Fantasy with Stillman & Birn Sketchbooks

[gakinme]

Thank you, Jacquip.

This is one of those where I have to decide if I should do it on black paper and paint white ink on or do it on white paper and put black ink on. In the end, I chose white paper with Chinese black ink and brush for the bigger strokes and then a G Nib with Kuretake manga ink. The areas where I need hair and fur flying out, I used Deleter manga white ink. In real life, the white ink is not white enough. I should have used Dr. Ph Martin's Pen-white tonight. But photoshop renders every shade of white pure white anyway.

It's been a while since I used Stillman Alpha for Chinese brush and ink. It is so thick a paper relatively that I could still use the underleaf.

[jacquip]

Really good work here. Very effective. Great expression. I keep looking to see what you did in black and what in white.

I finally got some G nibs and don't really like them, they are way too fine for me. If you want some extra nibs (I bought the 10 pack) I'm happy to send them to you. PM me.

[DrDebby]

Amazing variety of work. The black and white is very dramatic.

[gakinme]

Thank you, Jacqui, Debby.

I've PM'd you, Jacqui!

The black is the left background, the eyes, and shading on the face, and the jacket is done with a very dry Chinese brush of Chinese sumi ink. The white manga ink is on the few flying hair that needed a finer tip, the bangs that fall on the face and I had to cover some shading on the forehead and eyebrows that way. I also put white ink over the lapels where there were some patches of black previously. I also had to cover some black crevices on the rith side of her hair where I previously put too much black. It's a lot of fun knowing that I could cover black ink that way. It's less scary because now I know I could "fix" things.

P.S. The eyes. A huge dollop of ink fell on the left inner corner of the eye and I soaked it up quickly with a bit of paper towel. So I had put put an equivalent dollop on the right eye to balance it out.

[JTMB]

Nice group of sketches! Good to see the results of the graphite powder experiments. My favorite image is the one with the frog.

[Vivien Maloney]

I love your inventive work Sandra and the variety of it is wonderful! Great black & white portrait.

[gakinme]

Thank you, John, Vivien, for your comments.

I was following a Painting the desert (in oil paint) book and I think this is supposed to be Arizona.

Dr. Ph Martin Bombay India Ink and Caran D'Ache Neocolor II
Stillman & Birn Alpha 9x12 inch hardbound



This horse is from my friend Ana.

All Holbein oil pastel.

Same journal and size.

I always have a habit of sketching only with oil pastel leaving a lot of white holes in between. Melting crayons doesn't give me that option and so I move the colors around more boldly. You could see my melted crayon horse I did this morning here. But using cool dry oil pastel, I keep falling back into my old habit of brief sketches and worry that I would overdo the colors. You could see how I'm still hesitating between the two approaches in this one.

A mention about Holbein oil pastel. I don't understand why so many people complain that it's either too hard or too crumbly. It's neither. It's soft and buttery. I don't even need heated surface for something so perfect. It has the edges to do the perfect small details and it has the right consistency for layering colors. With plastic wrap around the stick, there's no mess.

[jacquip]

I love this last piece Sandra, great colour and so cute with his tongue hanging out. Melting crayons sounds intriguing but very messy.

[Joan T]

Great work!!! I love the black and white, but the one of the horse is super!!!

[Davkin]

That ink sketch is excellent Sandra!

David

[JTMB]

The desert scene is very strikingly done. My favorite is of the horse done with oil pastels. I echo your sentiments on Holbein oil pastels - they and Senns are my favorites.

[DrDebby]

Stunning desert scene. Don't think I've seen a horse portrait with the tongue sticking out. Cute.

[poochemio]

Lovely desert painting Sandra, could be Arizona, could be right around where I live in Northern New Mexico

[gakinme]

Thank you, everyone, for your comments.

Alright, I've been practicing doing waves in oil pastel the last two weeks following this thread How to Get Started in Painting Ocean Water Scenes Using OPs .

Today I've done two more pieces. This is a second piece. You could see the first piece at this post. That piece is acrylics base and oil pastel top and it's going onto the wall tonight.

I did it on a small 6x8 inch Stillman & Birn Delta Spiral Bound sketchbook because I wanted to test out my watercolor skills.

This page has Golden Crackle paste that makes the watercolor crackle but it didn't. But it allows me to put many layers of watercolor on without the page curling so I'm happy.

Since I didn't save enough white and the color was very weak since the ground absorbs the color tremendously and dulls it, I added Mungyo Gallery Artist grade oil pastel and Sennelier Jumbo oil pastel too just like the other one. Only that this one, I didn't fill every hole because I want a certain transparency still. It worked fine.



Granted, this is not fantasy yet but very soon, I'll be populating these seas with my monsters and perhaps full battle scene.

This reference is based on Frederick Waugh's work.

[RainySea]

Love the angle you got on that horse, cool composition and great color. The landscape is beautiful even without monsters

Man, I have to drag out my oil pastels soon . . seeing yours motivated me.