Syd 2

My work area is currently covered in work that has buckled because of the unusually high humidity we've been experiencing. Everything is weighted down under glass and books to keep it flat until this weather passes so I decided to add a background to my Sydney Revisited painting while I wait. Of course once my brush was wet I felt the need to tweak Syd, something I don't recommend when doing a loose style watercolor painting. I don't think I did too much damage but some of the spontaneity was lost. My mantra for loose style paintings: "get in, get out and don't go back unless you absolutely have to".

Sydney Revisited

I'm currently working on a commission on gessoed paper. The humidity level here has been unusually high lately and the gesso seems like it's taking forever to dry. It's like waiting for grass to grow.}:( In the meantime I felt the need to paint something so I used another of Kali's photos to paint Sydney, this time strickly watercolor...no pastel. This painting came together very fast and I found a new favorite color...DS Perylene Violet. So far I haven't met a Perylene I didn't like. It's possible to get a full range of values from them and they are great mixers as well.


p.s. I think Syd needs a background of some sort. Maybe just a few splatters.......

Sydney~Completed

As it happened, this turned into more of a pastel piece with a watercolor underpainting than a watercolor with a bit of pastel. I'm glad I was working on HP paper and was pleased it took the pastel so well. The background color was decided for me when my masking fluid decided to stain my paper. }:( I've never seen it do that before. Ummmm....anyway, I've sent an image to my niece for her approval. I'd love to paint Sydney again, this time with just watercolor and probably not in this particular pose.

Sydney~WIP 2

I've been working on this portrait for three solid days now. Unfortunately, my first attempt ended in failure. I was well into the painting when I realized my subject was too small for the size of the format. I've never pulled that stunt before and hope to never have it happen again. Thank God for my scanner and it's ability to enlarge drawings. What a time saver.

Yesterday I realized I wasn't happy with the fur. A Golden's fur tends to have lots of wispy waves and it just wasn't happening for me with the paint so I got out my pastels again. The nice thing about adding soft pastels to a watercolor...you can go back in over the pastel with the paint to bring back that vibrancy if things are begining to look a little dull. I'll probably have some colored pencil in this before it's over.

Sydney the Golden Retriever~WIP

From looking at the other photos of Sydney I noticed her eyes were quite large so I increased the size here which also worked to lessen the distortion. I enlarged the width of the top of her head, too. I also fixed the flash bulb eyes. Now to sort out the light source.

My working reference photo

My niece Kali's Golden Retriever, Sydney recently passed away quite unexpectedly and she requested a portrait. She had some nice large file photos of Sydney for me to reference which will help greatly. She also hoped I could paint Sydney with her mouth open which apparently was her normal expression. We had a Golden when the kids were little and he always had his mouth open in a perpetual goofy grin so it must be a Golden 'thing'. Kali provided me with one shot of her dog with her mouth open but the camera distortion wasn't going to make a nice portrait IMO so I'm sorting that problem out first. The photo was taken fairly close to the dog's face making the nose look too large, the eyes and head too small. It was also taken indoors with a flash so I'd like to change the light source. I don't want to lose the angle of the shot completely, just lessen it a bit.

This is a very rough sketch and I'm posting it mainly for my own purposes. I can spot things on screen I often miss IRL.