8 Finish the frame

The frame is painted, and texture is added over the Norse knotworks. The last detail to paint is the Viking axe, sword and helmet. I decide to paint them as realistic objects, so they can pop up from the frame, but at the same time be a part of it. So I paint cast shadow from those items over the frame. Another connection with the frame – I have included the Viking’s helm, but the beard and hair is stylised and integrated with the knotwork. I am using small sable brushes for this part of the painting process.

In this stage I am separating foreground from the mid and background. As I described before, the character on the left is painted in colder values, and I am putting one thin wash of blue colour to the rest of the foreground, and yellow washes on the mid and background. I am painting Odin and the other characters in the mid/background in warmer colours and values. Slowly building the image is essential for this way of painting.