Cat...

Just completed this commission - it's a surprise for someone who has had a very rough year and I am hoping it will do the business and cheer them up.  Drawn using Derwent Drawing Pencils and Coloursoft Pencils on pastel paper.

I am now free for the first time in months to paint what I want to paint...now to find some inspiration!
 

Hello February!

I've never been so glad to see the back of a month as I am to wave goodbye to January 2016!  What a ghastly few weeks it has been - I am hoping that February will see an upturn in our luck as we could sure use it.

This little pencil drawing has gone some way to keeping me sane - I've put a considerable amount of hours into it, but it is very slow progress.  Nearing the finish line now, just the left-hand greenery to do.  I'm using Derwent Coloursoft pencils - lovely selection of colours, but do need a lot of repeated going over to get the depth of colour I am after.  Not a problem, in fact quite soothing!  I did discover that I can scrape back the applied colour with a sharp blade to reveal the first colour used - terrific for detail on the shiny feathers.

I've had this sumptious ball of laceweight yarn for months now, since my last trip to London.  Finally started a wide lace scarf with it and am loving the way the colours blend into each other.  The flash on the camera has made the purples a lot brighter than they actually are, but it is still a stunning colourway.

I've been having a small spring clean of various drawers in the house lately, the spice drawer being one of them.  I discovered I had caraway seeds (who knew??) and with the left over beetroot in the fridge, it all came together to make this interesting cake, recipe in this month's Simple Things magazine.  I wonder if it tastes as good as it looks...

Taking It Slow...

Well, the beginning of 2016 was so awful that I haven't felt very inspired of late.  However, as things slowly quiet down it has been possible to gently get back into the swing of things. I've had this picture of a turaco in mind for months, probably since the summer, and have finally got a spare week to get on with it.  I am using Derwent Coloursoft pencils - a huge set of 72 that I was given on my birthday.  They are indeed quite soft and took a while to get used to, but I am now getting the hang of them and realising they need to be built up with many layers to get the depth of colour I want, but it is worth the extra effort.  The slow pace has been great for de-stressing!

With the January sales going on in our town, I have found several knitting books going very cheap.  One had this fab hat pattern in it, which justified the whole £3 I spent on the book!  Quite complicated when you are not feeling 100%, but it turned out well - a present for my boy!

It's been a tad chilly this week -this was the edge of the pond yesterday where the fountain had gone off centre and sprayed the rocks.  Pretty!

Not Mushroom In There...

I could get used to this working from home malarkey!  A free morning while my daughter was out meant I could buckle down and finish this highly detailed coloured pencil drawing. It was fun but the tight detail was beginning to pall, so I am glad it's out of the way.

This was drawn using Faber Castell coloured pencils (wonderful things!) on The Langton Extra Smooth watercolour paper.  It's now for sale in my Etsy shop.

Next up....not sure, but nothing using coloured pencils for a while!

Slow Going

Considering I have supposedly been freelance for over a week now, yesterday was the first day I actually had time to work in the morning as well as the afternoon.  I'm trying to get this detailed coloured pencil drawing out of the way in order to move on.  It's taking far longer than I thought, not just because I've been painting & decorating, but also because I am discovering just how much detail there is in old leaves!  I'm using Faber Castell coloured pencils which are a dream to use, especially with the new pencil sharpener I got for Christmas which hones them into a deadly point, ideal for fiddly detail.  However, it's reached the stage where I am starting to get bored, so it needs finishing before it gets abandoned.

The new work area has reached a bit of an impasse as well. Over the weekend we put up the little corner shelves and a corkboard. Kind of appropriate that the only thing on the corkboard is one lone plush brain cell...  Until the new divan with under-bed storage gets delivered, there is not much point in shifting my yarn stash upstairs.  Some of it has gone up there, but the bulk of it will go under the bed, so I can't do anything for now.  At the moment I keep wandering in there, admiring it and wandering out to go back downstairs and work in the living room - got to get a grip!

On the needles this week: bagpipes, haggis, whisky and a small dog.

