The portrait of this much beloved and sorely missed scamp Sam is now finished and ready to be sent off to the client. Sam was a happy dog that I had the privilege of meeting a couple of times, and he was always a very bouncy happy boy indeed. With his bright eyes and long lolling tongue, he would effortlessly capture the hearts of anyone who he met. It was…
This handsome chap is alas no longer with us, and I’ve been commissioned to create two portraits of him. This one is the first one with a tighter deadline, the other being a larger piece for Christmas. At this point I’ve just mapped out the entire piece, and there are a few areas that need a bit of attention before I blend and work it up towards finishing. Notably I’d…
I’ve been continuing on with this project, and as you can see I’ve been gradually working down the left side of the bird to fill out the wing. The variety of tones and subtle textures within this area alone is quite intense, required several different colours and blending them together. This makes it a very labour intensive piece to work on, but I’m happy with the effect that I’m achieving.…
Its been a while sinse I updated this one as I’ve been enjoying some time off with my partner over the half term. But not that the schools are back in (for now at least!) I’ve been back on it. As you can see, I’ve been making some progress over the face and head area. The depth of the feathers and that incredibly dense texture is a challenge to work…
I’ve been steadily working on this one as you can see, but the progress has been incremental rather than huge strides. Piece by piece is how such things are completed however, and I’d rather gradually build a piece up and do it right than not. The whole composition is in now, the whole owl and the perch too. There’s so many subtle colours and details in this one that its…
I’ve been making steady progress on the Tawny Owl, gradually building up the initial tone and underlying texture. It is taking its time as there’s so much to get in, but it is a very satisfying project to see come together. I’ve so far managed to plot the head in and have started work down the neck of the piece and starting work on the near wing. This can be…
If there’s one type of bird I really like and admire, its owls of all sorts. They do come in all sorts of wonderful sizes, patterns and colours, all of which have their own unique character and nuance. Tawny Owls, a rarely seen native of Britain are easily one of my favourites due to their fantastic colouration and patterning: and I thought it was certainly about time that I had…
I recently acquired two new colours of paper, both by Clairfontaine who also makes the Pastelmat paper I use from time to time for my pastel work. This paper however is thicker and rougher than my usual Strathmore paper, but not by much. It does make a difference though, as I’ve been experimenting with both the “Naturelle” colour and the “Gris” colour papers. I don’t seem to get quite as…
“Lion silhouette”, Mars Lumograph pencils on Strathmore 300 paper, 297mm x 173mm. This piece is what you might call a bit of a break from the normal efforts, as there’s no detail to speak of, everything is backlit and the colours are as simple as could be: very unlike my usual work then! I wanted to try something a bit different and also see what would happen if I got…
For a sketch piece, I did somewhat get very involved in this one perhaps a little more than I had intended to do. But these things happens once you are into the swing of things. With this one, I just wanted to do something fairly quick, challenging and colourful that would be a good way to get into the swing of drawing again after August. I think the forced break…