Happy Fan Art Friday, everyone! 🎨
I hope you all readers out there are very excited for another fun fan art coming right up on today’s second topic for this week, as I am, only because we’ve got an all-new Disney watercolor fan art drawing! Four days ago, I posted a fan art drawing and wrote a review on the movie Children of a Lesser God (1986), and if you didn’t get to see the drawing and review, you can find it and it’s available to read here on The Autistic Animator’s Desk. So today, I’ll be sharing a full watercolor drawing of Tinker Bell the fairy from Walt Disney’s 14th animated classic, Peter Pan (1953).
This topic on the drawing will be a special tribute to the film, in honoring for the 70th anniversary of the film’s theatrical release in year 1953, and it became one of the most successful Disney movies of all time, based on the classic novel and stage play by J.M. Barrie.
I grew up watching and absolutely loving this movie so much, from watching on the VHS. One of the best things about collecting Disney VHS tapes, if you were born in the 1990s’, like me, was watching the Making-Of featurettes after the movie is done, where you get to see the interviews of the Disney artists, such as the Nine Old Men, the legendary Disney animators, voice actors, the concept art, and animation pencil tests. I have always love watching the Making-Of Disney movie documentaries, and if you want to study animation and art, you have to watch a Disney movie documentary, in order to understand the concept of making an animated movie. I think Peter Pan was the second Disney movie that I’ve got to watch the behind-the-scenes featurette after the movie from the VHS, done in the late-1990s’. Sleeping Beauty (1959) was probably the first Disney movie that introduced me the behind the scenes, introducing me to Walt Disney, the Nine Old Men, and even Eyvind Earle, who worked as the production designer and background artist for the film. Earle also worked on Peter Pan as one of the background artists, including Lady and the Tramp (1955). And of course, you’ll see Mary Blair’s concept art, and you’ll see her style in Alice in Wonderland (1951).
Later on, I got the DVD copy of Peter Pan, when I was a teenager, and got to watch many bonus features, and that includes the same Making-Of featurette. I absolutely loved the animation, the characters are iconic, I love the story on flying off to a magical island where you can never grow up, it’s about holding on to the spirit of your childhood and believing in magic. It has that perfect Disney touch! I remember just believing that Peter Pan and Never Land is real and imagining flying by sprinkle myself with Tinker Bell’s fairy dust with glitter. Walt Disney had always loved Peter Pan since he was a boy, he got to see the full stage play, and he even got the chance to play Peter Pan at his school play. He always wanted to make it as an animated film, the second film right after Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), but that became Pinocchio (1940). However, the production of Peter Pan, along with Alice in Wonderland, got delayed, because of World War II, and the studio was focus on making of short films on the war and package films. It took both Alice in Wonderland and Peter Pan nearly twenty years to make, until the 1950s’, when the studio was coming back to make a full-length movie with Cinderella (1950).
My favorite character is Tinker Bell. I had always loved Tinker Bell ever since I was a young little kid, I had always been a Tinker Bell fan, thanks to Disney’s Peter Pan, and she became one of my favorite Disney characters. Created by J.M. Barrie, in the stage play, Tink can be seen as a little light shining around the stage with the sound of little bells. In the Disney film, she was animated by Marc Davis, and Margaret Kerry was the reference model for the character. I think she was probably the first Disney character I got to learn how to draw. Yes, I used to collect many Tinker Bell merchandises, such as the school backpack, lunch box, pillows, shirts, posters, etc. I have seen the Tinker Bell (2008) movie, and I got to meet her at Walt Disney World, when I was eighteen, just before graduating high school.
This watercolor drawing is basically my return on drawing the beloved pixie, illustrated an iconic scene directly from the movie, where Tink flies around to find Peter’s shadow, and suddenly, spots a mirror, and decided to check her poses. Marc Davis did such an incredible job on animating Tink, especially on her emotions. I’ve always loved Marc Davis’s work! He’s known for animating leading female Disney characters, such as Cinderella, Alice, Tinker Bell, Princess Aurora, Maleficent, and Cruella De Vil. He also worked as an Imagineer for the Disneyland Parks.
Not only this watercolor drawing will make a wonderful tribute to the Disney classic, I would also like to make a tribute to Tinker Bell, since she has been part of my childhood, and I hope you all will enjoy learning my time working on this project.
✨ Tinker Bell on Mirror Drawing 1 (Sketching and Cleaning Up Process) ✨
I haven’t been drawing Tinker Bell for so long, and so, this artwork became like my comeback to do another new Tinker Bell drawing, and I was happy to come back and draw her again, in order to do a special Disney fan art tribute to honor Peter Pan’s 70th anniversary of its theatrical release.