Transformations & Toadstools

For the past few years, this has been my work station, although not usually quite so messy as this!  Under that heap are two boxes of fabric, two boxes of yarn, so deeply buried that I can't remember what is in the yarn boxes. There are three bags of yarn that I use most often, a wadge of felt that I am currently using, two boxes of habadashery, a couple of books, a few magazines, and several wips.  It's awful, I know!  The only plus side is that it's right next to where I sit on the sofa and everything is within arm's reach.  But it has reached unworkable proportions - and something needed to be done!

I'm a firm believer in everything happening for a reason, and last month events seemed to fit together like clockwork - it started when I made the decision to quit my day job, followed by my son announcing that he was moving out.  Which meant there was a room going spare....  I have worked very hard over the past couple of weeks, painting the walls and door and assembling and placing new furniture.  The room is so small that I cannot get far enough back to take a decent photo, but this will be my desk and those shelves are waiting to be filled tidily with all my clutter craft materials and books.  There are shelves under the desk, one of which is just crying out for the sewing machine.  I'm aching, tired, but very pleased that it is well on it's way.  Now comes the long process of sorting through my stashes and being ruthless with anything that is never used. 

Did you notice that the new rug has buttons on it - buttons! 

I did take half of yesterday off though - a trip to the tip and a second coat of paint on the door were enough for me, and so I could spend a little time on the toadstool which has been sadly neglected over Christmas.  I think one more afternoon should see this completed.

This & That...

Two days before the festivities begin and I think we might be just about ready!  Stacie and I have been having fun with a gingerbread house kit (Morrisons £4, I can't get over what good value this is!).  Stacie has badgered me for several years now to buy a kit and I have held off because I felt they were always expensive - and looked complicated!  However, this one was dead easy and while I had to do the construction bit (with Stacie holding things in place) and the icing, she was able to add the sweetie decorations and thoroughly enjoyed herself.  Trouble is, it will be a shame to break into it to eat it!

Despite tearing around Christmas shopping, sorting out the house, finishing off the day job (yay!) and wrapping presents, I have managed to squeeze in a little painting time.  This is a small coloured pencil work of a toadstool we saw on a dog walk a few weeks ago.  I'm using Faber-Castell coloured pencils - one of Amazon's Black Friday bargains - and they are gorgeous!  Very slow and painstaking, but very therapeutic!

And while taking a short break from the Nudinits knitting, I've been doing some other crafting.  This is a purse in the shape of a goldfish....I got the clasp free with a knitting magazine and it just shouted out to be used as a mouth.  The purse will no doubt be totally impractical, but will look cute at least!

Climbing That Hill...

There was a moment a few days ago when panic was setting in as I wondered if I had bitten off more than I can chew as far as commissions are concerned.  However, it would seem that with nibbling away at the list whenever I can, it is slowly getting done well within the deadlines.

This is a portrait in Derwent Drawing pencils which should be finished by the end of this week, with plenty of time before Christmas.  The poor dog was sadly run over earlier this year, so hopefully the painting will be a reminder of a much-loved pet.

On the needles: ARGH! You'll have to keep an eye on Nudinits in the run up to Christmas to see what I have been knitting lately!  It has been challenging...

Leopard

Yesterday was finally a productive day and this painting got finished at last.  I think I could spend another week on it if I am honest, messing about with finer details, but it needs to be left now as I have other things to be done.  I also want to enter this into the Derwent Prize this year and there aren't many days left to do so!

This was using Derwent Drawing Pencils on a light brown pastel paper, with copious amounts of white body paint as white pencils just don't show up.  I wish someone would invent a white pencil that did the job properly.

The leopard is one I photographed at Marwell Zoo last month - I had to 'edit out' the wire from the enclosure.

Next up - a horse and his girl in acrylics.

The Last Leg....

...literally, just one leg to go on this painting.  Half term has not quite worked out how I planned - life has a habit of getting in the way and we have had things beyond our control to deal with.  So I have not managed to put in as much work on this as I had hoped, but the end is definitely in sight.  Today should do it however, and the next painting is aready in preparation.

