Unfortunately sometimes I order watercolour paper and it comes through the post a bit bent up, so my answer to this is to splice up the creased up paper into strips where only small critters like these fish can fit — a happy ending!
These fighting fish were created using Indian ink, brusho pigment, white pen and watercolour and available to purchase in my shop.
Here are some working progresses, I’ve used a variety of water soluble markers to highlight where the colours will be strongest on the paper before adding water and fainter colours. These two are painted on 200gsm paper and hopefully I will update soon with the finished results!
I decided to try out a lighter weight paper 200gsm to practice on rather than the usual 300gsm, and surprisingly the paper buckling which I expected to be more dramatic — isn’t! I threw a lot of water at this piece but the paper stays relatively flat thankfully.
I love the colour orange so this omnivorous, leggy beast was perfect subject matter for me to paint, he has flecks of white ink in his ears and salt ground into his coat for texture. Maned wolves are found in South America and despite its name is neither a fox nor wolf.
Contrasting past and present bat paintings this week to gauge how my technique has changed. The biggest change I’ve made is that I no longer apply strong colours straight to the paper — which was a huge mistake, my past ‘technique’ was more reliant on luck rather than observation.
After losing a little bit of confidence painting big cats, I decided to retreat to smaller A5 cold pressed paper to paint this Mallard Duckling. I used to have a real problem with making animal drawings cute enough, but with time and practice I think this piece worked out.
My Lynx's on the other hand, did not work out. Discovering my strengths in painting is still really tough and I have a major problem with planning, I often sit wondering with a near finished piece — now what? And then overwork the piece to death. But the colours are nice, so I've decided to embarrass myself by displaying the results!
The more successful mallard ducking painting is available in my shop.
This large hare was created using lots of smudgy charcoal, I started with a simple scribbly hare drawing in which I defined more with charcoal before outlining in Indian ink. I then added white pigment to highlight the hares face and a few details.
I dragged a rubber across the lower back of the hare to get those distinct white streaks to come through.
