'The Dead Planet' Dalek Painting

We just watched the Doctor Who Christmas special, and it seemed like a good time to talk about my first piece of fan art related to the show. I had never seen Doctor Who before I met Sam, but as a lifelong fan he got me into it pretty early in our relationship. Over the last two years, I've gotten to know most of the eleven Doctors, met some interesting monsters, and seen a lot of rock quarries decorated to look like barren planets.

I'm a big fan of geek crafting, and I really like making things for Sam, so it didn't take long before I started on my first whovian art project. The Dalek seemed like the coolest and most recognizable subject for a painting.

I did a bit of research and found out that the Daleks were first introduced in a 1963 episode named 'The Dead Planet', so that determined my concept. I chose this picture of an all black one from the Doctor Who Gear website as my model:

Painting a dead planet was pretty easy. I tried to give the red sky a colour gradient and lots of texture to make up for its plainness, neither of which really show up in the photograph (sorry). Someone pointed out later that I should have added several suns, but the planet in the episode only has one (hmm, kinda like it was filmed on Earth or something). For the Dalek itself, I mixed in some linseed oil to create a black-on-black contrast with the matte paint. It turned out pretty well, and now hangs in Sam's office.

There is a companion piece to this one, which will be a hand sewn felt TARDIS. I've been working on it for over a year now, and it's finally almost done! Look for that one soon.