Picture content:

A Dragon

Treasure; gold coins, a throne, jewels.

Weapons and armour

People x2

A cave

A torchlight (fire)

Lit-up room from the fire

A stoney floor

Cave opening (doorway)

The image here by Mark Oliver, is of a dragon in a cave surrounded by treasure, armour and weapons, in the room with him are two characters. I am unclear about the gender of the lead character.I believe it may possibly be female due to the long hair, but the scene makes me initially assume that it is a male character. This could be simply due to the quality and size of the print as it is difficult to see. However, I do not feel that the gender of this character would explain nor take away anything from this narrative.

The scene seems to be about two characters that have either found or have intentionally been looking for a Dragon, in a cave that is guarding a pile of treasure. There are weapons and suits of armour in the cave in piles, which could suggest that they are there from the failed attempts of men that have come to take the treasure from the Dragon. In the scene, the Dragon is asleep and there is one character in the lead with a torch, that is pointing towards the Dragon and a second character that looks like he is hiding behind the first character and is pointing back in the other direction away from the Dragon, suggesting that they should go back and not wake the Dragon.

This image uses both a hot and cold pallete, the hot areas are used for the main subjects, i.e. the dragon and the fire which is lighting up the cave in hot tones. It is also used on the faces and hair of the characters which makes them stand out. Although the second character is cooler than the first, leading him to recede slightly. The core colours are used mainly for the actual cave e.g. the walls and the floor. A lot of texture is used in this image, particularly on the floor, which helps identify the scene as a cave and also on the cave walls. This is more subtle in the cool areas of the cave and quite dominant in the area of the cave that is lit by the torchlight. This makes this area stand out as a focal point. There is a lot of detail used on the Dragon himself and the most detail is in the foreground of the image with the background being slightly out of focus. There is a definite contrast and a stronger contrast with the hot elements that helps bring them into focus and pushes the cool colours that use less contrast into the background.

I believe there is significance in the colours used for the story. The hot colours bringing certain parts of the story into focus as a main element. In contrast the cool colours are used to push those areas back with less focus on them. The Dragon being a hot colour could imply the significance of Dragon’s breathing fire and the characters having a fire torch with them ties those two elements and ideas together. The torchlight is creating a warmer, brighter glow on the Dragon, whereas in the shaded parts of the Dragon, his colours are cooler.

The most significant part of this image that the artist seems to want you to focus on are all in warm colours, including the faces and hands of the two characters. The other elements in the image are cooler, which takes the focus off of them. There are a couple of the other elements standing out that are warm to medium tones in the throne that the Dragon is guarding and also the green of the character’s outfit. Perhaps this implies that that throne belongs to this character as the two are matching in colour and both highlighted in this bright green.

I believe that the Dragon is a significant part of this image. However, I think that perhaps the character in the bright green and the throne on the right that is in a matching green is the leading element to this story, as they are paired and different in colour to all of the other elements in the image. The Dragon and the fire, I believe, are secondary elements, with the armour and the second character being the third elements. This is because as although these do stand out amongst the background, they are both slightly duller and therefore do not appear to be leading element. I think that the coolest colours being the surrounding caves, sets the scene, but is the least dominant element.

I like the way the bright colours have been used to focus the viewer on certain elements within the image. I think that this image is successful in creating a story and leading the viewer through a journey, very well in just this one image. It gives a lot of information and I found I could easily create a big section of narrative around just this one image. The textured areas in this image seem to not necessarily be the most important areas and therefore the areas are not as in focus and the smooth, clean cut textures, used on the Dragon specifically help him to stand out as the main focus point. My eye on this image tends to lead from right to left, focusing first on the large Dragon and his treasure, that is bright and taking up the main portion of the image. My eye, then works its way across to the left up to the ceiling with the fire and down to the lead character. This then leads me to notice the armour either side and finally the second character. When I first looked at the image I did notice the green throne, but I did not instantly put any value on this. It made me wonder what significance it had, but it took me a while to see what the possible connection between the character and the throne could be. This created interest as the story unfolded gradually.