on that experience as an artist, and even in time to celebrate the film's 30th anniversary this year. It was my first time drawing the characters, like Simba, Nala, Zazu, and the hyenas, and working on the background of the Elephant Graveyard, thanks to a good amount of research to find the right images of the screenshots on Google, in order to learn how to draw the background layout and the characters. When it comes to do a fun Disney fan art, I usually do easy watercolor drawings, but because we're celebrating the film's anniversary of the theatrical release and I was requested by one of my friends to work on it, I thought it would be easy just to do it as a digital drawing piece.
It takes work, but overall, you still wanted to put heart and soul into it, especially if it's one of your favorite animated movies, so of course, it's important to pay a tribute to it, in honoring of the film's 30th anniversary. So, I hope you all will enjoy the ride of learning the process of working this project.
🦁 The Elephant Graveyard Background Layout 🦁
Digital drawing (rough pencil), 1700 x 1080
The first part of the process of working The Lion King 30th anniversary fan art was starting off with the rough background layout of the Elephant Graveyard. With the help of the right screenshot images I found on Google, I was able to do a rough sketch of the Elephant Graveyard layout in pencil on Autodesk SketchBook.
Once the sketch was finished, I would save a copy version of it, so that way, I can save it to paint it later on as a separate copy.
🦁 Characters Rough Drawing 🦁
Next up was drawing the characters in rough pencil sketches. Each character was drawn in separate layers, which are one of the tools you can use on Autodesk SketchBook. As already mentioned, this was my first-time drawing Simba, Nala, Zazu, and the hyenas Shenzi, Banzai, and Ed.
I begin drawing the cubs and Zazu first, and then drawing the hyenas, starting with Banzai, then Shenzi, and finally, Ed, who can be seen on top of the elephant tusk bone.
Whenever I was finished with drawing the characters, I can combine the background layout, which that's also drawn on a separate layer, so I can check and see, if this drawing looks great or not, or if I have to move the characters in different spots or angles. I had to tone down the opacity of the background layout, so that way you can see the rough drawings of the characters.
The drawing was approved, the background layout looks great, and the characters were in the right place. So now, the next part was getting the characters in clean-up form!
🦁 Characters Clean-Up Drawing 🦁
So here, it's the clean-up drawing of the characters for the Elephant Graveyard fan art drawing. Instead of just tracing the lines in black, I thought I go with the Disney tradition route: using different colors to trace the lines of the characters, which that's the art tradition in Disney animation, during the ink and paint process. They would take a cel, tracing the lines in different colors, until it dries, and they turn the cel around and paint the characters in color on the back.
During the clean-up drawing process, before starting tracing, I created myself a color chart for each character to color. I would take a color scheme, one each, darken it up, and trace the pencil outlines of the characters.
After the cleaning up the lines, I would take a pencil tool in blue, and draw the shadows on the characters.
🦁 The Elephant Graveyard Background Painting 🦁
Digital painting, 1700 x 1080
Then, we move on to the background painting job! 🎨
Like I just mentioned in the background layout section, I saved a separate copy of the rough layout, so I can paint it, and then save it as a JPEG copy, and put it into the main drawing later on. Using the Google research to learn how to paint the Elephant Graveyard, including images for reference, it became helpful for me to paint the background with the exact colors. In the film, the colors of the Elephant Graveyard were all in warm and cool combination of pinks, purples, blues, and grays.
This background painting actually didn't take me too long to work from start to finish. I started on a Thursday morning and continued working on it during the afternoon, and then, I went back to finish it on Monday.
🦁 Characters Coloring Process 🦁
With the background all finished, it was time to get the characters in color.
I kept the color keys to paint the characters in their exact colors, as how they were designed for the movie. I went on to paint the hyenas in color first, before I can color Simba, Nala, and Zazu, so that way, the hyenas for each can be painted and finished at the same time, since the three share the same color schemes. After the hyenas, I painted Zazu, and finishing up were both Simba and Nala.
Whenever the characters were finished being colored, I can now combine the drawing with the fully finished background painting. The last step was adding the fog, thanks to the spray paint tool in light gray to create the creepy effect.
After getting this drawing finished, I messaged it to Sez to wait for her critique. Funny enough, I realized that I made a mistake: it was forgetting to add the fog. So, I went back to paint the fog, and resent it to Sez. I got her reply, and she loved it.
It was finished on June 4th, 2024.
And that is the fan art of the Elephant Graveyard scene from Disney's The Lion King, and I hope you all enjoyed it. With that, I would like to pay a tribute to one of my favorite Disney animated film classics, in honoring the 30th anniversary of its release back in the day in this special topic at The Autistic Animator's Desk.
Next up, coming on June 27th, I will be sharing a film review on a second documentary, in honoring of Helen Keller's birthday, and it's the PBS documentary from its program, American Masters, called Becoming Helen Keller (2021).
Happy 30th Anniversary to The Lion King! 🦁 Hakuna Matata!
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