NELVIA'SART.COM

 It is that time again to go run, supposed to have sun, but alas no sun, but it is warmer than yesterday and maybe no wind and it is fresh air. Took my picture downstairs and even though this is a big pic for me you can see it is still dwarfed by the size of the wall.  But I am going to frame her and she will reside there for a while until I get the urge to try bigger.   Sure beats a blank wall.  Still thinking about if I could do color pencil on canvas, know some do with beautiful results.  So we'll see, can't get much larger than this with pastel, just not big enough supports. Got all her legs in so she is a free running gal.  Just a bit more on her face that will take quite a bit of time as it is tedious detail and then it will be finishing work.  Not sure if I will get more done this afternoon as I have to do some work - bahhh, and that in addition to the ever constant request to clean house - sure don't know where the dirt comes from.  Also have to wash the bird

Well Paulie is yelling at me to shut down and come on down for the evening.  Two posts today, sorry for the doubles, but wanted to mark this spot as I really made some good progress this afternoon and am getting the feeling that yes, she will be done one of these days.  Still have a lot of finishing work to do but at least I will have most of the base color in and the back ground.  I will have some finishing work on dead grasses in the front.  Liking her legs, still think I am going to have to darken her somewhat more than the reference photo just to be sure you can see the musculature and shadow definitions. Going to collect my glass of wine now and watch some college basketball and maybe if I am lucky get to see some of the skating nationals. Thanks for stopping by and taking and look and hopefully more tomorrow.

Ok thinking it might be warm enough for me to go out and run now - been missing it the last couple of weeks, either raining, too cold or just basically nasty, and I do need my fresh air.  My pedometer bit the dust and I got me a new one that I have to wear out.  Trying to get my act together as this week brings the annual visit to the doctor and am sure he is going to find something he doesn't like, like blood pressure, weight, etc etc etc. Been quite a nice morning, listening to French radio, sipping my tea and working on "The Hunter".  Just had to post up what I accomplished on this bad girl during the week, stole a couple minutes here and there.  I always seem to see things on a picture post that I don't seem to see in person. The more color on her I get in the more I really think I nailed the background.  I have worked on the left eye, you may not see it, but I feel better about it now, downsized it a bit, reshaped it a bit and am much happier with it.  Pretty

Well didn't get to work on this much this weekend, yesterday got caught up in the shopping world and housecleaning to bring me back to earth.  So just got an hour or two in today.  Acttually spending time looking at where to lighten her.  Not much on the fur technique on this one since it is fairly short and sleek and tight to the body.  Now it is time for football, our Atlanta Falcons are one step away from the Super Bowl.  That day of the game, Super Bowl, must be one of America's biggest holidays and if our team got in would be the first time and this town will be crazy.  Not sure that we aren't going to get our butts handed to us, but will be fun to root for them. Caroline, Rita and Renate, those of you who counseled me to wait until I had more face color, seems you guys are right, as I am liking the eye better now.  Am a little worried now as the left eye appears like it is going to be a lot larger than the right, looking at the reference there is a difference, but

Sort of feeling off today, big flu here and everyone seems to have some version of it.  Felt ok to do my 3.5 mile run this morning, but this afternoon just kind of lethargic.  Well really busy week so not much done during the week so this is today's work.  Added portions of the head, still more ear work on the left ear and pretty much got the shoulder based in so I can stare at it for a while and try to figure out the darker hair parts for the shadows that show the musculature.  Next do the chest and top turn of the front leg tomorrow and maybe the top of the other leg, that would frame the face very nicely and then could determine whether to finish it or complete the paws/legs before the face.  Added more green to the eyes.  Just not satisfied with them, probably have tinkered around on them too much and might have to scratch some layers off to see if I can recapture what it is I want.

Blogger is still having issues, but might have found this is a better way anyway.  Got to go take down the rest of the decorations so here is my final post for this weekend's work.  Isn't it ironic, Paulie and I haven't figured out yet, how the most impatient person in the world can sit for hours and do this tedious stuff.  Strange.  But here are the ears, and I have about 4 hours into them.  Undecided but still might need to tone them down a bit and might be too much detail for a picture that will be hanging high and that you might view from a greater distance since you would look out and up, maybe that's the reason to leave them lighter so you get the impression.  Guess the next thing I'll work on is getting the rest of the shoulder in and then the chest areas under the muzzle so that I can put the rest of the fact on top of it.  Might just complete all the legwork and leave the fun face for the last, will see what speaks to me next.  Have to say that working a

Well here is this weeks and today's progress.  Still gray and cold outside, not raining today but sure looks like it could.  So a good day to stay inside and clean and get to work on the cat a bit.  Reworked the eyes, Renate, what do you think?  Hope they are improved as I don't think I can do a whole lot more to them and not get total mud.  Off the easel now and am going to being doing most of the rest of this cat on the drawing board, flat surface as I want to really get into the detail.  I will have to adjust the colors too once I get more down, wanted to stay light in the midtone region and just accentuate the ridges and muscles but think I will have to go darker, never can tell until you get more color to compare against. I have been adjusting my settings and it appears that the rogue search engines are leaving me alone, but I have issues today with uploading these images so had to upload through Picasa, hoping they are just having issues.  I readjust images and stil

Well as is always the case, time has run out and this holiday weekend is almost over and it's back to the work day grind which means less time.  However, in addition to getting some more work done on the leopard I also got some other organizational things done.  It just seems to take longer to do things than I imagine it should.  But at least some progress. Hard to believe it is 2013 and already we will be going into the second day - know this year too is going to just fly by too. Hope this finds all of you recovering from the big party action and appreciate all comments, thanks for stopping by and have a great painting week.