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Have found some time to work on Buddy this week.  Almost have his ear in place and as you can see still working on the fur.  The cheek section shows the second part of the working process, after I've brushed on the charcoal dust, then the hair growth is pulled out with eraser and then charcoal hair strands are put back in and finally topped off with the white pastel or charcoal which is smoothed a bit back into the greys.  I think now I am finally starting to get more comfortable with the process and find myself adding darker darks in the initial stage so that I can get the color contract that Buddy needs.  think the grey now is dark enough to pop against what will be a lot of white dog.  Still debating on whether or not to leave this all in black and white tones or add color to the eyes, will need to decide pretty soon because once I go over half way I don't want to be working anything on the left side as it will turn into one big smear. Hope everyone is having a great week

Meet Buddy, this is the new dog that I am working on and he is a Great Pyrenees, which is a herder and a very large dog.  Hi to the ladies from the quilting group and I hope that you enjoy watching him come to life (I hope) as I work through the process. My friend Terri provided me with a couple of pictures and this one was the clearest for a reference and really a nice cropped shot, although I have to admit it's quite an unusal dog pose.  Buddy is a lover, a real in-your-face guy whose owner recently had heart surgery so I am hoping she recognizes him from this close up as that is probably how she sees him often.  He went to visit at the hospital several times and gave her a tremendous lift just full of love.  I am making some of him up as I go based on other photos of him but also another Great Pyrenees she owned, so am hopeful that he will really come out looking like Buddy with a complete head and chest area.  Seems it is quite natural for them to lay their ears down flat to

Ok, just so you know I've not been a total slug this weekend here is an update on my parrot.  Now that I have the color in I have to go back in and add in additional ink, but pretty much have the background complete enough that I can start to work on the parrot's feathers.  I am learning a lot from doing this painting and am planning the next one in my head, only next time I am going to do it in brown ink so it's not quite so dramatic, but then again it might be too subtle - we'll see.  But alas I get ahead of myself and got to focus on getting this one finished.

Title: Ziva Size:  9"x12" Media: Colored Pencil Had a quick trip to the mountains this weekend and got Ziva pretty much finished late Friday night and finishing touches a few minues ago as she has lingered on long enough.  Again this is with colored pencils, done in a watercolor style and then I inadvertently overlaid it with some graphite so tired to fix it up a bit.  Going to leave her on my easel this week so I see her each morning and night and then will probably try to tweak her up a bit before I show her "live" finished to David for his final thoughts and comments.  Am going to try a new fur technique with charcoal on my next dog and am thinking it will be a very unusal pose as well, but Terri kind of liked it and think I can take some creative license and fill him out, so Buddy, a Great Pyrenees will be my next adventure, you know how I love black and white dogs. Have the three day weekend coming up for our Memorial Day holiday so hope to get some t

Ok, here is the culmination of my weekend work on my upstairs project, Ziva, and my downstairs project, Parrot.  Still have lots of work to go on both of them.  Tried to do a different way of showing the  black reflections graying them down and then coming back to try to put in the black hair work and think I am liking it as I think it gives the reflection and glossy look that puppy fur would have.  Still lots of work to do on the muzzle though and then the body.  That will make Paul happy as he has complained on my only doing heads and not the whole dog, so a compromise of partial chest area. Although she is going slower than I thought maybe this week will see her almost finished, she looked deceptively simple and have found I needed more time to think before I apply the colors.  Well on the parrot, got to add a bunch more color to the background which helps me visualize where I am going with this.  Again, goal this week is to get the rest of the background work in behind the parr

Well here is this week's progress, not a lot, but a busy week.  Only get to steal 10-15 minutes here and there, but hoping to get more completed with a couple of hours of dedicated work between today and tomorrow.  But have to plant basil and tomatos and aleady cut back my roses so they can bloom again. I can see now that as I go into completion on Ziva I'll need to even out whatever color I am going to decide on for the accents, don't think the gold is the color I really want so will be interesting how I can alter that.  I always have to remember the flash and that she is actually darker than I think in real life - might need to look at some professional Rotweiller reference photos to capture better colors.  By the way with the web having such a great free image base I am parting with most of my reference photos that I have hoarded from magazines over the years - my closet likes it - declutter. Got more done on the parrot, am trying to dot out the background first

Well here it is already the end of the weekend so posting what I got done yesterday and today, I just feel like I'm getting started and got the groove going.   Here is an update on Ziva and I think I am missing the mischevous look that David sees, will check on his reaction tomorrow. Ziva appears more sweet here than a little terror, which hearing the stories I know she is.  Using a more watercolor approach to this picture and like it with the pencils as for me it gives more control and the darker darks.  Looking at it on the screen here helps my objectivity, so I think I'll have to tone down the accents, still trying to find the right color and I knew that was going to be a challenge. I am working on the parrot, will keep dotting away there all next week to see if I can make some good progress for you to review Renate against the real thing. Hope you all have a great painting week and makes lots of progress.

Just got finished with my 3 mile run, a good one, so full of it right now so will get this posted early this weekend.  I have 2 projects going this week.  One to be like Renate, with a parrot - except mine doesn't bite or .....!!  :) Well wanted to do this picture for many years as I have always been fascinated with pen and ink and pointillism.  As I was cleaning out my closet, decluttering, I ran across the picture and was looking for a downstairs project so looked like the time was right.  This is a VERY VERY slow process but somehow, as I have no patience, I like it - guess it's that drawing thing.  Then if you add the colored pencils I really like the color punch against the pen marks, like it better than water color since I can get that translucent deep color with the pencils.  Using tiny disposable .01mm pens, testing out several brands I've acquired over the years and will have to check the craft stores for replacements when I find the one I like.  I usually end