Portraits of the Younglings of Dunnottar!

Dunnottar getting close to being cover ready

Yeah it's a little hazy there - I was going to re-shoot the photo, then looked again and realize I kind of like the look ... go figure. I will have to do the finishing touches on this piece and get another photo of the final thing, but this will do to go on until then.

The portraits of the Younglings of Dunnottar are also works in progress ... rough pencil sketches with colors added, similar to this process - pencil, seal, tint, seal, pencil, seal, tint, seal ... ad nauseum, ad infinitum LOL !!! Not really; it just seems that way!

Most of the portraits have their first tints; everything is experimental, learning as I go along here ... Merri, for example is going to get her mother Alianora's hair instead of the straight hair the sketch shows, just because; Diann's tinting needs toning down and touching up - her hair's too bright; Dothann's is going to need its hair fixed; Corrbed, however, may well be finished as is - I'm afraid to touch it for fear of messing it up ... Brann and Rua are still pencil sketches. So all you get to see here with any color is Corrbed - the others might shoot me if I put them up before they're ready to go. When they are ready, the current plan is for them to go onto the cover photo with Dunnottar centered among them. 

Here are the pencil sketches of the Younglings:

My Lord! Look at the eyes on that boy! Not his natural color here - those are even more stunning.

These are my current works in progress, and joy it is to work on them!

Experimenting for the Youngling Cover

Yeah, I know ... 

'Really, Shiela? Experimenting NOW? On a COVER? AGAIN?!'

Um ...

This time I'm conducting my experiment in an orderly fashion, I'll have you know.

*laughing*

I've got the horses and ponies sketched onto the 4x6 foot painting fabric, and instead of trying to remember what worked and how I did the ones for Perth and Tarnos, I've decided to not experiment directly with the big one.

So I've got myself a dish towel stretched onto my window frame easel (ironed this time, believe it or not) and am going to sketch the basic outlines onto that and go with the paint. 

This might take a while.

Here's a photo of the blank 'canvas' for you to gaze at while I go sketch.

# time gap

Okay, this is how I do some of the paintings. My own 'style' being more on the abstract or impressionistic side, when I want the conformation and such to be more 'accurate' I cheat. Pulling up the photo I want to enlarge on my computer screen, I hook the computer up to my handy dandy projector.

I can make the image any size I want, from big enough to fill the 4x6 foot painting 'frame' that I like, to small, to in between like the following photo. This is the image projected onto the fabric stapled to the window screen easel (three window screens hinged together, but I'm only using the top of one of the screens for this). Whatever's on my computer screen is what shows up.

I've had to do things the hard way for so long that I automatically take that route first, no matter what. I know that trying to draw on low thread count fabric is not going to work well. I always try it anyhow.

Then I try to make it easier by trying to seal it, this time with a spray sealant.

While I was waiting for the sealant to dry, it dawned on me that I've got part of a roll of actual canvas, so out I rolled it in my sewing room and cut a hunk to fit the screen easel.

Having neither the time nor the patience to get the heavier canvas 'stretched' onto the screen easel, which isn't exactly designed for any such thing, I looked around for another alternative. In front of my eyes sat a stack of pre-stretched canvases. These are the ones I use for pencil sketches of actual people, but really ... there's no law that I know of that says I can't sketch book covers on them. 

And so I did. 

Hung one on the pegs I put onto one of the screens for exactly that purpose, adjusted the projected image, and it took a whole ten minutes or so to get the horses and ponies sketched in.

Not only can I sketch more easily on the pre-stretched canvas, I can paint on it, too.

That means this experiment can continue with the dawn's early light as I try to figure out how to get Merri's Percheron a fiery red chestnut, Diann's Arabian white, Corrbed's Arabian black, Dothann's Welsh Pony a sort of bay, Brann's Welsh a gold palomino, and Rua's Shetland dapple grey. 

I have a plan, really I do. It's an experimental plan, but it MIGHT work!

