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                                                                    Into the Light                                                                          9"x8"                                                                         Pastel Well, this is based on the first advanced lesson from Colin Bradley.  As I have done previously, I am using a different pose than he did, but a similar concept.  then I still work through the instruction videos...

                                                                         Majestic                                                                           10"x8"                                                                           Pastel I think I mentioned that I was thinking about studying with an online English pastelist, Colin Bradley.  I have worked through several of his free lessons, this being one, and decided to bite ...

This is another picture of Mike the LSU mascot for a friend.  This time it is an 11"x14" oil on canvas and incorporates the LSU stadium as well as the cat.  Buildings aren't my forte, so I have it roughed in somewhat and will definitely go back and make some tweaks.  Just am getting the base tones on Mike.  Wanted to have some darker tones as much of him is going to be in dappled light.  Just playing around here with impressions of foliage and grasses with all the tight detail being on the cat.  I am hoping it will keep him as the primary focus. Thanks for stopping by and hope you are having a great week.

Well here is an update on Mike.  For those of you that already work in oils you know that you probably have to have several pictures in process because you have to let what you work on dry enough to go over it.  So promising myself to start the Grand Canyon today.  Because of the detail I am finding it hard to be as loose in this as I would like to be.  Aslo while he is white in much of his face I am going to have to go in and add in grays to show separations of the hair riffs to make it more believable.  I am scared that I am getting to points where I am beginning to over work him, so am going to try to make myself finish off the first coat and then go back and tweak the shadows.  Also this time I am not having any problem getting thick paint on the canvas so the dry time will definitely be longer as I am hardly using any Liquin at all on this piece. Thanks much for stopping by and hope you are having a great week.   We are going to go back i...

   Mike   8"x10" Oil Yep I am taking a bit of a breather after the challenge, but have been working on trying to get some technology things in place.  While most poeple say, this is easy, I am not the least bit computer intutitive so things like PayPal accounts and buttons take me a while to grasp and then be brave enough to try. But I have been painting, meet Mike.  He is the sixth LSU mascot which I am doing for a friend who is a huge LSU fan having gone to school there.  Mike is the only live college tiger mascot, is a Bengali-Siberian mix, and lives in a 15,000 sq ft condo enclosure complete with waterfalls and pool cared for by the vet program.  He is one pampered cat.  He has extremely light coloring, except in the muzzle area where all the color seems to be congregated.  I am trying to work in oil again and definitely guess that with oil you have to work in layers so that you can get i...

                                                                         Thirsty                                                                           8"x10'                   ...

Well got so used to posting something each day, yesterday felt strange.  Since it is a big day here in the US, due to Super Bowl Sunday, thought I would post early.    Not only the Super Bowl, great commercials but also a new episode of Downtown Abby!  Does that equate to heaven for both boys and girls? As I said I want to continue to work in oils after gaining some confidence in the challenge.  So while I do have a pastel on the board also, a snow leopard, I am alternating with this piece.  Again my goal with oils is not to get too precise, but try to go with looser work and get used to bolder brushstrokes.  This is a beautiful piece of a tiger drinking, the photographer is Nicola at PMP.  Many have done this shot which shows much more background and water.  I decided to do a close crop (I think that is going to be part of my style going forward) and want to try to do a bit of an abstract background.  This again is the water mi...

                                                                       Watching                                                                          9"x12"                      ...

 Watching   Ok, here is the tigress with her final tweaks where I changed some of the color zones - hoping you can't really tell the differences.  Don't think I am going to do anything else to her but put her in a frame.  Let's talk about this unique way of framing pastels....... Am going to try to frame as Leslie Harrison suggests.  One thing she does I didn't know to do initially was put this piece of velour on foam board before you start painting - next one definitely as velour paper is rather thin and could wrinkle.  Anyway you put velour on board or acid free foam board using a sheet of double-sided adhesive.  Paint away - Then she thoroughly cleans the glass and puts the picture right against the glass (usually in pastel you use the mat space to act as a dust catcher) and then puts in her brads to the frame to make it snug.  She says you get a little dust but she doesn't have any issues.  Hoping for no issues as this is...

