BakaTest Himeji Vector

Since my last real vector, over two years ago, I’ve become rather nonchalant over the whole vectoring thing. Thanks to the ubiquity of high speed internet and higher resolution anime, I haven’t seen anything worth vectoring in a while.

The original.

This all changed after I watched the BakaTest BD special where there was a nice eyecatch with Mizuki — but not only did it have a part of it covered, the art was done in a messier, more manga-esque format. I jumped at this chance to show that vectoring didn’t just have to be about redoing high res images or taking girls’ clothes off.

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Updated Version (LOL updated again):
Darkened parts of the images (mainly clothes), adjusted some shading. The second edit was just a further darkening of the clothes and her hair. Adjusted the shadows on her left sleeve a bit too.

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lol stars

Version with black outlines, as discussed with a certain Roxas, it does look quite a bit spiffier.

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lol stars

Provided is the vector with a shitty 5min background modeled after the original (I put it in to make it easier to compare side-by-side but was too lazy to do anything else), as well as a transparent background version (with a meme-tastic surprise ♥).

Not too many shapes this time.

Unless you want to hear me blabber about technicalities, you can stop reading here.

Since my artistic skills are rather lacking, I had to make use of reference images to properly draw the form of her back, luckily the pose wasn’t as rare as I thought [1]. As for refining the details of her hair, eyes, colors used, etc. I simply used screenshots from the same BD special. It was especially gratifying to see that the artists consistently drew her the same way, making it very easy to count hair bangs and visualize how everything should look, from the subtle gradient of her hair to the details of her ruffled clothes.

Overall I am extremely satisfied with this vector; there might be some lines that could be smoother but it’s probably one of my best ones — up there with that maid one I did many years ago.

Update: Added a version without the silly text, also if you don’t know where the meme comes from, it is this.

Update 2: Upon further discussion and some inspection on my part, I felt it was prudent to darken some parts of the image, especially her clothes. I also ‘missed’ some shading (that was otherwise covered). I left the old version up in case people liked the lighter colors, but I think my newest revision is superior.

[1] I found the almost exact same back twist pose in an image from a “how to draw animu” book somewhere. Very convenient.