ONLINE ART COURSE – SELF-DIRECTED CHALLENGE PT 2

Today I completed the second facial feature on the self-directed challenge in pastel pencils. I’m not entirely happy with the result, but the ear is a complicated structure. The lighting on the reference photo was pretty strong, resulting in lots of contrast, but I think I may have overdone this a bit!

Here’s the close-up.

Certainly not the easiest subject to draw.

New art materials

My Strathmore Bristol Vellum paper arrived today – my goodness what high quality paper! It is extremely thick – almost like cardstock. The vellum surface has medium tooth so you can build several layers of coloured pencil. I am getting prepared for that module in the art course, which follows on after the next one, which is pen and watercolour (for which my hubby is joining me again – something I’m really looking forward to). I shall reserve this paper for special drawings, I think, as it is expensive.

I have also got some pencil extenders for when my coloured pencils get sharpened down to too short a length to be practical, and some refills for my Tombow Mono Eraser – a fine, spot eraser for fine work, not just for erasing errors but also as a drawing tool in its own right, for creating features such as fine hairs, by removing medium from the surface. I also have an electric eraser for this.

I have prepared several sheets of my very smooth printer card which I use for Zentangle drawing; I have painted them with Golden Satin Glazing Liquid which provides some tooth, making it suitable for coloured pencils, and which also makes it ideal for blending my Tombow Dual Brush Markers.

My next task is to make myself a colour wheel and swatch chart of all my coloured pencils – Derwent Coloursoft – I have the set of 72 which my hubby gave me a couple of years ago, and which I haven’t used much as yet. I am keen to get going on coloured pencil drawing and have been watching quite a few YouTube videos on the subject. There are some excellent teachers out there.