The Crafty Crane Finish

This was my first try at combining stain with the gouache I was using earlier, and I'm really pleased with how it came out. I think I'll be using this method for the rest of my work.

If you look back a few posts you can see how the background in my sketch differs greatly from what ended up in the image. That's because I let the pattern of the wood grain dictate some of how the background fits in. In this piece I used the shapes of two lighter areas of wood to become the shape of the ground.

Just for Fun

A happy little whale to put on my business cards.

The Sound and The Fury

I've decided to experiment a little bit with wood stains again at the prompting of some of my fellow thesis mates and Fred, and the first piece I finished is an assignment from Seminar to illustrate a sound I hate.

This piece is done entirely with wood stain for the tone and ink for the outlines, and I really like some of the subtlety of it. I want to tweak it a little where the mosquito overlaps the girl, but for now I'm really happy with how it came out. I'm already incorporating stain into the next thesis piece I am working on, so hopefully I'll be able to bring in some of the successes of this piece into my thesis work.

A Failed Attempt

It was a few weeks ago that Fred brought to my attention the fact that I should find something to seal my paintings with. My first thought was some kind of spray varnish to avoid possibly smearing things with a brush, but I don't want a glossy finish on my paintings so I decided to try out a matte spray. The store I went to didn't have much of a selection and no brands that I was familiar with, but I finally picked out a can of something called Matte Spray Clear. Unfortunately this product is about as far from clear as possible.

Luckily I decided to test it out before putting it on my actual paintings. I blocked out the bottom half of my test piece because I wanted to see if there would be any color changes. Instead I came back to find a milky white film over the half of the painting I sprayed. It is possible that I put on a bit too thick of a layer but too much thinner and I don't think it would be fully protected. So for now it's back to the drawing board I guess. I have some acrylic gel medium in matte that I might try out next, but any other ideas or suggestions are quite welcome.

Elephants, Hares, and Crafty Cranes

I feel like I've been lagging a bit this past week or so, but I do have an almost-finish for the story Elephants and Hares. The story can be read here. There's just a little bit of detail work left on this piece, there's going to be some plants and such in the foreground.

I also have a sketch for my next piece, The Crafty Crane and the Craftier Crab (text here). The background in the sketch looks a little sparse but thats because I usually figure out exact placements of things once I'm actually working on the wood and can use the grain pattern as a guide. I think I'll try a post documenting my process with this next piece.