"Can You Draw Elves?"

[endersaka]

Gorgeous! And boy did you ever do nice work on that profile.

Thanks.

Disclaimer: beware, I say all the following things, not for arguing but because I believe that artists should know what they are doing and the origin of the things that inspired them. Even if they decide to take a complete different path than the "traditional" one.

I love Tolkien. He describes his elves very well.

I love Tolkien too, though, about the physical description there is not much. By the way, Iluvatar himself says, in "The Silmarillion":

But the Quendi shall be the fairest of all earthly creatures, and they shall have and shall conceive and bring forth more beauty than all my Children; and they shall have the greater bliss in this world

Therefore, we know that they shall be "the fairest of all earthly creatures", and be more beautiful of all Iluvatar's children.

Which reminds me of the passage from Prose Edda (13th century collection of old myths, often accounted for containing the most direct description of elves):

Ljósálfar eru fegri en sól sýnum

Which means: "Light-Elves are fairer to look upon than the sun". Light-Elves because there were, of course, Dark-Elves too, and they were dark as pitch. Light-Elves used to live in Alfheimr, "Home of Elves", a land ruled by Freyr, brother of Freyja.

In general, in the old myths elves were described as human-like (and human-sized) creatures.

Volund himself is accounted as an elf, according to many researchers. He is the god of smithcraft and formidable sorcerer, which make me think of the ability in jewelry craft that Tolkien attributed to his elves and their connection with magic.

Often, kings were accounted as elves, in other sagas, or humans with elf blood.

Elves were not necessarily good. They were believed to represent a threat for humans, bringing disease or representing a sexual threat for maidens.

The gnome-sized or fairy-like with pointy ears creatures of the later folklore (particularly exalted in Victorian age and early 20th century, including the Christmas elves - which I hate with all my hearth ) are not part of the original Norse and Germanic myths. In particular in fairy tales folklore "fairy" and "elf" were often considered terms to identify the same creatures.
The pointy ears in Tolkien's elves are an addition introduced by artists (and it seems unbelievably impossible to identify the first one responsible for it) probably because of the association of elf with fairies.

About Harry Potter, as I already said, I do not like the films, so, I am personally reluctant to deepen in the franchise or the books. I personally do not like a single one of the characters or the designs of the movie and the overall story of Harry Potter is boring and childish to me. For comparison, I consider "The Sword in the Stone", "Snowwhite" or "Sleeping Beauty" and other early Disney film much more complex, interesting and adult than Harry Potter. In particular I really hate the depiction of Harry Potter's elves

I think elves and fairies have many different descriptions fiction and folklore and legends. Same with angels. Which gives us the creative freedom to express them however we wish!

Absolutely. If we speak of creativity, we can do whatever we want. It doesn't matter what. After all, even the elves of Tolkien are not the elves of the myths, while pretty close.

 

[PaintBoss]

Well, I have a great imagination so I don’t need too much prompting to get me to see things visually in my head from an author. And listen as far as I’m concerned, I want elves to be a little different than people. And there’s not much you can do to them to make them plainly different. I think the ears work. I understand the beauty aspect. I don’t need big descriptions -there’s something about them that is “other”. You can make them pretty and ethereal and powerful. You can make them ugly and magical. I don’t think anyone has any claims on what they are or are not. It’s just interesting to look back and see how it has been interpreted over centuries. Tokien had a great love for the Nordic folklore and myths and wished England had the same. So he decided he would create a fictional mythological history for England. That is why he created their language and then eventually the world. He was a linguist. He studied language so it was natural for him to start there. Being a professor, he had a deep knowledge of all the old tales.
Love Harry Potter. For myself and many adults it was very enjoyable, delightful even if it was a child’s story. It made us feel like children again, discovering something wonderful. It was magical and highly creative. I definitely found enough description there. They followed it very closely with the movies. The first book they did not allow for a lot of extra detail. It’s much smaller than following books. At the time she was unknown as they had no idea how this book would sell. Once it became a hit, she was given free reign.
I could never get into a lot of fantasy writing for adults. To me, the constructed world sounded a bit weird. But that is ok. People find what they enjoy and they can be different from us.

 

[Bongo]

I misread your Post , - I thought it read "Can you draw eyes" Fortunately I discovered my mistake before I posted my half-baked method.