I've been knitting away too, trying to replicate wicker and tartan in miniature for this dog bed.  It took a bit of thinking and experimentation, but I think I got there in the end.  I like the wicker effect so much that I may well use it again in the sets I make for my shop.

On the needles...a church door!

Leopard...

This is making slow progress, probably due to the fact I keep getting distracted by the garden in the sunshine! But it's making good progress and I am pleased so far.  I'm using Derwent Drawing Pencils, which is what I use a lot for pet portraits but not often on wildlife art.  I like the effect though, but it is very painstaking.

I'm noticing that my new Splender Blender pencils are slightly different to the old ones I have - the blender pencil is an integral part of these pictures, it not only blends the pencil marks together, it brings the colours out.  I prefer a waxy blender pencil which is what these were, but now they seem harder and not so forgiving on the paper.  Other brands have never pleased me - either too hard or too powdery, so I am hoping this is just a blip on Lyra's part.

On the needles....nothing!  I finished the thrush, managed to finally get the wings right and get him assembled to my satisfaction.  I'm dying to show you but have to get permission first as he is technically not mine!

Preparation Is Everything

This is my sketch, ready for the painting demo on Tuesday.  It took me roughly two hours all together to get this right (I'm hoping I have!)  One of the main points I always stress when people ask about painting animals is that the initial drawing has to be as correct as it can be.  Ther is no point in spending hours over your painting, using your brush and paints beautifully, if the underlying structure of the animal is completely wrong. I have see it time and time again in local exhibitions - and occasionally even some professional work - where there is something amiss with the anatomy of an animal, some skeletal fault in the drawing that has a huge knock-on effect on the rest of the painting.  It's a shame to put so much work into a picture and have the creature look like it has been beaten round the head with a sledgehammer!

It is not necessary to sit and study books on anatomy, although that wouldn't hurt. My tip, such as it is, is to imagine you are actually touching the animal as you draw.  If you think about when you pet your cat or dog, hopefully their skull is symetrical, with no untoward lumps and bumps sticking out. Their limbs have the same amount of joints and bend in a certain way; they have a ribcage which creates the whole shape of the torso. To get this basic anatomy incorrect will obviously make the finished painting incorrect.  There's nothing worse than a wonky aninal!

So spending at least a couple of hours in preparing is time well spent.  Hopefully this drawing will result in a decent painting at the end of Tuesday night!

Meg

This was one of those paintings that I really didn't want to end, I enjoyed it so much. It's when you find yourself going over the same ground and achieving nothing new you know that it's time to put the pencils down!

This was in Derwent Drawing pencils with white acrylic highlights on Canson pastel paper in a grey/blue shade.

Next on the drawing board, a tutorial in Inktense for Paint magazine - yup, I have to write an article for a magazine....gulp!

I Wish It Were Mine....

A few years ago, a work colleague of my partner mentioned he had found a certain book in the effects of his recently departed brother-in-law.  When we heard what it was, we asked if we could have a look - what artist would not want to see a first edition copy of Stubbs The Anatomy of The Horse?

It was a huge book, about 2 ft across and not in the greatest of condition.

Good enough to read the text however, and also to look at the incredible illustrations.

We painstakingly photographed every page in order to keep a record of this wonderful book.

I've always loved Stubbs' work, and Whistlejacket is one of my all time favourite paintings.  Every time I go to the National Gallery in London I have to stand for a while and gaze at that lifesize painted horse.

Obviously Stubbs had researched horse anatomy to the minutest detail.

I only wish we had been able to keep this incredible treasure - we did consider trying to convince the man that it was worthless, but I don't think that would have worked somehow!

At least I have a photographic record of it though and know that I got to look at it in real life.

I also wish I could paint and draw like him!

At Last!

Thank goodness that's over!  I did enjoy drawing this but found it a real slog - perhaps I wasn't in the mood for a tight controlled pencil drawing, but the final few days felt like very hard work!  But I didn't give up and I'm glad because it's come out reasonably well.  I'm not too sure what to do with it now....any offers?

