Design for Beginners – ‘Dragon Scales
Kathleen Kay
Some of you will be familiar with the tiny dragon in the corner of the Welsh postage stamp. The one in my reference book is just about a quarter of an inch square.
To avoid infringing copyright, the design should only be used as a source of inspiration, rather than for line-by-line reproduction, so here I shall show you a way to elongate the whole design, giving scope for many subtle changes. I have enlarged the minute original dragon, so that, we can see what we are doing, and, over it, I have drawn a grid of exact squares, say ½" x ½".
Next, we draw, in ink, a matching grid, but using rectangles say ½" deep x 1" across. The shape is now twice as wide. Referring to the original drawing, plot the lines of the dragon onto your rectangular grid, using a soft pencil.
Connect your lines with emphasis on the elongation. Keep a rubber to hand, so that the soft pencil marks can be modified as you develop your design.