More Katie ...

Katie - work in progress
acrylic on Aquabord panel
© Xan Blackburn

Some good work on this, today.  Building up more layers of color in the background, approaching the values (light/dark) I want around the portrait in general, and pretty close to done in some areas.

I had the idea today to make the shadows warm, and the highlights cool, which is the opposite of my general rule (very general), and I like how it's working.  My idea is to make the shadows, which is where all the detail is in this portrait, reveal the life, the blood under the skin and fur, the translucence of a living being by allowing that warmth to glow through.  The highlighted side of her face is almost featureless, a silhouette in reverse, but making that side glow with an almost blue light will give a sense of reflected sky, and really make the warm shadow areas pop.  In the end, the background will suggest a leafy background on a sun-filled day, and Katie will be emerging from that like the bright spirit she was.  Her lower body will fade gently back, so all our attention will be on her face, her expression, the gesture of her tilted head and half-raised ears.

It's really hard to show you what's going on in some areas.  My scanner can't capture the layers of color bouncing around in the background.  This just mostly looks like green, but there are blues, greens and gold-greens all laying on top of each other like leaves in the sun.  The eyes are too dark to scan well, but there is more subtle color going on there, too.

Katie (detail) - work in progress

This shows a little bit more.  There's a sketchy quality to this that I like right now, but it will get a bit more smoothing out before it's done, with more glazes pulling it all together.

So, that's where we are tonight.

Katie the Greyhound, Portrait

Katie - work in progress, detail
graphite on Aquabord panel
copyright Xan Blackburn 2013

Now, here's a challenge.  Katie the greyhound was a lovely girl, much loved by her humans.  Okay, that's not unusual for my clients and subjects.  Katie was mostly white, which presents the challenges of subtlety in shading, particularly where there is no strong light source to cast deep shadows.  Still, okay, not too impossible.  Katie's humans are both fine artists in their own right: okay, now it's gotten tricky!  The photo references are by Katie's human dad, and they are lovely just the way they are.  Katie's human mom is an accomplished artist, using pencils and watercolor.  Argh.  How to do justice in my own fairly realistic style to a photographic portrait that stands on its own?

I decided to try something a little different, this time.  Starting with a graphite drawing as the "under-painting" stage, and layering on glazes of translucent color after.  Working on Aquabord, an archival panel with a toothy texture which you can see in the detail above, means that detail will be slightly compromised by the bumpy texture.  Not a lot, but enough that it will keep me from getting lost down the rabbit-hole of every-single-hair, and so I can rely on the color glazes to build an atmosphere.

Katie - work in progress, stage 1
drawing well begun
© Xan Blackburn 2013

Katie - work in progress, stage 2
drawing done
© Xan Blackburn 2013

Once I had the drawing about where I wanted it, I sprayed it with a workable fixative, so that painting over it wouldn't smear the drawing.  I did this with my heart in my throat, since you just never know how that's going to go.  Luckily, it worked fine, and I didn't have to start over.

Now to start the glazing!  The background in the reference photo is dark, which is exactly right, to make her dazzling whiteness pop out.

Katie reference photo
 © Steve Uyehara

I plan to take a similar approach, keeping it vague, dark, with the lively greens kept to a suggestion of simple leaves, not to compete with Katie, herself.  Building up layers means you can achieve luminous, glowing dimensions of color.  The first go at the background, I'm laying in a clear yellow, to pull the background together, and begin achieving the final green tones.  Katie's shadier side is washed in a warm pinkish tone, to give her the glow of life that shows through her pale fur, and is clearly visible in her ears, and spotting the top of her muzzle.

Katie - work in progress, stage 3
first color glazes

 That yellow seems really strong right now, but it will become just a glowing member of the color team when all is completed.

That's where we're at today.  More as I go along!

Speaking of updates, I've added several projects to my Commercial Art page for your viewing pleasure.  Go take a look!

Truman

Truman
11" x 14", Acrylic on Canvas
copyright 2014 Xan Blackburn

Truman ... I loved this big boy.  He was my first big greyhound crush who was not my own dog. 

I rarely get to meet the subjects of my artwork, but Truman and his family are friends I've visited with all up and down the west coast.  When he passed last year, it was a blow to everyone who loved him (which is the same group as everyone who ever met him).  Lori asked me to do his portrait, and I jumped at the chance to share this tribute with her.  But wow.  It was tough.  I was choked with emotion, the need to do him justice, and got stuck a lot along the way.  There are only a few progress pictures, because when I finally got going, I didn't stop to take pictures.

Truman - work in progress, stage 1
starting the under-painting

Truman - work in progress, stage 2
crawling forward on the underpainting

Truman - work in progress, stage 3
getting a handle, developing the underpainting

Truman - work in progress, stage 4
most of color is laid in, developing detail

If you look at them closely, you can see how I had to re-adjust his eye focus as I went along.  Other than that, everything went forward pretty much as planned from the start.  

I will miss gazing into those almond-colored eyes, as I know Lori is also missing her blue-brindle coyote hound ever-puppy.

What I did on my "Summer Vacation"

So, "vacation" might not be the right word for when you've been too sick to work much, but let's just gloss over that for the time being (except to say, if you're old enough for the shingles vaccine, go get it!!)  (NOW!)  (If you want to be seriously grossed out by my shingles story, click here.)