Watching  9"x12" Pastel on Velour Well I think that "Watching" is pretty much complete.  As usual I am going to let him sit on the board and rest a couple of days and then I can do tweaks to him.  I think I see a few of the markings that I'd like to change, especially that longer tough hair just around the neck area.   But want to get some distance first, too many hours in this to try to radically change and ruin the piece.  Know that I need to keep going over the whiskers to get them whiter and with more substance.   I will admit that I tried whiskers with pastel and couldn't get the lines thin enough, so ended up using the trusty Sakura white gel pen and keep going over them as the velour sucks it up.  All the experts say sharpen the pastels - well I just don't know who to get it that sharp!! Why is it with pictures you like some parts and hate others?  Do you think anybody gets it all where they like it? ...

Well continuing to work on this tiger.  Even though velour seems to take color pretty fast I find I am working lots of hours without looking like I am making progress.   I find that I keep adding additional layers to what I have already worked, still trying to get that individual hair look.  Think I may have been lucky and able to mask my error at the top of the head, thank goodness each tiger has different random markings. I had to freshen up the left eye as well, and you can really tell the difference between the two eyes.  It seems that even though I am trying not to lay anything or put hands on areas that have been worked, the color I guess gets imbedded into the velvety paper, dulls and needs to be touched up a bit.  Today's time has been spent trying to get the muzzle to come forward away from the flat plane of the face.  I also have to get some more references on what the nose looks like as I am not happy with this...

Ahhh, boy does it feel a lot better doing something more inside my comfort zone.  Just couldn't make myself deal with green today (ok there is a little I did on this, but not like the landscapes).  Decided even with the velour I was going back to work on Watching.  Saw a documentary last night on lions with some previews of a tiger show to come and got excited. Speaking of the velour, I think I quite like that surface a whole lot better than the sanded paper.  I am going to try several other brands and the pastel mat as well to see if I can find a surface that feels smoother.  I got more Colorfix sheets to have to use up, so there will be more pics on it and maybe by the end I'll know what to do with it.  Fingers crossed. Today was sketching in definitions, where the black and white zones should be to form the cheek and muzzle areas.  Still playing with underpainting on the beige zones - I am still undecided on what the color and o...

                           HAPPY THANKSGIVING - HAPPY TURKEY DAY!!   US STYLE Ah yes, I hear you, you are saying, there sure isn't much that happened here.  And you would be correct.  I had ordered myself a book written by Lesley Harrison, a wonderful wildlife pastelist.  She kind of specializes in horses and wolves and does all other manner of critters.  Anyway why I went ahead and got her book, besides the beautiful pictures, is that she primarily has worked on velour paper for the last 30+ years.  So thought she might have something to tell me that would help me figure this out.  So am taking some time to read it.   Besides it is Thanksgiving, lots of food, fun, football and stuff - so I can be lazy. You can see that I did start to try to figure out fur with this paper.  I approached it as I did ...

This is a wonderful shot from Gary Jones, at PMP, of a Sumatran tigeress called Kirana.  I wanted to do her because she was an excellent face close up and I wanted the challenge of her beautiful eyes and features because I am working on a new support surface and I figured why not give me a chance.   I wanted to do this larger than I normally would so that I have enough space for each feature to try to do some experimental things.   I changed this shot up a bit as I am going to bravely add some leaves over her finished face to give the feeling that she is in hiding and "Just Watching".  As you know I am one of the most patient people I know - NOT.  So rather than do a lot of extensive reading and then swatch experimenting - well, I am going for it.  The paper color is a light tan/or golden beige.  The velour surface takes the pastels (am using for the first layer primarily Nupastels (hard sticks) and some pencils, and will come back w...