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    Ok, between sneaking off to the mountains to see the Fall colors (it had unfortunately gone past peak in many elevations), attended a big time craft show and being under the weather for a few days when I got back, there hasn't been a great deal of work going on artwise.  But here is an update on a new piece which I thought was just an awesome Osprey shot.  It is from PMP and Sandy who is quite a wonderful wildlife photographer out of Florida.   He caught this Osprey in full flight with his catch of the day.   I am going to call it "Triumphant".   This will be another color pencil on Stonehenge paper, 11"x14". I started it because when I drew him up I was really pumped, but laid him away and now since I was frustrated with both trying to get Khrys drawn for another portrait and not being particularly excited about Pink I figured well, why not.  So figure now I will have multiple things to be frustrated about...... LOL Once I got rolling with the

Haven't given you an update on my weaving lately, so here it is as of today.  Yep, when I said it was slow, I meant it goes really slow, it takes two lines of yarn to complete one row (kind of like the knit/purl routine) that you see on the front side, so......  Not sure but I am pretty sure grass grows faster in the winter than this is going.  I am pretty excited with this one, I intentionally kept it simple, very few color changes, but I really am liking this, even hubby is enthused with this one.  I am toying around with adding a different color pink or peach at the top of the sky before I move into a steel blue night color, but just debating at this point.  You can see on my original cartoon where I have the bright red pops in the blue portion.    Just think that the transition to a softer, paler color may be more realistic.  Boy I do like that the pine trees are silhouetted and am going to have to remember to build in maybe more sky holes in the mass areas to keep it real.

The other day I suggested you might check out wetcanvas.com, I was going to do that to check out info on drawing feathers and didn't find much that would help me with Pink.   Well I took my own advice and ended up finding a thread on drawing wildlife with charcoal and chalk, check Drawing and Sketching/The Classroom/Basic 102: Wildlife in charcoal ad chalk.  Well after 17 pages of conversation and people posting pictures, I got charged up and came up and drew up this sketch in about an hour and a half.  What I wanted to accomplish with this sketch: 1)  Measure, since this is a portrait I measured, using my handy dandy ruler to get not only spacing, but size and angles.  This part probably took me about 30 minutes, but felt comfortable with my base 2)  Limited palette of:  vine charcoal, General white charcoal pencil, orange-ish light dark pastel (all my pastels are arranged by values) and 2H and 9XXB graphite pencils (seems like I always have to get graphite in there somewhe

I almost called this "Lucky Blossom" because under several layers there are koi fish swimming around.  But I figured only a few people would get the joke and I didn't want to air my dirty laundry to the whole world, just you guys dear readers know the actual truth.  So instead I went with Georgia Blossom as we get magnolias blooming both in Spring and Fall here in Georgia.  They are such beautiful flowers.  Another one I think I could paint again and again and not get tired of them.  Love that white really isn't white with this flower.   I had done a magnolia before in color pencil in a 12"x12" size, but altered this one a bit (not using grays for the shadows, but violet and blues) and did it on a 6"x6" boxed canvas.  Again working on getting the sides to participate as part of the composition.  I did a couple of things here:  1) I covered the koi with several coats of gesso and realize that gesso doesn't allow the paint to soak into

Not exactly sure how to approach this one, but thought I'd start at the bottom and kind of work my way up through the feathers since they all sort of overlap a bit.  Also trying to give some of the fine line work and sleek lie to the feathers that you see in real life, but still that little bit of texture.  I am finding that is a bit of a challenge.  I am hoping that by the time I complete Pink I will have a technique and then I think I better write it down (alas, senior moments my friends) as there was so much time between my eagle I think I forgot what I did.  I am then going to go forward after this one and try my scratchboard egret before I forget what I did, however that one is lots softer feathers.  I also have a reference of mine that is a black swan and I'd kind of like to try that as well - sort of a feather clinic.  Hopeful I will be smarter at the end of it and not feel intimidated by them.  Have to admit when I looked at this reference I was so excited with all t

Ok, I think I am pretty much completed with Jania.  She will sit on the board and watch what I'm doing for the next couple of days and hopefully tweaks will be done only as needed.  I can always find tweaks, pick out lights or add more darks and already see some of those, but have been at it too much today and want fresher eyes before I make any adjustments.  (As I look it's not what you'd call a real centered picture here, sorry, but had to wait for the rain to stop and now too lazy to walk back downstairs and take another that might be more centered).  Did you ever notice how when in the sun you can't see what you are taking a picture of because you can't see the screen? Anyway, darkened her hair up (but it might need more), added more facial color overall and then more darks to try to give a little definition to her headpiece.  Sorry Jane, wasn't a lot I could do with the lips being too long, tried to take some off, but it was pretty imbedded in the paper

Ok, airing dirty laundry here, but I have spent a couple of days working on these koi fish on a gallery wrap canvas and quite honestly it is such a pathetic result that there ain't no way to salvage it.  I am and have been stuck in the muck and mire with these fish.  There are just so many things wrong with this attempt (poor proportion, muddy colors, poor composition, etc, etc) that I am going to have to gesso it over, sand and gesso some more and hopefully forget what's lurking underneath.  Then I am going to try to paint my magnolia one more time in acrylic or maybe a hibiscus.  They, like the poppies are such a beautiful flowers.  Yes dear readers we all have bombs, but I guess we learn from them, although I am not sure there is any positive to take away from this muddle. But there is good news.  I have been letting my brain and Jania rest on my board for a couple of days.  After being disappointed in some of my measurements, I corrected what I thought I could get away w

Just an awesome beautiful morning here in Georgia - had some rain, finally, and a cold front pushed through 45 degrees this morning!!!    Sorry the picture quality that isn't that good, but my camera battery was dying on me and I auto adjusted the pics since the shutter speed was sloooooow and they were kind of fuzzy.  They aren't quite this orange in real life and I kind of have angles and a bit of glare as wanted to show the sides.  Am thinking this might be the first of several I try to do that would be in the 6"x6" wrapped canvas with acrylic.                                                                               I have been looking for an alternative to get to a lower price point.  Since most of what I have done previously has been on paper, it is hard to hit a lower price point as you have to absorb the cost of matting and framing.  (Personally I think framing costs are way expensive and cheapest I can come up with for a decent size, 11x14, is $50. 

TODAY'S ADVICE: MEASURE, MEASURE, AND MEASURE Decided I would leave the picture in as it was yesterday when I was ready to stop because I had lost Jania.  Was getting ready to start over because I won't be defeated, but experience tells me to put her on the board and just look at both reference and picture and note the differences.  Top picture is this morning with a few changes, plus put in some additional definition on the light side of her face.  Just standing back and studying the two shots I had identified what I thought were correctable  reasons for the aging distortion (remember I had several of these issues when I did the original drawing):  1) part of the face was just lightly colored in,  no definition to balance the more finished shadow side, 2) the jaw on both sides needed to be reworked to regain the shape from the shadow, 3)  lengthened the chin,  4) shortened the nose; which gets me to today's advice.   I thought I had the features set, map