Asuka: Dark

Asuka: Dark

Ink, Pen and Watercolor on Watercolor Paper

Artwork by Rob Schamberger

Printed on 11" x 14" 130 pound uncoated cover stock, perfect for framing!

While I was working backstage at the 2023 Royal Rumble the talk of the day was ‘Dark Asuka’. I was sitting outside of the photo studio when she walked in with her new look and my wife and I couldn’t contain our excitement. As soon as Asuka walked out after her shoot I gave her a thumbs-up and said, “New painting!”

Asuka is one of my very favorite subjects to paint, because her look inspires me to push things even further visually than I often would otherwise to spectacular results. I’ve recently been a lot more painterly and realistic with my work and I eagerly dove into this with a completely different illustrative approach.

After building up values with watercolor, I used a purple ink instead of black to get a richer shadowed area. I particularly love how it picked up the watercolor pigment under it to give slightly different values. I also used brush-tipped pens for the details on the fur of her coat as well as the lines in the hair of the mask. I finished off with a black brush-tipped pen for a few details on the mask and Asuka’s face to make them pop even more and then with a French Curve I ruled in black lines radiating from her eye through the purple shadows.

This is quite unlike anything I’ve done before and I couldn’t be more thrilled with the results!

This print is made on demand and may take up to a week to be produced before shipping.