Weekly Update

Here's a full body shot of the Rose Reiner I'm working on. Right now, I'm working on his second layer of roaning. I'm trying to incorporate the blanket in with the roaning as I work. At this point it takes me several hours to do each section of roaning and then I spray it before continuing. I'm working in sections: barrel, right hindquarters, shoulders/neck, underside, etc. Once I get 3-4 layers of roaning on him, it should start to speed up a little.

I've started putting color on Hank. He's in that really ugly streaky mode.

I'm still in the process of warming up Sushi's color.

I posted this Mercurio picture on a forum and on my official Facebook page, but for those of you who don't go there, here he is in his finished form.
That's all I've got worth showing this week! Lots of roaning to work on, so pictures may be sparse for a while.

Weekly Update

I have so many pictures to show this week, I had to leave some out! Here's the Jezebel that is going to be a red chestnut. She does look more red now. She'll probably end up being more orangey-red. Thanks for the tip, Jenn!

I'm warming up Sushi's body while cooling off her mane and tail, I think she's starting to head in the right direction now.

I've just got a base layer on the Hank commission right now. I'm excited about the color and pattern of this guy, but I don't know what it's called so you'll just have to wait and see.

A monster! I love this sculpture, he's so cool. He is going to be a roan. I hope my eyes hold out!

Dafydd has another layer, I've darkened his neck a bit and worked a little on his dapples. I have to work on the mane and tail next because they're bugging me.

Here's one of the mini Nahars I've been working on. I'm really happy with this rich bay color.

Okay, that's it for this week, hope you all have a great St. Patrick's Day for those of you who celebrate it! It's my husband's birthday so I'm off to get ingredients to make him his favorite treat.

Don't Give Up

Sometimes I have to remind myself of that when a piece is at this hideous stage. I knew I was going to have trouble with this color, and sure enough it is starting out with the wrong colors, wrong values, everything is wrong! How this Sushi looks right now reminds me of one of my very early attempts at painting when I was about 12 year old. I wish I had a photo of it, but the colors were almost exactly the same. Back then I did give up, and was so discouraged by my results that I didn't pick up painting models again for over 15 years. I didn't realize that I could continue painting and it would eventually look better. I thought everything had to look perfect right from the start lol! I'm glad I know better now ;-)

Here's a detail shot of the Rose Reiner that I'm working on. This is the 1st layer of roaning. I think I'm going to try something new with this one and incorporate some of the blanket in with the roaning and go back and forth with it.

Lots of chestnuts coming up. They always start out too orange. This guy is on his second layer.

This Mindy is going to be more of a toasty reddish-brown when she's done.

Nevada has another layer of oils. I really like the simple, clean shapes on this sculpture.

I've finally started on this Jezebel after customizing her tail and forelock. I'm planning on making her into a red chestnut. I haven't done a really red chestnut before and I think I'm going to have problems with that color.
That's all for this week! I think I'll be able to spray a couple of things that are almost finished and there might be a new face to see next week as well. Have a great one!

A Day in the Life

I'm always interested in seeing other people's spaces and work setups, and also in hearing how people spend their workday, so I thought I'd share a typical workday for me.

I get up early every morning: at 4:00 am! I start every morning with some exercise, when I have energy and motivation. Otherwise, I probably wouldn't exercise at all.

After breakfast, I start working. I try to start every workday with some drawing. I usually do line drawings of my kitchen, or sketches of my cats/husband or "talking heads" from the tv. Drawing is the one thing in my life that I can truly say I have confidence in. I'm a good draftsman and it brings me great enjoyment. I'm  past the point where mistakes would make me cringe and I would stress over every little thing. Now it's simply a joy.

Time to start on models! Here's my little oil painting setup. I hardly ever clean my palette. I tell myself that I will hold the model on the table, but I always end up scrunching down in that chair with the model in my lap. I usually listen to NPR while I work.

Here is my airbrush setup. The lower half holds paint and a few models-in-waiting. There is a fan that goes out to a fireplace behind it. I have one of those horrible loud compressors, it always makes me jump. I usually just do base coats with the airbrush, otherwise I would have to get a silent compressor.

In the afternoon I start painting my "flat work." It's not horse-related, as you can see. My eyes are usually pretty tired at this point so it becomes a bit of an endurance session now.

Here's my flat work setup. I don't know why I keep this palette clean and the other one dirty. I paint until the evening, about 7:00 pm.

No day is complete without Jeopardy! I always make grand plans to do some digital artwork in the evening, but unfortunately my energy is really low at this time, so it's usually off to bed soon after this.

