Illustration for Creative Crypto magazine's "Forever Rose" article

I was commissioned an editorial illustration by Creative Crypto Magazine which will be out Spring this year.
The article I painted the illustration was on Forever Rose, a crypto-artwork by conceptual artist Kevin Abosch. He was partnered by a virtual gifting platform based in China called Gifto. The painting was introduced on Valentines day 2018.

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And here it is!
My personal interpretation on this world's most expensive rose, priced at 1 million USD.
I wanted the rose to stand out the most from the composition. So I sketched out few ideas during the brainstorm phase. List of my ideas included:

• A group of people hiking in the snowy mountain reaching for the Rose that sits on top of the mountain.
  Why are those people hiking? To get the one and only rose! But I ended up not doing this idea because the image was not straightforward for the article.

• A rose inside a glass dome... like Beauty and the Beast. It's pretty, but nah. Too Disney.

This is the initial sketch which I just let out my idea roughly on artboard.
The painting is framed in elaborate hardwood frame juxtaposed in the center surrounded by luxury goods.

I cleaned the sketch by drawing it again on a new layer and re-arranged the elements for visual balance.

local color layer.
I usually work in one layer first then use more layers for shade, highlights and tiny little details.

Shade layer added.....

And it's the final illustration.

I can't wait to see my illustration on @creativecrypto's article! ^_^
Please check out @creativecrypto and follow them for more updates :)

Thank you so much for reading :)
I hope you all have wonderful Wednesday.