I began working on the first Tinker Bell watercolor drawing on one Saturday afternoon. I was sitting on top of my bed in my room, gathering up my mixed media drawing pad, pencil, eraser, and sharpie pens I’ll be needing, and the iPad to do Google research. It was not learning to draw Tink, she’s simple to draw, so there was no need to find a picture of her, but it was only for drawing the background layout and little bit for Tink’s pose.
I started with using a pencil to lightly sketch the full drawing, and when that was done, I would take four long straps of tape, and tape around the page to create like a frame-like border. Then later on, I can clean up the light pencil lines by tracing with the black sharpie ink pen. Light green outlines were for Tink’s dress, shoes, and ribbon tied up on the bun, and red for her lips.
✨ Tinker Bell on Mirror Drawing (Painting Tink in Color) ✨
With all of the pencil outlines erased, it was time to get the drawing in full color. The first thing to do was getting Tink in color, thanks to the magic of the watercolor pencil sets. The coloring process begin on a Thursday afternoon. I colored Tinker Bell in her iconic color studies, as she was designed for the Disney film, and then, I can color the gold light glowing around her. When the coloring with the pencils was done, I can go ahead and paint the colors on the Tinker Bell drawing into a full watercolor medium paint.
Little note here that this is the first watercolor drawing to be painted with a new set of paint brushes 🖌
✨ Tinker Bell on Mirror Drawing 3 (Paint Half-and-Half on Background) ✨
At the same day, just right after I had painted Tinker Bell in color, it was a good time for me to get started on painting the first half of the background, setting in the Darling family’s nursery. The first half begins the top part, such as the darken wall, table, and the silver brush. The mirror was saved as the final half of painting the background for next time.
I only begin coloring and painting the color studies with the watercolor pencils, just like I approach for coloring Tink, and later on, I can go back and add shadows to make it look detailed, as how you would see it in the movie, which I would use a screenshot image on Google for reference. I started with the wall mixing with colors in purple, red, and black; next up was the table and the cloth; and the comb on the left.
The next day, I came back to finish off painting the first half of the background by adding shadows. I also used a dab of black acrylic paint and wet it down to create a watercolor medium paint to darken the wall, and then, I would save the acrylic paint to paint shadows on the mirror later on. I still have the black watercolor pencil, but it’s so tiny, after sharpening it so many times. However, I’ll use it for any easiest spots I can darken the shadows, with an example like the comb and the tablecloth.
✨ Tinker Bell on Mirror Drawing 4 (Finishing the Background and Sparkles) ✨
At last, we move on to the final section of this topic is finishing off the background and adding Tink’s magical sparkles for final touches. The last thing to paint for the background was, of course, the mirror. One of Tinker Bell’s iconic moment!
I actually begun coloring the mirror, just as I was getting the shadows colored and painted for the first half of the background, that way I can catch it up finishing the drawing with no stress. The pencils I used to color the mirror were gray with bit of gold (to create light touch effect from Tink’s light) and purple on the right side. Purple was also for coloring the glass, along with gray.
After I painted the mirror, even finishing the first half of the background, I can go ahead and paint the shadows with wet black acrylic paint. The shading for the glass was done with the black watercolor pencil. When shading was complete, I can add bits of shine on the mirror with white acrylic paint, and then, use it again to paint sparkles around Tinker Bell.
And you finally got the picture all finished! It was completed on Friday afternoon, on February 24th, 2023. The illustration has come to life! 🤩
I hope you all have enjoyed reading and learning the process of working this fun Tinker Bell watercolor fan art on today’s topic, and I think this adds to a very magical tribute to Disney’s Peter Pan, since it will forever hold a special memory in my childhood. And I hope it does for you too!
I personally would like to dedicate this topic to my Grandpa Pflugh. He passed away two weeks ago at the age of 83, and he’s finally reunited with his wife, my grandmother, who passed away two years ago in December 2020. It’s funny, as I’ve wrote at the beginning, I’ve been a fan of watching making-of Disney movies, and whenever I’ll see Marc Davis’s interviews, he always reminds me of my grandpa. It always sticks to me since I was little. With that, I’ll dedicate this topic to both my grandfather and Marc Davis. And one more – to Disney Legend Burny Mattinson, who recently passed away on February 27th, 2023, at the age of 87. This year would have been 70 years from working at the Walt Disney Company.
Who are your favorite characters in Disney’s Peter Pan, and why? What is your favorite scene? Your favorite song from the film? And what are your favorite Tinker Bell moments, and why? Please share your thoughts in the comment box at the end of this topic! If you would also like to see another fairy fan art I did before this, which is a watercolor fan art of Crysta from the animated film, Ferngully: The Last Rainforest (1992), you can find it in the link below.
You can watch Peter Pan on Disney+. Off to Never Land! ✨✨✨✨
Link:
The Autistic Animator's Desk 
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