Meet Olly: Hailey’s Friend

Olly is my friend’s  husband’s dog. He is also a friend to Hailey, featured in the previous post. I really enjoyed painting these two collies. Olly is the Rough Coat Collie, like Lassie of TV fame. The one thing I had to concentrate on, throughout painting him, was that his painting may hang with the one I did of Hailey.  This is why I faced him left. That way, when they hung on the wall,  they would face each other. The other thing I had to be aware of is that they would look better if paintied in much the same style, using the same color scheme. That is why the background is the same and I approached sculpting the forms of his face similar to the way I painted Hailey. I have never attempted something like this before, so that was a learning experience.

Above is my initial drawing. I had to draw him twice. The first attempt was way off!  I had trouble with getting the length and width of his nose correct. I used cross hairs the second time and that did the trick. My perspective had been off.

Olly had white hairs running through his coat, so I frisketed those. I also frisketed the highlight in his eyes as well as the lighter areas to either side of his iris and began adding the first tentative strokes of color.

This step was largely sculpting the nose forms and studying where I would need to have lighter color under darker color. I felt a need to establish the darkness of the eye because many of the darks in Olly’s coat matched the values found in his eyes. I pinked the nose as my initial step on that and pinked the shapes on the inside of his ears. These were all the lighter colors I saw under and around the darker values I had yet to render.

In this step, I did most of my painting. I frisketed the pink dots on Olly’s nose. I darkened the areas of dark coat in the way I read the patterns. I frisketed more of the long hairs from his ears so the would show up after laying in the background. I, then painted the background in. I knew I’d need to do that so I could finish my darks in his ears and his nose and have the correct value tones. So many times, I have painted the background in, only to find I had to retouch the portrait because the background lightened the foreground dramatically. At this stage, I always know how I am going to finish a painting. I have enough information down and it is just a matter of detailing and getting the darks to read right.

  finished painting

In the last step I  detailed the darks in the ears and painted in some of the white hairs that poked out from around them. I detailed the nose and mouth, darkened the darker portions of pattern in his coat, erased the frisket and worked on softening some of the edges around those frisketed patches.  I darkened the whites on either side of his iris and painted a faint shadow under the upper lid of his eye. I added the whiskers with a rigger.  The last thing I did was shadow the coat under Olly’s chin with a mixture of the blue I used for the background and a light touch of the browns I had used. I also shadowed the white patch of his coat in the lower right hand corner for balance.

A huge thank you to my friends for sending me the photos to use for reference, so I could paint these two beautiful dogs!   

 

Hailey: A Service Dog

This is Hailey. She is a service dog of a very dear friend of mine. I have wanted to paint her for some time. Her owner was kind enough to send me multiple images of her to be able to pull this off. I was intrigued by her skeletal structure and her dignified expression. I have to admit that I had to use my piece of acrylic with the crosshairs drawn on them to get her long nose right. I kept wanting to shorten the nose on the initial attempts at drawing her. You can find out more about that drawing technique here.

Here are my steps in painting her:

I drew her with the use of the piece of acrylic with crosshairs, mentioned above. I payed careful attention to the linear forms of shadow throughout her face and ears. I knew I would need those lines, carefully placed, in order to render her contours and form accurately.

This was the longest stage of the painting for me. I worked very slowly. I used small round brushes with very light washes and worked from very light to dark. She is so lightly colored and I did not want to “botch it” and have to begin over.  The smallest brush I used was a #1 round. The largest was a #8 round. I applied liquid frisket on the highlight areas on her nose and eyes and some on that thin strip of a blaze on the bridge of her nose. I chose raw sienna, naples yellow, sepia, some burnt sienna, permanent rose, and blue stone as my colors. I made the grays with mixtures of blue stone, permanent rose and a raw sienna. The raw sienna and permanent rose were very watered down as they were added to the blue stone.

