Master Haigui - A Sea Turtle Painting Creation Process
- Jun 7
- 2 min read
Updated: Jun 25
What comes to mind when you think of sea turtles? Their slow and steady pace? Digging holes on a beach to lay eggs? As shown in this painting, what I picture is a sea turtle munching on jellyfish. Maybe because I’m a foodie, and I always imagine animals while they’re eating lol.
Inspiration - Sea Turtles Eat Jellyfish?
I can’t remember exactly when I saw it. Probably in a documentary I watched as a kid, or maybe later on YouTube. But I definitely remember seeing a sea turtle eating a jellyfish. I also recall the narrator saying that while jellyfish can sting humans, their stingers don’t really affect a turtle’s mouth. So in my Night Market Under The Sea, the sea turtle had to be the one selling jellyfish dishes.
But what kind of food can you even make with jellyfish? In Chinese cuisine, the only thing that comes to my mind is cold jellyfish salad. And since it’s a cold dish anyway, I figured I’d throw in some cold seaweed salad too. After all, sea turtles also eat seaweed.
As for this turtle’s name, it was inspired by Master Oogway from Kung Fu Panda. So this one’s called Master Haigui.
Sea Turtle Painting Process
Challenges
Before I started drawing, I thought the brown spots on a sea turtle’s head were random. But as I kept working on it, I realized they actually follow a specific pattern. So I went back and redrew everything. I originally thought turtles would be easy to draw, but once I got serious about the details, it turned out to be a bit more complicated than I expected.
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