WIP 19th Aug 2015

It's been almost a fortnight since my last WIP and this is what I've done. Not a whole lot, really, but through a combination of car trouble, visiting the Edinburgh Festival and photographing new models I've only had two actual painting days.

One of which was my first full day painting since the op. As well as finishing the teacakes I started four new paintings. I'm starting small, since I have a lot of small canvases lying about and I have various ideas I want to try, so the bigger ones will have to wait a little while.

WIP Thursday 23rd July 2015 - Composition

This week I was reading about perspective and thinking about composition - I think I've been making progress and am quite excited about what I'll be able to show you next week.

WIP 2nd July 2015 - a day late, sorry guys!

Had a busy day and night yesterday (was at the Glasgow Print Studio opening of Comic Art: Millarworld and beyond, well worth seeing) so didn't manage to post up my last two weeks efforts.

Sadly I'm still getting a lot of pain in the hand so am limited in how long I can draw. Which is why there are only 5 drawings. But I do think things are getting better, and having less art making time means I've had more thinking time and more reference gathering time - which I really expect to get the benefit from over the next few months.

This weekend I'll be at the comic-con and then I have to do some really boring grown up stuff, so might be another fortnight before there are more drawings. However, I should move on from the single portraits into more imaginative grouped figures in this time - which is really exciting! Watch this space!

Liquid Pencil - WIP Thursday 18th June 2015

Liquid Pencil (made by Derivan) is my new favourite medium - using it lets me draw on the same scale as my paintings, really giving me a good idea of whether to progress or not. I also find it much easier to control tone than with charcoal, and using different pencils, graphite sticks and powdered graphite along with the liquid version lets me get different textures fairly quickly.

The above three drawings were done today in under six hours - so although drawing first may seem a waste of time, it really isn't. All three show potential to become drawings - although the top one (at 18 x 27 inches) is just a wee bit too big and if it becomes a painting I think would look better at maybe 15 x 24 inches.

Presently I'm working on doing portraits of each of my models before moving on to more complicated, several person compositions - doing this seems to make it easier to get a likeness later on as well as just generally being quite fun.

W.I.P June 11th 2015

My first full day back drawing since the op and I'm fairly pleased with the results - I did have to stop and start more than normal though, and finished early as my hand was just getting too sore. Never mind, it is a start and it feels really nice to finally begin to put down on paper some of all the ideas that have been percolating.

Stretch - Artgraf Watersoluble Graphite - Day 23

This was done with water soluble graphite from Artgraf, that comes in a little tin I bought at the Royal Academy last week. I thought that graphite might suit a picture of kitty with the grey winter trees behind her and I am fairly pleased with the results although as always with new media I can think of a few ways to do better next time. I used a chinese brush, which is my favourite for life drawing - I can really see this stuff being very useful indeed in the life class, especially if using pencils as well. The finished work has a lovely granulated, slightly sparkly look, which might suit a future project I'm thinking about. So although not entirely pleased with this drawing really glad I did it as I think it will lead to lots of other, better works.

All Black - day 7

Day 7 and I went shopping today for art materials - I realised that I didn't have any good, dark, 8b pencils - I think I must have used them all as I really, really loved these pencils once upon a time.

Now my hand has cramp as I'm really not used to this kind of intensive drawing any more, using a brush is so very much quicker. But being forced to take longer is possibly a good thing, I certainly felt that I was making more adjustments and decisions as I went along than I do when using watercolour so that it actually felt more like oil painting.

Next time, maybe a more scribbly, line based style - we'll see. There were a few other purchases which I'll use before the month is up - one of my aims this year is to broaden my drawing skills, both in what materials I use and how I use them - I hope you are enjoying my efforts so far.

Nosy Cat Day 3

Had a bit more time today so thought I'd try a ore detailed pencil drawing. Unfortunately black fur doesn't lend itself to that kind of work and I chose the wrong pencil - a derwent sketching light wash hb. It just wouldn't go dark, or layer satisfactory - I tried adding water, and that seemed to help a little, but still not happy with it. Oh well.

One reason I had more time was because although today was a studio day, I had to do various collecting/delivering paintings type of stuff. But I thought it would be nice to share how the studio looks presently - a tip, as I have been photographing for still lifes and everything has been pulled out. Anyway, here are some photos.