Shawnee Painting Update

Not much of an update on the painting of Shawnee but it's been a pretty busy last few days.  As usual, I see several things to be corrected already and I'm just blocking in color at the moment.  One of the wonderful pluses for acrylic paint though is the ease in correcting mistakes!

The most exciting thing that happened lately was a trip to Raleigh (NC) for the "Art of the Carolinas" trade show that Jerry's Artarama puts on every year.  We got there shortly after it opened on Friday figuring that it wouldn't be too crowded on a Friday morning - Wrong!  I picked up a few items I needed  then stood in a check-out line that didn't seem to move.  I was told by the artists in front of and behind me that it was the worst time to visit the show!  I guess everyone tries to get there early to buy supplies for the different workshops along with trying to get frames and canvases before they get picked over!  Since I wasn't in the market for either of those items and wasn't taking a workshop, I wish I'd waited to attend the show! 

As it was, I bought a few things at the show for some good prices but still ended up with a small bag of stuff and about $60 poorer!  Not only that, but we ended up going just down the street to the actual Jerry's store (which blessedly was nearly empty of customers) for some acid free foam board.  I also saw some Rub'nBuff which I had heard was great to transform frames and picked up a tube of that.  I'd looked for it in Hobby Lobby and our local big box building supply store but hadn't found it. 

Since it's so rare for me to get to go to a large art supply store, I really wanted to look around more.  But being at the show with all that crowd was really wearing.  It was shoulder to shoulder in the huge room that contained much of the show and trying to see what was available was nearly impossible.  At the store itself, many of the shelves were empty or depleted because the stock had been taken to the show. 

Oh, well, I got pretty much what I went for plus a little extra so it was certainly successful in that regard!

It's back to work on the portrait of Shawnee today and I think I may get the colors all blocked in and a good start on the detailing if all goes well.

I'm also starting a portrait of two beautiful Golden Retrievers and have the sketch pretty much worked out for that.  It will be on a full sheet of PastelMat which is the largest size pastel portrait I've done.  I'm looking forward to starting it but feel I need to wait until Shawnee is finished so pastel dust won't contaminate the acrylic portrait. 

As always, I'll keep you posted!

I Can Spell Schnauzer! Pastel on Suede Paper

This little guy was the source of some controversy as I had gotten the reference photo from Paint My Photo, a group I belong to.  I had started the painting but gotten busy and put it aside until today when I finished it.  I had intended to finish it in a loose style and enter it into a challenge at PMP but the person who posted the photo had left the site and removed the photos they had posted. 

The challenge is to paint a photo from the site in a loose manner but, as you can see, I failed miserably at looseness with this!  At PMP, all paintings posted must be from a photo also posted on the site.  I guess it's ok that the person left and I can't enter this in the challenge as it's not a best effort.  I began it to play on some suede paper I'd bought and had liked for other paintings but it was difficult to get the colors right on this bright red paper. 

It's another painting that I'm not particularly pleased with but I'm posting just to show you that I am painting. lol!

BTW, it's still ok to post the painting even though the reference has been removed from PMP - it's also posted on MorgueFile.

New Portrait Painting & Some Observations

I just finished the portrait shown and delivered it to the customer yesterday.  This one went fairly easily and I just love this little dog's face.  It's a pastel done on velour paper and everything went fine until I began to spray between the layers.

Velour is a funny/odd substrate in that pastel will all fall off when you don't want it to and will cling tenaciously when you want to remove it!  I swear it seems to know the difference!  So, to prevent problems, I normally spray with fixative between layers then leave the top layer alone or spray very lightly.

I reviewed the SpectraFix fixative not too long ago here on my blog and that is what I used on this portrait.  It's about the only fixative I've ever used that doesn't change the color of the pastel and I think it's the best fixative out there.

However, even with the utmost care, it can "sputter" and leave large drops of the fixative on the painting.  I've had it happen both on paper and with the velour and it's very difficult to correct as the spots show up clearly.  There's not much you can do to correct the spots on paper and even going over the spot with more pastel sometimes doesn't cover it completely.  Normally it's a bit easier on the velour, fortunately.  I waited for the spots to dry completely then took a stiff bristle brush to gently brush the fixative off as much as possible and to sort of fluff up the nap.  I can add back pastel if needed to cover completely but usually the velour doesn't need it.

This time it didn't work that well and the spots were really visible on the background where there was no pastel to begin with.  I ended up adding a halo effect with pastel around the dog to hide the spots.  This worked, fortunately.

