Channeling ~ WIP

I'm almost done with this latest collage. There's still a little tweaking to be done. It was inspired by the man made channel (aka Pine River) in my own town. It connects Lake Michigan with Round Lake creating a safe harbor for ships and boats. I've taken photos along the way to create a work in progress beginning with the very first sketches. Most of the papers are homemade including blue crystalline paper for my lake water. The rest are magazine pages and a few prints I made from images I found online.

Fabulous ~ rough sketches

When I first saw my photo reference online the word 'Fabulous' popped into my head so that will be my working title until further notice. I had snagged this image quite some time ago because I knew I wanted to do something with it but wasn't sure what. I finally had some ideas, maybe too many. That's why the variety of sketches. Anyhoo I did a Google image search, found the photographer/s and contacted them. These ladies generously granted me permission to use a few of their photos for inspiration. Don't you just love the attitude? This is SO in my wheelhouse. These are just rough sketches to help me toss around ideas. They all could work but what is my main intention. At this point I'm leaning toward the top comp. Sometimes less conveys more.

Drawing People Faces

I've got two more victims on the drawing board, both inspired by more photos courtesy of frankin (PMP).  I liked the idea that their hands made it in the photo but I was concerned I might have problems rendering them. It's been a long time since I drew a pair of hands. Boy, was I wrong. Much to my surprise the hands turned out to be fairly easy. The girl's hat however became a nightmare. I don't like ellipses. Or they don't like me. Whatever.....anyhoo it's taken me two days and I'm still not entirely happy with the hat but I'm going to make do.

Above: the man drawing 1. the original drawing   2. a continuous line drawing

the girl 1. & 2. two tries. I never did conquer the hat. I finally resorted to tracing the darn thing.

Back to the Drawing Board

Sorry for the lapse in updates. My flamingos fell by the wayside when my COPD flared again this Spring. Seems it's become an annual event. While recovering I needed to avoid the alcohol ink fumes so I completed a commission for a long time friend, a watercolor painting of a lady slipper I've been promising her for yeeears, and also a few pencil sketches for myself. I forget to simply draw something for my own pleasure. I enjoy it and don't know why I don't do it more often. I need to remedy that.

This gal is strickly from my imagination.

The receptionist at my doctor's office.
Lovely girl.
She has a perfectly oval face.

Garlic ~ thumbnail sketches

I've been on a bit of a hiatus. This winter has been rough on my lungs and I really haven't been in a very creative mood as a result. I finally bucked up and drew these simple thumbnail sketches the other night. I'm thinking of a small, garlic themed series. I've painted a garlic braid (ristra) before but I've never painted the scapes. When the scapes first appeared in my garlic patch I was quite enamored with them. For those that aren't familiar, they are the stems and flower buds of hardneck garlic and they look like graceful, long necked birds. They appear almost overnight and begin to coil around in the most amazing way. I haven't decided what medium I'd like to use yet. I'm thinking pen and wash. 

BTW, I'm happy to report the client loved the portrait (JUGGS). Yes! I found out later that this is his 40th anniversary gift to his wife. And here I thought it was for Valentines Day. I'm kinda glad I found out about the anniversary after the fact. It would've added that much more pressure.      

Cawcus~Developing a Concept

I've been observing a flock of crows that have been visiting the park this winter. Actually I think they may be ravens because they are huge. I keep a tripod in the front window and take photos whenever the opportunity presents itself. The title is a play on words, the word being caucus (link). Here I've gathered various sketches of crows, some from my own photos, some from imagination and others from images online and created a storyboard of sorts. The sizes of the birds in relationship to each other and within the composition are off and the placement is still a work in progress but my ultimate goal is to create the illusion of a town hall meeting or 'crow caucus'. Because these birds seem to always be communicating with each other in some fashion, seemingly having discussions, the idea just naturally evolved.

Bandit and 8 Ball w/ WIP

Close to completion. Bandit's fur beneath his chin got a little heavy. It looks more like a goat's beard at the moment. I'll probably try to lighten it up a bit with white gouache and see how that works out.

The second series of washes. Bandit gets his mask.

The first washes

I wanted to pay homage to Bandit the lop ear which I mentioned in my previous post. I gave him a friend aptly named 8 Ball, a black rabbit with one white spot on his forehead. They turned out looking like a couple of rabbit desperadoes which I find amusing. My palette was very limited. Just Phthalo blue, burnt sienna and a little Quin gold deep.

Since we're experiencing an ongoing winter storm here I decided to pick up my brushes and finally get to work on the lop eared rabbits. I had been doing sketches of lop ears, working from online resources including Youtube videos. The videos definitely tested my sketching skills as I'm not used to drawing moving targets. Some of these videos were very entertaining. These rabbits are quite the little characters it seems. I also noticed a lot of variation in their facial features from rabbit to rabbit.

Cutie Pie

I've had the urge to paint lop eared rabbits but I don't happen to know any at the moment. I do remember a boy in my childhood neighborhood that had a pet lop ear named Bandit. What a character that rabbit was. He acted a lot like a little dog and the bond between that boy and his rabbit was amazing. Bandit would fetch for him and they'd lay on a fold out chaise and just hang out afterward.

I wound up searching online for photos to reference and found dwarf lop ears. Talk about cute ! These rabbits look like a cross between a guinea pig and a basset hound. I plan to do several of these sketches to become familiar with how they look from different angles, study their markings and color variations, etc. I'd also love to find some videos so I can see them in motion. I have an idea for a painting but I want to be as familiar as possible with my subject first. Always a good idea.

Beach Babies~Sketch

I've finally decided on a format for this commission. The current sketch is only 10" x 14". I'm going to go ahead and paint this but may wind up enlarging the sketch and redoing. I'm not sure I can work this small and include enough detail. I'll also be matting and framing this so I don't have to worry about keeping to any particular size. The hands will be the most difficult, especially since I changed a few things. I may have to borrow my neighbor's kids as models to sort things out.

I haven't been painting a lot these past two months but have been taking lots of photos for possible future references. Hopefully they will provide me with plenty of inspiration during the coming winter months. Fall in northern lower Michigan has been unusually pleasant weatherwise this year but I know it won't last much longer.

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.