Quackers and squeakers

This is my latest painting, using pastels on sanded paper. I wanted to tackle the challenge of drawing animal reflection on water, something I've not dared to try. And I'm so glad I did! Another milestone checked.

 

Also unlike my previous pieces, I wanted to see if I could achieve a more painterly look, meaning broader marks and fewer details, like an oil painting. So I stuck to soft pastels as much as I could and minimised the use of pastel pencils. I used my Unison Emma Colbert Animal and Mungyo Gallery 30 soft pastels sets.

I started with the head and had to force myself not to go into minute detail with the feathers. This is Canson Mi-Teintes Touch paper, which is a sanded paper, different from the regular Canson Mi-Teintes. This paper has a very fine sanded surface, and took the soft pastels quite well, although it's smudgier than the rougher sanded papers.

 

And then I added the broad strokes for the body. Sometimes I do the dark areas first, other times I do the light. Don't ask me why - I'm just indecisive that way. Often, I end up going back and forth, unable to decide right to the end. Argh.

I didn't know what to expect with the reflection - reflections on water always struck me as very tricky. I copied the reference photo as best as I could and took some liberties with the colours. One thing I have to say, not having to go into fine details with the soft pastels felt especially freeing! It's a different kind of messy fun. Though I guess you can't really call this a painterly look.

By the time I filled in the water ripples, I was feeling really good about this drawing. Somehow it all came together quite well, even though there was a momentary mess when I really dithered between leaving the lighter parts of the water uncoloured and filling them in. I finally decided on the latter This photo was taken before filling in the lighter tone. The final picture is the very first photo above.

Often, I take inspiration from photos. I didn't intend to draw a duck until I saw this great reference photo on Paint My Photo. Finding good reference photos to draw from can be challenging, which is why I was so glad to have stumbled on this site. Here, you can find thousands of photos taken by people who wish to share their images to artists. This means artists are free to draw from any of these photos without impinging on copyright laws. It's a terrific idea - bringing together artists and photographers for the creation of art.

This was another drawing I did two days ago, also using a reference photo from Paint My Photo. Isn't it sweet? It's a harvest mouse.

I applaud the photographer for being able to capture this shot! Unfortunately, my photography skills aren't as good as his - if you see the background in person, it's a lot less splotchy than it appears in the photo.

I used coloured pencils for the mouse, the wheat and the branch, and soft pastels for the background. Coloured pencils are always nice in bringing out the very fine details that pastels can't. The paper is the regular Canson Mi-Teintes, the non-sanded one.