I'll know in the future to shield any areas without pastel to protect from these spots! 

Whew!

I know it's been a while since I was last here but I've been swamped by various projects. Some have been in the making for a while and I'll let you know about those when they're ready to be announced.

In the meantime, I've started a new dog portrait. This one is very special since 1) it's for a wonderful person 2) it's a lovely dog and 3) I'm using my new PastelMat for the first time on a commission!

I'd planned to do give you a full WIP, but, as usual, I got started and forgot to scan the basic sketch! However, I didn't get very far before I remembered so there's very little done.

In this wip, I hope to better learn the properties of the PastelMat, of course, but I also hope to learn more about mixing colors in pastel. I've been told that an artist really needs the exact color they want to lay down as mixing colors isn't really feasible in this medium. For this dog, I don't think the exact colors are available as I think I have just about every "dog" or "cat" color made and they're still not quite right!

Also, I'm working from some relatively bad reference photos. Well, the photo showing the body of the dog isn't too bad but the eyes were totally flashed out in that photo to the point where even the area around them was badly affected. I had another photo showing the eyes pretty well so I ended up using the one photo for the actual dog but am using the second photo to sketch in and paint the eyes. It looks right so far so I'm excited to see how it all works out!

I'm also excited about using the PastelMat again. I said in an earlier post that I didn't think I wanted to like it very much because it wasn't available here in the US. Well, I just found out that it is available here now! I don't know if any other art stores will carry it, but Dakota Pastels is now offering it to their customers. Having it available in the US may not entice me to use it more though as it's still a very expensive support! Hope my customers appreciate the fact that they're getting the best! lol

More later - let me get back to work on this so I'll have an update to post tomorrow!

Sadie Memorial W.I.P - Final

Sadie - Complete
Pastel on Velour
copyright
Jan Gibson

I think I've completed the portrait of Sadie but am letting it "marinate" a bit to be sure. I haven't sent a proof to the owner yet either but will do so in just a little while. She will know for sure if I've gotten sweet Sadie right.

Now that Sadie is complete, I feel as if I have unfettered time to spend with my granddaughter before she leaves to go back home. I also want to practice more with the gouache as well - I'd like to try an animal instead of a flower the next time. I'd like to learn to paint animals in gouache as it's easier to correct mistakes with it than correcting them in watercolor. And, with my heavy hand, I think gouache may be more suited to me than watercolor. We'll just have to see how it all goes after a few practice sessions.

So many mediums, so many supports and so little time! lol

Memorial Portrait W.I.P.

"Sadie"
pastel on velour
copyright
Jan Gibson

This is a portrait I started a few days ago and I figured I ought to post a wip (work in progress) while I was at it since I haven't posted here in a while. So far it's going well but all I'm doing right now is laying down the base colors and I don't know how long it will take to finish. I'm trying to work all over the portrait to make sure to get the shading/tones right as a whole instead of working a section at a time.

The light has been awful since we've had rain for what seems forever here! It's not been so much rain as it's been drizzly and overcast and really kind of depressing!

I'm kind of excited as next week a friend and I may go to Raleigh to Jerry's Artarama (retail store) and that should be a really fun trip. It's not that I need any art supplies but just getting to go look is a real treat. So much of the time, I mail order my supplies and don't know exactly what I'm getting until it arrives. I even mail order from Jerry's as the store doesn't carry all of what they have in their catalog. But, even being fairly well-stocked right now, I'll bet I'll find something I just have to have. What do you think? lol

The Trials of a Pet Portrait Artist!

I have a new commission to paint a very sweet, but lively, LowChen dog. The owner did not have any good photos of him and he's definitely a dog who wouldn't sit still long enough to have his portrait painted so I took some photos of him for references. It almost seemed like a scene out of a Laurel and Hardy movie or something! Just as I'd snap the picture, Samson would turn his head
or scoot completely out of the frame! Food was a great incentive for him - an incentive to dance around until he got a treat from you, that is. At one point, it almost seemed as if he was laughing at us!


I did end up getting some decent photos of him and it was really a fun challenge doing so. Not only did I get some reference photos, I also got to know Samson a bit better. I had never seen a LowChen in person and had only recently even heard of the breed so this was a great opportunity for me. If Samson is any indication of the traits of the breed, I'd definitely recommend one for a pet. He's loving and lively and really beautiful!