Lucario's Aura Training

In partnership with DDJ Cards store there will be several TCG (Trading Card Game) gamemats with my designs sold exclusively at the shop.
Above you can see the full version of the background image used for the 1st singleplayer mat.
The gamemats will also feature intricate designs of its own.

For more details about the DDJ Cards shop go to this Facebook page:
[link]

A bit about the picture.

Background story:
While honing his aura powers in his many training sessions he found new untapped power within himself.
This enables him to ascend to all new power levels he previously thought was impossible to attain.

Other tidbits:
At first I used the SSBB Lucario render, but then I switched to the official Pokemon main RPG series artwork for reference.
Originally I only had a small window of time to finish it and I got a bit stuck on how to begin.
To get a push in the right direction, I traced some base lines of the SSBB Lucario render to get a feeling on how to draw his face.
Later on I removed these lines and drew new lines of my own.
All the other lines of Lucario are not traced and drawn with a reference in view.

Considering I am usually not at my best at drawing animals, the lineart for Lucario I am relatively positive about.
His hindlegs were the biggest hurdle when I drew Lucario.
I never knew his legs is very similair to the legs of a hyena.
Very cool and very tricky to draw (at least for me).

All the other background and effects elements were made by me.
Which includes the logo for DDJ Cards store as well.

The picture was made with Photoshop CS 5 and drawn with a Wacom Intuos 4 S tablet.

What first was meant as a quick yet proper avatar image gradually grew to a fully fledged scene about Lucario's training with his aura.
The painting took about a month to make with some several artist blockages in between.
While making the image I discovered several new techniques and tricks to get some very interesting effects.
In that regard this picture has several milestones for me, which I am really happy about it.
As for the end result I am far less happy, because it didn't fully looked like I had in my head.

Lucario (c) Nintendo