amberdreams | Art for balder12

balder12 won one of my offerings in the fanworksauction auction for sylsdarkplace - and by the way it is not too late to donate even though the auction is now over. So balder asked for some art to accompany this rather beautiful story, and I was happy to oblige. Everyone is Trying to Get to the Bar has some wonderfully descriptive passages, with amazing imagery about Castiel's true form, and the nature of Heaven once you get outside of the human regions, and I thought I'd give one particular scene a go.

Initially I liked what I'd done, but now I'm not sure I'm happy with any of it! So I've stopped fiddling and will let you judge. And read the story, if you haven't already!

This is the main part of the picture with Dean inside of Castiel's true form.

I did two banners, both incorporating the main picture

and a darker version

Process bits:
I drew Dean first, based on a ballet photo I found on flickr. I loved the contorted pose.

Then I painted him in PaintTool Sai, added a Hubble photo of the Cat's Eye Nebula because it seemed to encapsulate Balder's description of Cas, incorporated a gyroscope for Castiel's rings, and then finally for the banners I added another Hubble photo of the Horsehead Nebula.
What I wanted to do was a William Blake-esque picture but my drawing of Dean wasn't anywhere as good as it needed to be...so now I'm thinking maybe I should do something else, as I'm not good at doing the same thing twice.