I'm 1/4 Filipino and I've wanted to do a drawing that was a nod to that heritage for along time. Finally came up with this. Started it forever ago, let it sit, did the lines in vector, let it sit, and months later finished it at last over about a week of coloring. The original file is huge too, my computer kept getting mad at me and telling me it was too big to save.
The girl is meant to be a wandering spirit. She's wearing some traditional garments that are still worn today for traditional dancing and festivals.
The white blossom floating over her head is a Sampaguita, the national flower of the Philippines.
The flames were inspired by a traditional dance I remember seeing preformed when I was a little girl. The dancers would balance candles on their heads and the palms of their hands as they danced.
The spirit dogs are my favorite because they have a more personal root. One of the big things that my Filipino grandfather didn't like about the Philippines was that his family lived in a more rural area where there was little electricity and it got very very dark at night. The reason he didn't like the dark was because he firmly believed that in the jungle in the darkness was where the ghost dogs roamed. Only light would keep them away. The ghost dogs were an omen of death, if you saw one you were sure to die shortly after.
Something about that that occurred to me while I was working on this picture is that when my Grandpa moved to the US he eventually moved out to a country area outside town where it still gets pretty dark. But instead of forest the house is surrounded by open field and to this day my grandparents house sits underneath the only streetlight on their road.
See it bigger in my deviantart: http://thedustyphoenix.deviantart.com/gallery/#/d3fwfu4