Mm-hmmm.

I see those heads shaking and those brows raising.

Oh ye of little faith!

What is life but an adventure?

Yup.

And this one is only just beginning.

What I would like to know is how on God's green earth I'm going to get any details at all onto the faces of the Younglings who are destined to ride these steeds. They'll be about the size of a quarter ... thank goodness I have a very good pencil sharpener.

Ah well, I'll fret about it tomorrow.

'After all, tomorrow is another day.'

If I'm to be up by dawn's early light, I'd best find some rest.

*laughing*

I just thought to check the 'sealed' fabric - it actually seems to have maybe done some good, so I can use that one to test the colors on!

By the time I'm done experimenting this book cover is going to have half a dozen preliminary experimental versions!

Artwork In My Front Porch Windows

I live on Main Street of Small Town USA, just in case anyone was wondering how it is that so many people happen to drive by my house on a regular basis.

At different times I've hung artwork in my front porch windows, and get plenty of nice feedback about it. There are fourteen windows out there, four on each side of the front door and three each on the ends. Plenty of room for artwork!

Just recently I've hung the big drafts of the book cover paintings, to keep them unfolded and out of my way, and because I like seeing them.

A lady stopped by the shop where I was working the other day and told me that she had seen the Characters (of Mamm of Perth) in my front porch! It took me a minute to realize that she hadn't been hallucinating but was referring to the painting hanging there. Made me smile.

As this my artwork blog, perhaps it would be a good place to put the process of getting that painting done.

1.  Right off the bat I used a full sized bed sheet vertically, projected the images I wanted to use for patterns onto it, and sketched them in. I needed more horizontal space and the images weren't exactly what I wanted so I scrapped this one and started over.

2.  Here's the paper mock-up I decided on after a lot of image printing and making many and many 'paper dolls' to play with and rearrange. I also took lots of photos of the faces of my volunteer 'Character Reps'.

3.  This is the yew tree I chose after looking at photos of hundreds of them. I wanted the family to look like they were striding right out from the tree.

4.  Here and below are a trial I did. I wanted to back paint the background for the painting, and needed to know what to expect, whether the back painting would bleed through the images I blocked out on the front, or what. It looked like it might work, so I got to blocking the figures onto the front of the painting. This time I went with marking out a section four by six feet so as to have a painting that would translate well to the four by six inch size called for by the book cover design.

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5.  Blocking in the figures just means painting them as silhouettes on the face of the painting so the back painting wouldn't come through and I'd have the solid color to paint on rather than having to fight with trying to paint one design over the distraction of the one already there. Above is the face of the painting; below is the reverse showing through using a backlight.

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6.  Once the blocking was done I projected the image of the tree onto the face of the painting, checking to see how it might look, getting it to fit ... then I penciled it in.

7.  Above is the Yew sketched in with the figures, front view. Below is the reverse side of the painting with a backlight. I went ahead and used a marker to make the lines stronger. Paint trumps marker.

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8.  Next came blocking out Ullin's form and putting a defined outline in place with paint. Below you can see the result lit from the reverse side of the painting, the side the Yew gets painted onto.

 

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9.  This is the front of the painting. I added just a bit of water to the acrylics I used for the Yew, wanting to be sure it would saturate through to the front of the fabric - which it did beautifully, with the blocking holding its place nicely. Below is Ullin's face surrounded by the Yew foliage. That's a shadow on the painting; he isn't actually part grey. I added touches of foliage here and there on the front side to increase the illusion of him being in or a part of the tree.

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10.  And so the painting of the figures begins ... 

                                                    

                                                               

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11.  Once I got a halfway decent photo of the painting I took it into one of the programs I use to fiddle with photos and gave it a solid blue background. If you've got a copy of Mamm of Perth with this solid blue background, it's one of the first ones out of the chute.

Here's the final cover. Changed the background to one of my own photos and added the Circles of Dunnottar.