Painting progress part 1

There is a group show coming up that promises to be a lot of fun, so I'll be documenting my efforts to create a painting for it. "Radical Nautical" is the title, and the loose theme as I understand it is the sea and related lore. There is only a vague idea lurking in my mind at this point, but that doesn't mean I can't at least get started on the background. So, on with the show! This canvas is 32" by 45", and after working feverishly for about an hour last night this was the result:


A complete and total mess, luckily this will be completely obscured by the time I'm done with the background. Another hour's worth of layering led to this:


The goal is a textured shade of green and blue, light enough to transfer a drawing to but interesting enough to keep me working. Still too dark at this point, so another hour of work this morning and:


Getting closer, but this is still a bit too dark for the transferred drawing to be visible against. Back to work......

Hero Abatement Process

One of the reasons for starting this blog was to have a space where I could play around, and not have to worry so much about keeping it looking professional, like my other site. For the most recently completed painting, "Hero Abatement Process," I took photos during the painting process, although not exactly at critical intervals. The documentation was taken at stopping points, when it was time for a break or to stop for the day.

The much-labored over background, which never really seems to be complete. If you look closely the transferred drawing can be seen.
Outline of the drawing, usually executed in black but for some reason, variety maybe, I went with red this time.
The first layer of black work, there will be two layers ideally, and three or four where needed. Also, this is straight black acrylic, which is never dark enough for me, subsequent layers will be black mixed with dark green, blue or purple.

It's never too late to revisit the background, although at this point the color scheme is mostly worked out in my head, and the background is almost dialed in.

The background is complete, and now it's time to concentrate on the main figures. At this point the skull is mostly complete, and the first layer of paint for the clothing is done.

The home stretch, I've mostly been concentrating on the female figure at this point, with many layers of paint for the skin tones. Her face never seemed to be just right, and it kept getting revisited and tweaked. At this point I ended up taking a day off from work and spending the whole day blazing through it. Once the skin tones for the face fell in to place the rest of the painting was a snap.

The finished painting, which was delivered to the client last night. I didn't want him to see the painting until fully complete, but now that it is in his hands this can be posted.

Testing

Testing, testing. In an attempt to keep my real website more professional, this will be used for more informal but painting-related material. Let's see if this will last for more than a week or so.