Dragon Hills

Dragon Hills is one of my older illustrations, with a classic fantasy theme inspired by fantasy maps and fairy tales. It’s available on Society6 as art prints, wall tapestries, jigsaw puzzles and some other print products. Society6 is based in the United States and international shipping is available. Here’s link to the store!

This illustration originated from a black and white ink sketch I made in 2017. It was one of the sunny days at our family’s cabin at the island, I was sitting on the tiny beach in front of the cabin and drawing in of my little square sketchbooks.

At the time I had worked as a book illustrator for some years and had created all kinds of imaginary maps in fantasy books as a part of my job. I always loved the nostalgic vibe and charming details in fantasy maps, so I think Dragon Hills was a celebration of that theme.

I really liked the sketch so I made a full colour version of it in Photoshop. I use my own handpainted watercolour or ink elements together with the digital tools whenever I want to give my digitally coloured pieces some of that gritty, earthy texture that you get with traditional paintings. Digital editing allows fixing a few details here and there and making slightly different versions of the image to suit different print products.But for the most part I like to leave the line art as it is. The soul of the drawing sometimes gets lost if you polish it too much.

I often decide to use small scale drawings as a base for my illustrations. I really enjoy the sketchy look, the tiny imperfections and the fact that when you look at the detail you can tell the artwork was made by hand. Sometimes people are curious how can you make a larger print of a small drawing: There’s no problem as long as the digital image file that you create is large enough. This requires using a scanner that allows scanning your drawing with very high resolution (around 1600 dpi).

Dragon Hills is available for purchase as various print products over at the Society6 store. Over the years I have ordered some of the items for myself for test use and to take my own promo photos – which you can check out below! Direct links to the item in question can be found below each photo.

These photos are just a few examples of all the available items, though! You can also get Dragon Hills as jigsaw puzzles, desk mats, tote bags, throw pillows, and framed prints. Click here to browse them all.

Dragon Hills wall tapestry: shop link
This featured tapestry size is 68″ x 80″ (inches).

Dragon Hills art print: shop link
This is X-small art print (larger size prints are available as well).

Dragon Hills notebook: shop link
These photos are front and back view of the same notebook.

Dragon Hills carry-all pouch: shop link
The photo here features size Medium pouch.


Images & artwork © Ulla Thynell.