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Well here is Lyrae, just finished her today as I am back from Florida and way too sore from building the show standing all day of the show to do much else physically.  got the grass cut and some weeds pulld, but that's it.  Getting to old for this.   Darn already Sunday night and almost time to go to work again, short week though for us as it is the 4th of July and my favorite guy has a birthday this week. David keeps saying she is going to be my masterpiece and I hope this doesn't disappoint him.  Pretty much believe she is done but will keep her hanging to make adjustments for pops and shadows for better form.  Not sure I am Liking the cloak hairs here and need to refine them I think for finer texture.  David will see tomorrow and give me his input. Stephanie, if you see this, why you decided to check in, still a surprise but months early.  I am hoping you are pleased and we will get her framed, thinking black mat in  black frame, very clos...

  Well it's that time on Sunday that I hate because I know the weekend is almost over and tomorrow it's back to work and this is going to be a very busy week.  Seems like you wait for the weekend to come and then it is gone in a flash.  Made some progress on Lyrae today, didn't get in all that I needed to but was concerned that I was losing the likeness so needed to start to build out her snout.  Just keep working the layers and adding colors and rebrightening the hilights.  Biggest hurdle now is to see if David still sees his dog and is as excited about where she is now as when he saw her last.  Keeping my fingers crossed.  Thanks for stopping by and hoping you have a great painting week.  

Well here is Lyrae update for my work this week.   She is coming out quite quickly and have to think it is the black paper.  Really gives you ahead start as you don't have to cover the white of the paper.  Have more colored pastel paper and might need to get into it again, but most are mid tones.  Would like to try the color pencil on them, have seen the most beautiful cats on samon paper.   Anyway back to Lyrae, i have most of our right slide blocked in with colors and am hoping to get refined through her muzzle.  As you can see i have the lay in colors on and am starting to refine and work in other colors to get fur texture, do this by laying in layers and working it and adding another color layer and editing.   I am using pastel pencils for this refining, they are harder and cut thru the softer pastel and leave stroke work visible.  i have a busy schedule next week so won't have much work time and want to stay consistent on most of her so the t...

Well after cleaning out the garage yesterday and washing all the woodwork inside and out on the porch today I have to go back to work to rest.  I am pretty tired so only got a could of hours of work on her and not it is down to watch the golf championship. But I was able to get started on my friend's dog.  She has been bubbling in my head for weeks now and just haven't gotten the nerve to put pastel to paper.  But think at least I got enough of her down so that we can do an eye color check and also a fur check.  My reference photos of mostly inside with flash and the one I have in sun is really bright light, so I am kind of guessing here.  She is definitely part long hair shepherd and thinking I need to adjust in more rust tones, but just want some more input before I get into her face and take her way to yellow.  This is somewhat a challenge because the black paper does funky things to the colors and I have to remember to put down purples befo...

Well I have been so art starved for the last few weeks, too much work and not any art timne.  So because I want to do a portrait on black paper I saw this challenge from Paint and Draw Together - Lela always comes up with such wonderful things to paint - and said this would be a perfect starter to see how differently the color react on black.  And believe it or not, old polkie got this done this afternoon in just a couple of hours from laying out the drawing and putting together.  Fastest color pencil piece I've ever done.  Of couse is it only 6x8 and I didn't have to lay in the background, just used the colored black ground. This is color pencil and no solvent, this time it is only layering colors and using an art blender for additional wax and then some q-tips to smush it around and blend together.  Also gave me the shiny surface that came together well with this subject. Now the rain is gone and it's time to go out on the portch for a little R&R wit...