Prior to finishing the details in a painting, I usually work in the background. I know the addition of a darker background will lighten the appearance of the colors in the subject.  This gives me an opportunity to go back into the portrait and darken what I need to and refine the details. Prior to washing in the background, I frisketed Hailey’s ruff around her neck, so the texture of her hair will show up in the finished portrait. I then worked blue stone washes around Hailey’s head and into the shadows of her ruff with a #12 round. I find areas within the positive shape to include the background color  so the painting looks more balanced and not like a cut out of a dog pasted on a background. The whole time I work my washes, I make choices about what edges I will leave hard and take the time to soften all the others with a damp or thirsty brush.

  finished painting

The above step is what I call finishing and balancing. I went back into some of the yellows and darkened some of the forms and enhanced some of the contours with lightened or watered down sepia. I detailed the grays around the muzzle and defined the shadows around her ruff. While the frisket was still on, I darkened and detailed the nose and went back into the eye and darkened it and detailed the pigment of the lids. I darkened her lips, freckles and the dots for the whiskers. I removed the frisket around the eyes and nose and washed light color into some of them so they did not appear so dark. Notice difference of highlights on the nose and the highlight in the eyes. I darkened the tips and dark line around the ears. I softened the pinks in the ears with very light washes of sepia. I then removed the frisket on the ruff. I did not have to go back into that area to soften the edges. Sometimes I do have to do that. The last thing I did was add the whiskers with sepia and a small rigger.

I hope, by including my steps, there might be something you can use in your own portrait attempts.

A heartfelt thankyou to my friend for sharing this beautiful dog with me so I could paint her.

Beagle

I am trying out a new paper. It is Lanaquerelle 140 lb rough. I like it. A lot! It is a little softer than Arches rough and seems to stay wet longer, allowing me to play with washes a little longer. I have also painted on this namebrand’s coldpress paper in the same weight and like it, too.  I just wish it was not more expensive. How many times, my lifetime, have I heard, “You get what you pay for”.

The above is from a reference photo provided by a friend. The black hues were created using harvest gold, alizarin crimson and prussian blue, in that order. The grays were made with lighter shades (watered down) of the same colors. I am playing around with using other colors to make colors I want rather than rushing to the tube color every time I paint.

 

Abner on Masa: Learning From My Mistakes

 photo reference

This is Abner. I have painted him here and here.  This time proved to be the most challenging.

 Fig 1

I had wanted to try something new on masa paper.  Instead of toning the paper, first, I began this piece with a continuous line drawing, in pencil, on the shiny side of a piece of masa paper. I went over those lines with a brush and waterproof india ink. Fig. 1 is what I came up with .

 Fig 2

After the ink dried, I crinkled the masa paper into a ball and wet it thoroughly in a bowl of water, reopened it and allowed it to dry. I then glued it to a piece of taped down Arches 140 lb coldpress watercolor paper. I mixed 4 parts acrylic Matte medium to 1 part water as my glue. I turned the drawing face down and covered the back of the piece with a thin layer of the glue mixture and then turned it over and affixed it to the surface of the watercolor paper by stroking a thin layer of the glue mixture all over the front. I encouraged air bubbles to escape by stroking with my brush from the center out. I then let the piece dry overnight so the surface of the paper was flat to work on. Refer to Fig 2.

 Fig 3

I, next, explored the colors I might want to use for rendering this image and ran into a huge problem! The colors were “dead” looking on the colorful background. They came out very mid-tone and matched the value of the background colors that I had wanted to save for this. I also had another problem. I was trying to paint the dog more realistically than my loose continuous line drawing was going to allow for. I had already lost the light area on the topmost portion of his skull. My next step was to spray what I had painted and lift out as much as I could with paper toweling. Voila! It worked to soften the grays I had tried to replicate and I thought I could, perhaps, continue if I did something with the foreground and background, first. That would give me some time to think about how I might approach painting the dog since my original intent to follow the patterns of the photo were not going to work. Refer to Fig 3.

 Fig 4

I painted loose greens, yellows and blues for the grassy area in the foreground and tried for a bushy red and green background. The background just did not fit, so I sprayed water on the bushy background and lifted as much as I could. It looked awful! …but, at least the dog’s head popped forward some.  I added a very dark underside to the bushes, accentuating two of the colors I had used to begin painting the dog (hoping for harmony). I liked how the original toning of the masa paper began to help me as I painted the dog, so I opted to allow some of the reds and yellows to show through and define some of the dog’s form. I liked portions of what I saw in Fig 4, above, but was about ready to throw it into the trash because I was getting a painting that was largely midtones in value. What did I do? I went to bed on it.

