New watercolor portrait demonstration

Some of you might recall that November was busy for me - I had more portrait commissions last November than I've ever had in one month...

Forty (40) !

Looking back, I think I was a little crazy to keep up such a pace, but the material I got to work with was fantastic!

It wasn't too often that I paused to take photos while I worked, but here I will show you some of the steps involved in at least one of those portraits.

I don't always follow the same formula - a lot of it depends on my mood, and where I feel like starting. In this case, I started on the eyes and then laid in a suggestion of hair color. I used a light wash of Goethite (Daniel Smith's Brown Ochre) here because I like the subtlety of it - no bright yellow to have to contend with later on. The inky lashes are a mixture of the blue eye color and a bit of burnt sienna - that way if I hit them with water later on, they won't bleed "grey", but will give off neutral colors.

Next I blocked in some chunks of hair color. Permanent Alizarin Crimson, Cerulean Blue, Burnt Sienna and probably some burnt umber by the looks of it. I can't remember, so I'm going by how it looks to me now.

At this point I went back to the face and eyes, with light rose washes. Looks like Permanent Rose (I tend to go back and forth with PR and Quinacridone Rose) - mixed with a little Yellow Ochre or Gamboge most likely.

You can see that I deepened the warm shadows under her bangs here. A warmer mixture of the same skin tone does the trick (add a little more ochre to the mix - if it is too warm, cool it down a bit with Perylene Green) You don't want the forehead too cool - if in doubt, remember the "color band" basics of the Masters: Yellow (forehead), Red (face), Blue (neck). I won't go into color banding here because you can easily Google it.

And really, if you're the one holding the brush, you can paint with whatever colors you want to!

I would have kept adding layers of transparent color to the face here, defining the features and warming the right side of the face (the side closest to the viewer)

You can see that I "lifted out" a few light colored strands of hair here and there. This was done with a flat brush dipped in clean water then dabbed on a paper towel to remove most of the water. Then I just pulled the brush along the hair, lifting out streaks of color.

The details on the eyes and lips were the final touches, and a light wet-in-wet wash of Cerulean Blue and some kind of yellow for the background. I probably used Aureolin, or possibly Quinacridone Gold.

A Talent For Silence and Brevity...and the Killers in Toronto!

"A Talent for Silence and Brevity"

watercolor on Arches 300lb cold press paper
22 x 30 inches

Last year I worked on a couple original pieces for my own collection, to be used for showing in exhibitions and competitions. The seagull "If I Were A Blackbird" was one of them. This portrait of my youngest son was the other that I managed to complete.

The challenge for this piece was to achieve a warm glow underneath the shadows - not so easy inn watercolor! I worked with transparent glazing and layering techniques, over and over - until I was sure I was going to ruin the whole painting by making it too muddy, but I stepped back and put away the paint before it got that far (thankfully) - although it is bound to happen, I do hate wasting a full sheet of 300lb paper!

Now to take it out of the frame and get a high-res photo for use when submitting slides or cds.

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On another note, I had a BLAST last night - I went to the Killers concert in Toronto (a three-hour drive for me) but it was definitely worth it. I haven't been to a concert in almost 12 years - my last one was The Cure in Vancouver. I was fortunate to live in very large metropolitan cities when I was young (Sydney, Australia, then Vancouver) so I got my fill of every act I ever wanted to see (even Deborah Harry at a rave party in Sydney - that was sensational).

Here's a little sample of my evening - we had fabulous seats!

Irrelevant Wordless Wednesday

day three hundred sixty three. a lady always does whatever it takes to be a good host..., originally uploaded by ::reflecting truth::.

Custom paintings $10 off till Valentine's Day

If you are thinking of having a portrait commissioned this year, now is the perfect time! I have created a coupon for $10 off any painting commission over $50 at my website: www.christydekoning.com

Enter coupon code: Custom10 at checkout, and please send me a message with any questions at all.

More Twilight Paintings

Holy Cow - I cannot believe how long it's been since my last post. Sorry! What can I say, except that I've been painting?

I've been fortunate to have a wait-list of portraits to start on right away this January, which is traditionally a slow time of year for me. Of course, I was looking forward to painting a few new originals for my Etsy shop but I haven't really gotten to that yet.


What I did do, however, was paint two more ACEO portraits inspired by the Twilight movie. I've had a few requests for more cast members, so I added Bella and another Edward. These two portraits were painted together, using the same cool color schemes, to evoke the mood of being in the forest. Both of these stills are from the scene where Edward is explaining how Carlisle changed him into a vampire. I love the light in this particular setting, and the wonderful play of emotions on the character's faces.

I've been taking photos along the way of some other portraits I've worked on this month, so I hope to post a step-by-step demo again soon.

Whimsical Doll Art

Last year, I was fortunate to meet so many different people through my love of painting. One such person has the most beautiful marionette dolls I've ever seen, and on two occasions now she's asked me to paint small portraits of her dolls.

This will be trimmed to ACEO size, however I like the lost edges in the original version so I thought I'd post what it looks like before I do any cropping.

Note the puddle of color at the top left? That's where I blot my brush, or test out colors. Usually I have a scrap piece of watercolor paper handy beside me for just such a purpose, but when there is excess paper on the painting itself, it makes a perfect spot - the paper and texture is identical to the paper so I can see exactly how it will react.

Twilight / Robert Pattinson ACEO

"Edward"
2.5 x 3.5 inches
transparent watercolor on Arches 140lb cold-press paper

There's a reason I don't read as often as I used to.

I'm one of those people that can't put a good book down. I can't read myself to sleep. In fact, if I need to sleep, the LAST thing you want to do is hand me a good book because I'll be up all night.

Case in point: my Christmas gift this year.

I printed off this book list because I had been so busy painting all year that I really wasn't up on any new book releases. So it seemed like a good starting point for me. My top 3 requests were "The Time Traveler's Wife", "Shadow of the Wind" and "Twilight", in that order.

I received Twilight and, not knowing anything about it, started to read it that evening. I was so disappointed when I realized I had mistakenly asked for a "teen" book, and it was the only book I got! I was a teenager when Ann Rice wrote The Mummy (or Ramses the Damned) - one of my all time favorite books.

Nevertheless I plodded along to the first chapter and didn't get up off the couch until I'd read all 540+ pages (well okay, I went to bed for a while but I hardly slept before I was back to the couch reading again)

At that time, I think it was 9:30pm on Boxing Day, my dear husband politely asked me if I'd like him to go and buy me the second book. I must have looked pretty miserable at the thought of not having book 2 ready and waiting for another all-nighter.

(now just to clear things up here: my husband IS sweet, but I also believe his motives weren't entirely selfless...see he'd just bought a new TV that needed to be tweaked to his current project - a digital home theatre contained within a computer - so it was in his best interest to keep me occupied)

So now I've seen the movie (disappointing screenplay but I loved the cast) because I had to suffer through New Year's Day without book 3 to get started on, so why not go to the show? And now that I'm almost ready to start painting portraits again for the new year, I thought I'd freshen up my brush strokes with a little bit of fun.

I looked for a good shot of the actor, Robert Pattinson who played Edward Cullen in the movie. I wanted a pic where he was displaying the charming twisted smile that seems to be his trademark in the book, instead of the brooding photos of him like the one on the movie poster. And of course I was looking forward to painting that lovely russet hair too!

The most challenging part of this painting for me was that I had to steer away from the usual warm colors I would use in a portrait. It was important to keep his skin tone "cool" without looking too too dead & lifeless.

I'm back to book 3 now (and yes, I already have book 4 ready and waiting - I DO learn from my mistakes, after all).