A bone of contention in our house is the amount of toys living on my daughter's bed. I know she loves each and every one of them and that they all have their special positions and at night the more favoured ones sleep with her while the others have little sleeping places made for them around her room, with cardigans and jumpers for covers.  However, when it comes to me making the bed, they drive me CRAZY!  My daughter cannot make her own bed - it's raised and she can't reach it without precariously balancing on the steps, so it's easier if I do it. So every day I have to gather them up, sort them out and put them back in their proper places.  When it comes to changing the sheets...well, you can imagine, it takes quite a while.

Today I took off the old sheets for washing before breakfast and it was an hour or so before I went back up there to put the fresh ones on.  This is what I found - a quite spectacular pyramid of soft toys - the photo does not do justice to the sheer mathematical precision of this arrangement.  I don't know how long it took her or if it was the work of some entity from the film Poltergeist, but it really made me laugh!  It made putting the sheets on a whole lot easier too!

Too Busy...

I've been very busy over the past week but not with much I can show unfortunately.  I've been designing and knitting some mascot scarves for a company in the USA which has taken up a lot of time - a terrific commission, but I'm keeping the designs under my hat. 

I did have time yesterday to hollow out a lightbulb.......why?  You may ask - I'm going to fill it with something which will hopefully look quite cute.  It took two attempts to get a successfully empty bulb - I managed to poke a screwdriver through the first one just as I had finished doing the hard work of getting the thick glass seal broken down and out of the way.  The thing I am most proud of is getting it done without any blood loss!

I'm losing the will to live over this drawing - not only is it in meticulous detail using only the sharpest of pencils, but he also has quite a difficult coiffure to achieve in this style.  As soon as he is finished, I'm getting the watercolours out and painting something loose and splashy!

Slow Progress.......

I'm very glad I don't work like this all the time, it would drive me crazy!  This seemed a good idea initially, a painstaking pencil study in minute detail, and I know it will be worth it when it is finished but I have to admit to feeling just a teensy bit.......bored.  Perhaps it's too soon after the three detailed animal pictures, perhaps I should have done something big and splashy instead.  Never mind little dog, you will get finished, honest......

Just For Fun......

I have no painting commissions on the go at the moment, and after a couple of days resting the eyes from painting that leopard, withdrawal symptoms set in.  A while back I bought National Geographic magazine as it had some fantastic photographs of dogs as well as a really interesting article about their DNA.  (Finding out my saluki is one of the closest breeds in DNA to a wolf was enlightening - wolves spend a lot of time lolling on sofas and pestering for cake do they?)

Anyway, the Chinese Crested caught my eye and I fancied drawing him in fine detail.  It's very soothing to quietly sit there using tiny pencil strokes, working at my own pace intead of breakneck speed.

I also found myself looking up rescue sites on the web to see if any of these adorable little dogs were up for adoption.....but having an almost-wolf (would-be wolf?) in the house might scupper that idea!

Let Me Show You....

Here are the three paintings for Derwent that I have been working on for the past couple of weeks.  Generally I work in quite a leisurely fashion, quickly but at my own pace.  This time I had to really get a move on!

These are for exhibition in an educational supplier's to show just what Derwent Inktense pencils and blocks can do.  I have tried throughout all three paintings to use the colours in as many ways as I could - as pencils, as paint, with washes, dry brush technique and even splattering.

This last one was very tricky indeed - usually such a detailed and complicated animal would take me about a fortnight to complete, especially mapping out those spots.  I managed to do this in five days....my eyes are still aching!

I'm taking a couple of days break from drawing and painting, but still have plenty to be getting on with.  There are enough knitting commissions to keep me busy this week - I'm working on a very small telephone at the moment - watch this space!

Hi Cutie!

When I was told by Derwent Pencils that one of my commissions was to be of a monkey, my heart sank a bit - I've not had much success drawing primates in the past to be honest.  But this little guy sems to have acquired a life of his own on the paper - I love it when that happens.  Everything just fell into place when I sketched it out and as for that face, so cute!  I just can't wait to get back to it - that's how work should be!