I actually have several graphics I've gotten wrapped up and haven't told you about along the way, and have a portrait of one of my favorite dogs EVER on my table at the moment.  Sadly, it's a memorial portrait, which I still cannot believe.  *sigh*  Truman was one of the few of my portrait clients that I've actually had the honor and joy to know in person.

Let's start with the graphics and illustrations, shall we?  

After completing two logos for Brian Southwick (the his real estate logo here, and this real estate development logo here), Brian's wife got in touch with me to work up a logo for her. Also a real estate agent - broker, actually - she wanted something to reflect her own interests in gardening as well as to give a sense of the sophisticated homes she sells, with colors that would work with the identity colors of the company she works for. We kept this very clean and the symbology clear.

Kiens Logo
©Xan Blackburn 2014

SilkenFest 2014 (primary logo)
©Xan Blackburn 2014

I have had a lot of fun working with Iola and Penny on this next one.  An earlier project they were involved with resulted in some graphics that ended up on the cutting room floor, but which had a lot of support.  We recycled part of that un-used imagery to create a logo for the 2014 SilkenFest; the big annual event for fanciers of the Silken Windhound.  This one has three versions, so far, which can be used in various settings, including a backdrop for photographs of the winners of the various events.

SilkenFest 2014 (variant)
©Xan Blackburn 2014

Awhile back, we took a jaunt down to California and stopped in at a tiny dog show in the Sierra foothills.  I met a woman who was showing her Lagotto Romagnolos, a breed I'd never run across before.  We got to talking, I gave her my card, and we've worked on three projects so far. The first was a logo for the Lagotto Club of America,  which I talked about here.  These two are for the Lagotto club specialty; one for the specialty logo, and the other for a custom wine label.  I really enjoyed building up a watercolory effect with these two.  I tried doing actual watercolors for the wine label, but the learning curve was too steep to get the effects I wanted with the editability we need for logos, so back to Photoshop we went!

Lagotto Specialty Logo
©Xan Blackburn 2014

Larcan Lagotto Wine label
©Xan Blackburn 2014

Starfyre Silken Windhound Kennel Logo
©Xan Blackburn 2014

This one was fun!  (I have such nice clients!!)  Working from a photo of one of my client's gorgeous hounds, we played with the wonderful silky fur, and the kennel name (Starfyre), for this treatment.  They thought they might even want a black line version as a tattoo (now that's a lot of like!), so we also have this version.

Starfyre Logo/tattoo design
©Xan Blackburn 2014

Illustration for water field guide
©Xan Blackburn 2014

Work continues on my husband's field guide for water use.  I mentioned the cover design here.  It's been enjoyable doing this pen and ink-style drawing.  I'm doing the drawings digitally, but they still feel very old-school to me.

Illustration for water field guide
©Xan Blackburn 2014

Now, on to Truman's Portrait

Truman - work in progress
©Xan Blackburn 2014

Truman was a big, beautiful greyhound, a blue brindle, which is a coloring that never fails to just make my heart go pitter-pat.  Besides being a knock out physically, he was a knock out personality, too.  Huge.  This portrait captures an especially quiet moment, I expect after so much throwing himself around that he was exhausted.  Lying in the grass in the cool shade of summery trees, I want to focus in on his pale amber eyes, that resting-but-ready attentiveness, and of course the classically long greyhound schnozzle.  

On the left you can see the beginnings of the under painting.  I've transferred my drawing to the canvas, and have basically nailed down the main elements using my old pal, Payne's gray.  The next steps show the building up of the underpainting, establishing the darker tones, building up what will be almost a full grey-tone painting, to which I will then add the colors.  

Truman - work in progress
©Xan Blackburn 2014

Note that the pupils are a little out of control, and that I have reclaimed them in the next phase below.  His spare brindling is also becoming more noticeable, as well as the overall light/dark focus.  His face will have the most light, the most contrast, while his body will recede into the shadow a bit, and the background will hold atmospheric light to allow us to feel the sunny day surrounding this quiet moment.

Truman - work in progress
©Xan Blackburn 2014

So, that's where I'm at as of today.  Always plenty to do, right?

The idea got tossed out that I might do a graphic novel/comic book using sighthounds ...

(and other breeds, probably) as the characters, maybe some super-hero action, maybe serialized, maybe digital and/or print-on-demand ....  Anyone have any thoughts on that?  Would you actually buy something like that?  What kind of story-line would be more compelling, to you?  I'd love to hear from you!  Drop me a comment!

Split Personality: Graphics & Portraits

I have gone back and forth over the last few years:

Keep graphics on my menu of services vs. concentrate on portraiture.  

On the one hand, I want to grow and develop my skills and career as a fine artist, which argues for being exclusive to the non-commercial work.  On the other hand, sometimes (like all winter long) I'm just not there, but I still need to make a living, which argues for continuing with the graphics.  

Okay, well, I guess I'll do both.  Still.  Again.  Okay, I never actually stopped, but I did sort of quietly take any mention of commercial art off my website.

So now it's back, but it's kind of its own thing.  It's over here.  Let me know what you think of the look and feel of the new site!