The next morning, with a clearer head and a completely dried painting (Fig 4), I asked myself what I thought the major challenges were. I came up with:

1. Lack of value contrast

2. I would need to work with the quirky distortions of my continuous line drawing

3. I would need to provide some kind of contrast between the dog and his environment

4. I needed to divorce myself from the photo reference and allow my imagination and creativity to come forward

I disliked the background so decided that one way I may be able to provide contrast in value was with a white picket fence in the background. By doing so, that would give me contrast between the flowing continuous lines of the dog and the rigid manmade lines of the fence.

 Fig 5

I rendered the picket fence with white goauche and came up with Fig 5. The white goauche was not sufficient enough, even with two layers, to cover the layers of watercolor which kept bleeding through.

 Fig 6

I pulled out my white acrylic paint and painted it one more time.  What I liked about this was that it immediately provided contrast between dog and background, pushed the dog forward and even looked like a painted wood fence due to the crinkles in the masa paper.  Refer to Fig 6.

Note, also, how the dog’s value became lighter with the brightening of the fence between Fig 5 and Fig 6. This often happens when you make value changes and needs to be addressed. Thus, I knew I had to darken the dog again.

Finished Painting

In the final steps of creating this piece, I worked with blending aureolin (transparent staining yellow),  permanent rose and prussian blue to develop a gray black on the surface of my dog portrait. I opted to allow and exaggerate some of the reds and yellows that were in the original toning of the masa paper, salvaging a quirky look to the color of the dog to parallel his loosely rendered continuous line form. I pushed these colors until I felt his contours read believable. I exaggerated the darkness of his pupils and iris and contrasted that with white goauche for the whites of the eyes and left his muzzle very light so as to draw the viewer’s eye to his face.

This is not at all the end result of what I had pictured in my mind. However, I now have a painting that is creative, somewhat quirky and reads well enough to avoid my trashing it.

The true test will be when my daughter sees this. This is Abner, one of her rescue dogs. He “IS” quirky, energetic and a bit of a prankster. Perhaps that comes through in the color and the playful way I have approached painting him.

What is the message? Don’t give up! Masa paper presents a challenge. As an artist, I have the tools and the creativity to learn from whatever any particular painting is trying to teach me! I can change it to a mixed media if I have to. I can create contrast and push for the values I want there. I may surprise myself.

To view other masa paintings I have painted click here.

Goauche Resist: Abner 3

Carol commented on the previous post that she liked both the black and white and the colored version of that featured goauche resist. I responded that I would be posting this one without the watercolor added. I like the resist, in and of itself, and can not convince myself to paint it.

This is a a portrait of my daughter’s weimaraner. I have painted him previously here and here.  His expression captivates me, so I just may paint him again sometime in the future.

A tutorial on how to do a goauche resist can be found here.

White Pup

This week, in watercolor  plus class we are going to watercolor on a gessoed surface.  In order to do this, we have to prepare our support. I use a synthetic paper that I order called Aquarius II by Strathmore. This is only because it does not buckle like other papers when the gesso is applied to the surface.

We also need a bottle of white gesso and a bristle brush to apply it with. I lay my Aquarius paper on newspaper, Squirt a dollop of gesso on the center of the paper and stroke outward with the bristle brush until the entire surface is covered. The bristle brush leaves behind grooves in the gesso that enhance the texture of the paper. Before the paper dries, I hold it up to the light to make sure that I have covered the surface.  This will also reveal the texture of the surface you have created.

I then allow the surface to dry. An hour usually does it unless you have applied it rather thick.  Most of the time, I prepare several papers and allow them to dry overnight before painting on them.

I, usually tape my paper to a board because I like a white border around my paintings, but this is not necessary as your  surface will not buckle much if at all. Many artists clip their paper or just tape the corners to a board to work on this surface.

