Holozing Creature Background Contest: My Water Whale background

I hope it's not too late to take a part in Holozing Creature Background Contest. Here is my entry and how I did it.

I have used Inkscape (free vector editing software) and Canva to create this background.

step 1

In step 1 I have extracted color palete from the whale image and added rectangle to mark dimensions requirement.

step 2

I've used Draw Bezier curves tool to create this basic shape, first layer for papercut effect.

step 3

For step 3 I've created several more shapes and applied colors from color palete. Select the shape, duplicate it with control + D. Apply the color.

Using control + shift grab corner handle and move a bit to the center. Repeat for all the shapes.

step 4

Now let's make that papercut effect. But before that copy and move aside smallest and biggest shapes, we'll need that for later.

Select all the shapes and go to Filters > Shadows and glows > Drop shadow. Use the parameters from the image and click apply. Voila.

step 5

Move back biggest shape (use snap if needed) to its original position. Move it to the bottom and adjust opacity and color if needed.

Move back smallest shape. Change color as desired. Add gradient to outline rectangle.

Step 6

Finally imported the image into Canva and added some elements from the free Canva library, bubbles, grass and sea star.

I hope you like the result.