It is already past my ‘normal blog time’ this morning, so I will get right down to business. I am figuring out that sometimes we need to sacrifice chit-chat for quality content. While I like to sit and muse about the day, my plans and life in general with you all, I am finding that sometimes it is best if I just get to what I want to do and talk about it a little less. The photos speak for themselves.
My routine has changed somewhat lately and I have been trying to hit the gym prior to writing here. I don’t mention the gym or stuff like that often, as it really isn’t necessary. However, with having a job that consists of so much sitting, I really think it is an important part of my day. It was getting cumbersome to go after blogging, as I wouldn’t return home until noon or later. Then I would need to eat and before I knew it, most of the day was gone. Sometimes it is best to light a fire under myself and get out early and get back and carry on with my day. I think I am liking that way of doing things better. I am accomplishing more, anyway.
So where were we …
Yesterday I was working on the wonderful “Sittin’ In the Patch” pumpkin pattern from the lovely and talented Kim Christmas. I had shown how I used the DecoArt Chalkboard Paint for Glass for the base, and then the amazing Metallic Lustre Acrylic Wax (also from DecoArt) for the base. I then had to undercoat the pumpkins and moon and add the colors on top of them.
It was looking pretty cool. :)
I then went ahead and started shading and highlighting.
One thing about Kim’s designs is that she has the most wonderful palette of colors she works from. I am always quite drawn to them and seldom veer off to my own colors (which I often do with other patterns.)
I do admit that I decided to add some beautiful DecoArt Glamour Dust Ultra Fine Glitter paint on the moon and the pumpkins to give them a pretty shimmer. I finished the project off with a couple coats of spray gloss and the final pumpkin looks amazing!
Here is a close up of the colors:
See how subtle the Glamour Dust is? It looks simply MAGICAL!
Kim has this pattern available on her site for those who are interested. It is available as a paper pattern or a PDF one so you can order it and start right away. I decided not to put the faces on my pumpkins because I wanted to be able to keep the piece out through the month of November. It was really a quick and easy project and lots of fun.
When I finished up the pumpkin, it was only around 10pm and I wasn’t really tired yet. My shipment of Pastelmat paper by Clairefontaine had arrived from England earlier in the day and I was dying to try it out. As I mentioned before, I follow Jason Morgan (an amazing wildlife artist and teacher) on Pateron and I subscribe to his page- Jason Morgan Wildlife Artist. For those of you who don’t know – Pateron is a subscription based forum for artists to acquire monthly support in exchange for exclusive lessons, videos, reference photos, etc. I found Jason through Lisa Clough, who is another artist I pledge to and an excellent teacher as well. The small monthly pledges are well worth the knowledge that I have gained from both of them. I invite you to check them out. :)
In any case, a couple of weeks ago, I was watching Jason’s video on creating using pastel pencils and crayons. He had mentioned that by trying a certain type of paper, it changed his entire idea regarding pastels. Apparently, the paper was the key to making the pastels manageable and work for him and he was more than thrilled with it.
The paper he used was “Pastelmat” by Clairefontaine. I looked it up on Amazon and ordered a pad to try.
For once, I already had the pastel crayons and pencils he was using so I was excited about giving this new media a try.
I took some photos of my own cats, and chose this lovely photo of Pancakes to use for my reference:
I decided to use the charcoal coloured paper for the drawing. I sketched out the main lines for the fur direction …
I used the reference photo from my computer and was able to create a 'decent’ eye:
I was encouraged and pushed on. At one point I was thinking that I had chosen “too big” a desk for my studio, but as I worked on this, I was happy it is a large as it is. I filled it up pretty quickly with the pencils and crayons.
In about two hours, here is where I am at with the drawing. (Remember – this is mostly the under layers showing. There is still a LOT of work to go on it!) The pastel pencils I am using are Stablilo CarbOthello pastel colors.
I only had the set of 36 pencils, which I found rather restricting. I especially didn’t like that there was only one grey – which is very light. Because of that, I had trouble getting the proper shade on the eyes and so forth that needed to be done in detail. I may have to invest in the set of 60 pencils after all. :(
The crayons came in a set of 48. They are also by Stabilo I think and they are called “Conte a Paris”. I think that is all the colors they had for them. It was helpful for the larger areas to have more shades to choose from:
You can see from the set that there are a couple of shades of grey and more browns as well:
But overall, I am happy with it so far. Seeing it side by side makes me realize just what I have to work on. Also, I think leaving it overnight helped as well:
So that is it for today. Over the weekend, I have orders to cut and I plan on doing more work on this and also creating some new scroll saw patterns. Sometimes I feel like I am juggling lots of things at once. I wouldn’t have it any other way.
It is supposed to storm here in our area this weekend, making it a perfect weekend to stay inside and create. I hope you all have a great weekend as well. There is always something fun to do! :)
Happy Friday to you all!
via Tumblr http://davidpires578.tumblr.com/post/152114887289
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