(Semi) Weekly Update

I think I skipped last week. Okay, several things to show this week:

Here is the Paige Patty reiner that I finished up last week. I like the angle of this pose, I can see envision him with tack.

Here's the Rose Reiner with a couple of airbrushed base coats on him. I did a little hand-painting too. You can't see it in this photo but he has a faint spattering of airbrushed white to get him started a little bit with the roaning. I may do a little more in certain areas before I start roaning in earnest.

I'm still really nervous about this Sushi. I'm not sure how to continue. Should I use acrylics or oils for a body coat? Go right in with fleabites or work up the body more and then do some fleabites? Use paint or pencil for the fleabites? Maybe both. I have a feeling she's going to take a really long time.

Here's Dafydd with an airbrushed base coat. The color isn't exactly right but I think it will be good enough for a base for me.

This Sushi is going to have a lot of bling, so I had to add some white to her legs to remind myself not to paint any more black down there!

Taboo is closer to being finished. I'm still working on his blanket and some details. He will be a sales piece on eBay, hopefully by the end of this month or early March.

I dropped this poor Mini Nahar and three of his legs broke off. I was so mad at myself for letting this happen. The legs broke very clean so they will be easy to repair, but the ear is going to be a challenge for me. I couldn't find the eartip. I have had very poor results using the superglue/baking soda remedy, so this will be another learning experience for me as I have another go at it. I think I'm too messy with it. The precise application of glue or baking soda is not my strong point.

I'm getting the dreaded taxes ready over the next couple of weeks so posting may be sporadic for a while longer.

Lots of New Stuff Today

While I've been waiting for things to dry and detailing other pieces, I spent some time starting a few pieces. It felt good to be able to touch every single one of the sales pieces that I have planned for this year.

But first up is this Mercurio, who is coming along much more quickly than I had expected. Good news since I've had this guy for far too long. I still have work to do on him, but this photo illustrates my favorite point in a paintjob: when I can see everything starting to come together and I know that the end is in sight. It can feel really daunting to spend several months on one piece, to the point where I wonder if I'll ever finish, but when I get to this point it literally feels like a weight lifts off of me and I feel a surge of confidence because I know I can do it now.

And this is probably my second favorite point in a paintjob, where I have finished prepping and have just started to add color. It looks horrible, pretty much unrecognizable to the finished product, but it's here where I can let my imagination go and just have fun and not worry about anything. I actually started painting this guy but then I felt that he was a little too tight on his base, so I've been loosening the holes a little bit so it's not so hard to stick him on the base.

Taboo has another layer of acrylics painted on him, not sure how much farther 'll go with that before I switch over to oils.

Here's the Sushi that is going to be a fleabit grey. I am very nervous about doing this color and I'm really not sure how I'm going to go about it. I will probably do a combination of colored pencil and tiny brushwork, among other things.

I sure love this sculpture, I can't wait to get more color on him.

This Nevada is going to be a dun pinto. You can see how poor my airbrush skills are in this photo. I originally painted a light pangare color, but clumsily covered it all up with the body color. So I don't know whether airbrushing actually saves me time or not, since I'll have to fix that.

I have a really cool chestnut color picked out for Mindy, I hope I can pull it off! It won't look anything like this, I can tell you that much.

Vixen is going to be an appy. This is two layers of acrylic hand painting.

Imp will be a black blanket appy. It's kind of an extended blanket.
That's it for now. I'll be continuing the detailing of my current commission pieces, as well as putting more color on the Rose Reiner and the bay Sushi.

Update

Okay, back to blogging! I've been spending lots of time on the dappling for Alvaro and Mercurio, as well as detailing on the Paige Patty reiner, but I still want to wait before showing them again. I thought I would show a couple of detail shots of the dapples. Mercurio is more of a sooty buckskin color and Alvaro has more caramel tones. I'd say I'm about 85% done on Avaro and the reiner, and probably 65% on Mercurio. When I get down to the more detailed parts of any painting I slow down considerably, to the point where it sometimes feels like I'm making no progress.

Hmm, what else? Here's a (blurry) shot of all the mini sales pieces I plan on painting this year. I really want to be able to finish all of these this year.

And here is a new oil paint that I tried out that I really like:

It's called "Modigliani ochre" and is a really nice dull flesh-like color. It's a mix of red iron oxide, brown ochre and zinc white. Here's a little swatch of it:

It's not as warm as it looks on my screen, I'm very happy with it as a starting point for flesh tone mixes.

Somebody wants to be a model!