Rhum

Here he is - all done!  Finished towards the end of October, but just got around to updating my blog.  I really enjoyed this - pastels are a bit scary as they're not too open to correction!  But, they give such a wonderful texture to the fur.

I'm just starting two more commissions now, wips to follow . . .

Nearly Jubilee Day!

Busy this morning, darkening down and adding  more detail.  I've just popped downstairs to upload this and also to give my two naughty boys a kong each.  Max hasn't had one before so isn't too sure what to do with it.  Buddy's throwing it round the room, but the treats inside are stuck to the peanut butter!  That's enough now - back to work . . .

He's beginning to take shape . . .

Today I darkened down the darker areas of fur with black conte pastel.  The mouth I gave a layer of pale blue covered with two different pinks; I'll come back to this at the end.  The eyes: I used three different browns; again, I'll continue with the fur then go back and make a few more changes to them to sharpen the definition.  For some reason I find noses incredibly difficult!  It doesn't make sense, I know, because I find eyes and mouth ok, but I'm building the nose very slowly as velour paper isn't very forgiving with mistakes!

Jubilee Rhum

Jubilee is my latest commission; a working police dog and all round handsome chap.  I'm doing him in pastels as I did 'Relax with a Max' - except on amber-coloured velour paper.  The paper is A3, my favourite size to draw and he's attached to my new Reeves drawing board which I'm very pleased with!  Here are some in-progress photos:

Jinxie in graphite

I'm pleased with progress on this one as it's a technique I've never tried before.  I attended a workshop in  June with Clive Meredith (www.artofclivemeredith.blogspot.com) and was very inspired by his use of layering different grades of graphite pencil to get a truly lifelike depth.  This is my effort so far and is probably about 15 hours' work by now (it is A3!)

Sophie

This is the original photo I've chosen to work from.  It's quite an old photo, but despite that, I can see the direction of the fur and enough detail around the eye and  nose.  

I've made a start.  The portrait is quite small - A5 - the pencils need to be razor sharp for the detail!  I'm using Fabriano 50% cotton rag paper.