My husband happened to read my blog yesterday and yelled at me for even considering starting this portrait over. Of course, he's not an artist and doesn't realize some of the problems and complexities but many times he's right.
In this case, he suggested a background and also suggested playing around with the color in my graphics program. So, I did. I know the wall color of my client is a tannish, grayish, pinkish taupe color and I know the dog is so light (actually lighter than I have portrayed her and I intend to rectify that) that I need a darker background color. Do any of you have any suggestions for a good color to use?
I also played more with the Richeson sticks and realize that the PastelMat needs a lot of pastel in order to build enough of a base for blending. Before that base is built, about the only way to blend is with another pastel. Even so, the pencil marks are still not covering well and it's still difficult to layer the lighter colors over the darker ones. I still have more work to do on this so please think good thoughts for me!
So, it looks as if I'll continue with this and hope I don't overwork it or otherwise mess it up. If I do, well, then I guess I'll start over at that time.