Graphite will show through the watercolor on this surface, so I always use watercolor and draw the image with a brush.  Watercolor crayon can also be used.

Once the drawing is done, I begin to lay in my color. The one thing to note about painting on this surface is that it requires very “little water”. I like to say I apply creamy pigment.  This surface is easier to work on than Yupo, but it still is similar. I work the colors in next to each other. If it gets a little muddy, you can wet it with a damp cloth and wipe the pigment off the surface or lift small areas of pigment with a damp brush. You can create highlights by using a damp brush or whiten back to the surface using the edge of a Mr. Clean eraser. Thus, there are numerous ways you can correct mistakes. However, I have not found a way to layer. A new layer of pigment removes and mixes with the first layer. Sometimes this creates mud. I like to scumble two or three colors together, much like you see with the shaded areas of the pup and the background.

I keep adding color and scumbling until I get close to the image I wish to portray.

In the final step, I punch the darks in where I think they are needed most. Once the painting is completely dry, I spray the surface with acrylic matte fixative. Otherwise, any water that may contact the surface of the painting will affect it.

Other watercolor on gesso paintings that I have done can be found here, here, and here.

Pirates Among Us

Recently I went to see the new Pirates of the Carribean movie with my sister. Johnny Depp makes me laugh!  I guess that jogged my memory of a cool photo Tracey sent me when she was in California last year.  I believe she said she thought I might like the challenge. This was a guy who ran a booth at a festival that sold dog wear, leashes and bandanas and such. …and, yes, Tracey, challenging it was.

I revisited hot press paper again as I am trying to get the feel of painting on this surface.

Below are some steps in my process for those of you who like to see that.  No special techniques other than the use of some frisket in a few places.

I prepared a line drawing, first. I used that cross hair acrylic grid that I spoke of in a previous post here. This helped me visualise the placement of the two figures and their shapes.

I started the painting with the blue cap and the blanket on the dog. I think I did this to get a sense of the values I needed. I usually do not begin with darks. Next, I worked on the dog because I knew I wanted him to dominate the scene and the guy just back him up.

I wet the entire surface of the background and ran two of the colors I had used in the portrait from top to bottom by applying the pigment onto the wet surface at the top of the paper and tilting it so it would run down the page.  If any of the pigment ran onto the figures, I dabbed them off with a paper towel.  I painted in the bandana, guy’s hair, and removed the frisket around the dog’s glasses, bandana, tip of nose and guy’s hair.

  finished painting

I finished the painting by softening and defining the areas that had frisket applied. I also had to work with adding some darks to the man’s skin tones.

 

 

 

For Wrick: Charcoal and Watercolor

Wrick, from A 19 Planets Art Blog left a very interesting comment on the previous Biskit post. He talked about how much more realistic Biskit seemed using a photo reference and how some of the photo distortion actually gets into an artist’s work. He went on to suggest that it might be interesting to try a dog from life.  The above painting was  done from life.  This is Haley, a friend of mine’s dog. I had just read a book about using watercolor and charcoal together and had wanted to try my hand at it.  The book was titled “Painting People in Watercolor” by Alex Powers.  The drawing is done in charcoal.  I do more than just a line drawing when I work this way and continue on with it until I have areas shaded in. The next step is to paint with watercolor.  The watercolor picks up some of the charcoal as you work in and around it.  There is an interesting mix of opaque and transparent passages.  

Thanks, Wrick!

A Dog Named Biskit

This is Biskit. My daughter recently asked me (6 months ago) if I would paint a portrait of her beloved Golden. I had tried about 5 years ago and was not able to come up with one that did him justice. I took pictures of him and flipped through them about two weeks ago and settled on the pose above. He is extremely hard to capture a photo of as he is an exuberant fellow and doesn’t quite understand posing. I have a lot of shots of him laying on the floor pouting as we would try to pose him and tell him to stay. He’d immediately lay down and pout because he  would prefer to have his head in your lap, nosing your hand and placing his paw on your knee.  I was lucky enough to get this picture of him later in the evening before he actually realised I was paying attention to him again.  This defines Biskit. Bright eyes, ears down and back and a huge grin on his face.

