work in progress: another stone!

My new rotary bits finally arrived, so I am working to finish this stone and the one from my previous post. Please excuse the bad photo - I'll try to get a better one up.

work in progress: green square knot stone

Newest stone in progress

I began this yesterday- spent just over an hour carving on it last night. This stone is carving nicely, and I can't wait to get more done.

celtic whales

Wow, it's been a while since I last posted. I've been busy with kids, colds and flus, too many snow days.

I've been working on the celtic raven painting, but I'm not happy with it at this stage, so I'm not showing it to you, yet. ;)

I will show you the line drawing I did last night. I will work on it more today, and hopefully post again with something finished.

Celtic humpbacks, about 4"x4".

work in progress: celtic raven

After finishing Dad's painting, I decided I wanted to do another acrylic before I get back to my apples. I spent the better part of the day yesterday deciding what I would do, and then last night worked up a sketch.
The first picture shows how I often compose paintings. I've drawn the elements of the compostion on tracing paper. Then I can move them around until I'm happy with how it looks.
Next, I lay another sheet of tracing paper over the design and trace everything again. Sometimes I'll do this tracing in ink. The next step is to turn the sheet of tracing paper over to the wrong side and trace each line in charcoal or graphite. When I flip the tracing paper over to the right side again, I have "carbonized" the image. I position the image over my canvas and tape it down, then re-trace each line again. When I peel off the tracing paper, the image has been transferred to the canvas.
Here you can see the carbonized image:

The next image is just an undercoating of paint, so I don't have to worry about rubbing the charcoal off the canvas. But, you can get an idea of what I'm doing. The image of the raven pinned to my easel is the reference image I'll be using... I swiped it from an old issue of Saltscapes magazine. As you can see, I like to work on the kitchen counter during the day, so I can see the kids and chase/fetch/feed/potty/rescue terrorized animals as needed.

Oh yeah... I'm thinking of starting a petition or something to have the school board subsidize nerve pills for parents of children who have been snowed home from school for four days now. Aaaaargh.

work in progress: apples and pot

An update on the apples: I have about seven layers of glaze down for the background, and have started building the apples and pot. I find watercolour painting convenient with my schedule because I can sneak up to my desk for 10 minutes at a time, long enough to lay down a wash, and then leave it to dry.

work in progress: tulips and fence

Taking a break from the apples while layers of glaze dry, I've been working on this last evening and this morning.

I did the line drawing last night, while hurling insults at Tracy Barlow and Charlie Stubbs on Coronation Street (okay, I confess... I don't watch much TV, but I am hooked on Corrie).


This morning, I transferred the drawing to my watercolour sketchbook and began by masking out the brach and tulips with masking fluid, so I could work on the fence. After I'm satisfied with the fence, I'll peel the mask off and do the twig and tulips. I'm trying something new with this painting: I am mixing all my colours from the three primaries (primary cyan, primary magenta, and primary lemon yellow) and black. You can see my mixed palette in the photo below.

more work on the apples

I worked on the apples last night after I got the kids to bed. Bobby was at the annual $100 buddies poker game, so I knew I had a few hours.
I traced the value sketch on a piece of tracing paper, then used the tracing paper as carbon paper to transfer the basic line drawing to a watercolour board. You can see the board circled in blue, with the top edge of the apples and pot masked off with greenish-blue masking fluid. I got a layer of paint down for the background, but didn't get a shot of it as the lighting wasn't great for photos.
The pad of paper you see is cheap watercolour paper. I'm using it here to plan what colours will go where in the painting. I drew a quick sketch of the outlines of the apples and pot, and used that to test the paints colours on.
The earphones on top of my colour wheel are also an important piece of art equipment! Last night I was playing an old Dave Matthews Band CD. I hadn't listened to it for a while, and it took me back a few years.