oil pastel experiment

[sundiver]

Found a use for that student-grade scratchboard paper I bought last summer. It's NFG for scratchboard, won't work at all, so I tried it for an oil pastel technique described by John Elliot.
You smear pale colors over a paper which has been covered with India ink (I used the scratchboard instead), then scratch out a snowscene. I found the cheaper pastels weren't very opaque and ended up sticking with the Holbein artist ones.
I worried that the black might scratch right off, since that's what it's supposed to do, but true to character, it didn't!
Thanks for looking. Comments/critiques welcome.

[Dark_Shades]

wow, all these different techniques you are coming up with Sundiver......... Yet another excellent one....... I love this one

[KarenU]

Now this, I love!! Both the finished piece and the process you used to get there....marvelous. You are on a roll here Sundiver and I'm loving it! Keep it up. It looks like you've used some beautiful purple's, blue's and cream's and that striking black is wonderful. How fun.

[sunny]

Fun technique I bet...the result is a beauty!

[Katherine J]

Neat technique, Sundiver, and very nice piece with a real winter mood about it.

Katherine

[sandge]

Wow! That technique has made such a beautiful painting! I love the variations in your 'white' snow! Great job!

[Mikki Petersen]

Talk about making a silf purse out of a sow's ear! I probably would have pitched that paper in the trash when it did not work as advertised. You instead find a very creative and SUCCESSFUL use for it. Beautiful piece. Great technique.

[Briar Rose]

I love it. I hope I will be able to achive this kind of mastery someday.

[Bluefly]

This worked out great!

[Bluefly]

I thought about buying some of those boards, thanks for that info but I may still buy some for this technique. Thanks

[marionh]

Very Effective. Did you blend all the oil pastels on top to give a smooth surface?

[pragash]

originally posted by sandge:

Wow! That technique has made such a beautiful painting! I love the variations in your 'white' snow! Great job!

ditto.
pragash

[Hazelnice]

amazing! that technique has made such wonderful art. thanks for posting this one.

[Phil Coleman]

Rather than using India ink on perhaps white paper, could one use black card?

Then there would be no danger of revealing the underlying paper, or perhaps coating the black card with clear colourfix to provide the tooth for the oil pastel.

[halthepainter]

I would use clear gesso to avoid damaging the black card when you start scratching.