The following is the making of the above portrait.  Please realize I only post these progression pictures in the event that they can help you in trying something I have attempted as I create. 

I chose hotpress paper again as I am still experimenting with it. My first step was to get a good line drawing:

In order to get the proportions correct, I used my clear acrylic crosshairs I talked about here.

You can faintly see in the above step that I used liquid friskit in tiny areas around the eyes, nose, mouth and to define the whiskers. I then began to paint washes of color onto the image by following the values I saw in the reference as well the countours that defined the roundness of his form or flow of the hairs of his coat.  I learned hotpress paper does not respond to my normal wet-in-wet techniques in the same way as the coldpress paper does. My images look a little better if I use contour  and paint more in a drawing mode on it. Approached, in this manner, I get a fairly good painterly feel as I lay color next to color or add a second wash.  I defined Biskit’s largest forms (head, muzzle and neck) prior to concentrating on the background and detailed areas of the features.  My palette consisted of  American Journey colors copper penny,  june bug, raw sienna, harvest gold, naples yellow, burnt sienna, burnt umber and permanent rose. I also used Winsor Newton quinachridone gold.

The above is the bulk or the “meat”of my painting.  I first described the eyes. I had an instructor tell me once that it helps to get some color into the eyes before working too much of the background. She said it helps to give some life to the image so you can see the balance between background and the image.  Notice, in this stage, the friskit has not been removed and the eyes don’t have too much definition to them. They just have the lights and darks of it.  I then layed in the background wet-in-wet. I wanted it to look a little broken up and mottled so I chose a large mop brush that holds a lot of water to lay the colors in. I mixed two large dark washes of the two dark colors I had used in the portrait. I chose these colors because I wanted to push the head forward so the golds could “pop” and  move forward in the format. Those colors were june bug and copper penny. I worked fast so I could get the mingling of color you see in the lower right quadrant. While the wash was still wet, I picked up the board and tilted it back and forth a little to help with the direction of the flow. Once the background was dry, I removed the friskit and furthur detailed the eyes and mouth.

The above view of the eyes show them after the friskit was removed.  Note the light tone in the irises of both eyes. I had layered quinachridone gold, followed by burnt sienna and waited for that to dry. I then layered copper penny, june bug and burnt umber on the pupil and waited for that to dry. Next, I took a small damp brush and lifted out some of the burnt sienna on the iris and some of the burnt umber on the pupils to create the lighter areas in them that give the eyes their roundness.  Note the friskit had covered some of the lid on the eye on the left as it faces you and I needed to touch that up and shape the white area nearest the nose to have a little warm tone to it more like the inside corner of an eye. This is detail work that can be crucial to some portraits if you wish to draw the viewers’ eye to them. I caution you to not add these highlights unless you see them in the reference material.  I did not see them in the Rudolph painting I posted here because his eye in the reference was soft and dark. Eyes can go wrong quickly and highlights and tonal differences look freaky if misplaced.

Above is the image of the finished eyes.

I then concentrated on tongue, teeth and lips. The above is an image before I detailed them.

I removed the friskit. I shaded the tongue and gums with darker washes of permanent rose so they showed the bends and folds of the tongue around the teeth and the darker pigment in the gums. I shaded the teeth with very light washes of june bug and lifted out some of the burnt umber along the upper curve of the lower lip.

  finished painting

Yupo Watercolors

This is the view of the same creek as here only it is looking west instead of east.

Have you ever tried using watercolor on Yupo paper?  I am not very accomplished but do return to enjoy painting on this surface from time to time.  I can only tell you that I jump right in and explore when I paint on yupo. I do not draw, first, but enjoy shaping the form in. I usually don’t get very far with the initial laying in of color. That comes, later as I introduce more and more color and begin to allow the water and pigments to mix.  Because this paper is plastic, I use very little water.  I enjoy lifting out mistakes with a damp brush and reshaping.  I never quite know when I am finished but thoroughly enjoy time spent trying to work on this slippery surface. 

Sandrine Pelissier has shared some of her techniques here.  And has a tutorial here.