Lion -Value Study



Just sitting here with Paul, recovering from 5 mile hike from top of mountain down a total of 453 foot drop to a beautiful mountain lake.  Tough part was the climb back up.  We are watching the US Open at Pinehurst and wanted to experiment on my tonal work.  This is a photo from Gary Jones at PMP named Iblis.  It is a beautiful black and white shot of this lion so had a gray tone reference to work from.  I had watched the great video, shown below, that Ruth Archer, also of PMP had found and will again, but wanted to put it into practice.  Using 7 tones, plus the color of the paper, I put together an 8 scale range of tones and not necessarily in lion typical colors.  Working from light to dark I used off white, light yellow, yellow golden oochre, light gray which is paper color, terra cotta, brown, indigo Blue and black.  I looked at the reference picture and decided where each tone should be used and in some instances combined those tones to create another.  Probably have two hours in this pastel study.  Surprised both of us how quickly this came together.  Also happy that this is a somewhat looser stroke piece than my normal pastel pics, tried to do less finger blending and more stick blending but overall less blending.
Thanks for stopping by and have a great weekend.

Comments

Jane said…
This is gorgeous Nelvia, the color of the lion is spot on ! I have very little experience with pastels and always used my fingers to blend the few times I tried...what kind of stick do you use for blending ?
June 15, 2014 at 7:44 AM
Alexander said…
this is wonderful. i just tried to draw a fog for a dear friend i despaired. but your animal pictures are really something. go get an exhibition fast, get deservedly famous for your paintings, and i bake in your sun
June 15, 2014 at 1:21 PM
Log Cabin Studio said…
That is wonderful Nelvia!
Caroline
June 15, 2014 at 9:31 PM
Nelvia said…
Thanks Jane, Stam Miller of the video says you can use any color, so going to,try another one with more outrageous colors to see how it comes together. Thought he did. Great job explaining. He has multiple other videos too that I am going to check oit
June 16, 2014 at 10:36 AM
Nelvia said…
Aw A you are going to give me a bid head. Thank you much for the kind comments and encouragement. Am going to see about getting in some organizations and shows when I get back
June 16, 2014 at 10:38 AM
Nelvia said…
Hey C how are you doing? Thanks for stopping by and appreciate the comment. How is the Grandbaby?
June 16, 2014 at 10:39 AM
hmuxo said…
Wow! a beautiful study, Nelvia!! It's amazing!!
5 mile hikes is quite an accomplishment !!! I did that a few years back..Now, maybe 2 miles!!! lol
June 16, 2014 at 2:52 PM
Rita Vaselli said…
Your Lion  communicates a sense of heat energy, as the Lion in the Zodiac. Dear Nelvia congratulations for this gorgeous pastel.Bravo!!!
Hugs,Rita.
June 18, 2014 at 1:24 PM
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