Swan

[TomSwede]

Very beautiful and breathtaking Clay!!!

Love the way you've worked those details!!!

Tom

[ClayB]

Thanks Tom!!

Here's today's progress.

First thing I did was paint the cat tails with Drake's X-1 leather dressing. This is an acrylic sealer that I use to stiffen areas that have been cut and lifted. I put it on the cat tails to make sure the "fluff" didn't settle back down when I painted it. When doing this, I put the X-1 on a small area, then lift the area with either the multi blade knife, or a scalpel depending on what it it. Here I used the multi blade knife. Just push the tips in and pull up to lift the fluff back up. When the sealer dries, the fluff will stay in that postition.

Since I had the X-1 out, I decided to apply it to the feathers on the swan at the same time. Again I apply it to a small area, 2 or 3 feathers at a time and then lift and shape the edges by picking them up with the scalpel.

After the X-1 has dried, I painted the cat tail with acrylic paint. For this I used Liquitex in burnt umber and burnt sienna mixed about half and half. Then I diluted this mixture about half with water. I like my acrylic paint pretty thin so it doesn't cover the leather heavily. I can build up the color by adding more coats. I used this mix on the shadow areas of the cat tail. Then I went and added stright burnt umber to the edge of the cat tail in the real heavy shadow area. Then I mixed a some burnt sienna with a drop of yellow. I used this on the rest of the cat tail, except for an area in the center that I left uncolored as a highlight.

Next step was to paint the background around the swan. For this I decided to use acylic again. I mixed some ultramarine blue with titanium white to make a pale bue. I used this around the edge of the swan and out about a half inch.

Then I added a couple more drops of the blue to the mix for a mid tone. With this I went out from the lighter blue about another half inch.

Finally I mixed some blue with cadmium red about half and half to make a purple color. Dilute again with water. I used this for the top of the sky. Then carefully start to blend the areas where the colors come together. This can take awhile using the different color mixtures as needed.

The next step is to add the shadows to the swan. For this I decided to use shades of blue. This is going to look pretty strange, but it works. Use full strength blue for the deepest shadows, the add more water diluting the blue for lighter shadows. Here's how it looks with the shadows all painted in.

Tomorrow I'll try and add the white to the swan.

[Crystal]

Wow, Clay. That is looking fantastic! Of course, for a sec, I thought you were going for a black swan -

Can't wait to see the white go on that!

I like your background color choice and how you faded it to the darker towards the edge. I am very curious to see what you do with the water.

Crystal

[ClayB]

I'm glad you like it Crystal. Hope I dont dissapoint you before I'm finished with it. I had thought of just leaving it the way it is and calling it "Blue Duck". Lonesome Dove fans will remember him

The sky is something I saw Bob Beard do once and I really like the look. The shading done this way is what I learned from Silva Fox's Dazzling Color video. It really helps to get nice looking shading without mixing a lot of colors, and it's pretty easy. I'm anxoius to add the white today and see what happens. As for the water, I'm curious to see what I do there to! As I mentioned to Kate, I really have no plan, just trying things as I go and hoping for the best.

[ClayB]

Okay, I messed around with some more color all afternoon. First thing I found out is that I wont use blue behind white if I ever do something like this again. First coat of white made for a pale blue swan. Second coat of white made it a little better. Took about 5 coats to make him not look some shade of blue, and by then, all the shading was gone.

Then I moved on to the water. I decided to try it the way Al Stohlman did it in an old doodle page. He started out by painting the water with green spirit dye. I used eco flow instead. I used a few drops of green with a drop or two of blue mixed in.

That seemed a little pale so I added several more drops of blue to the mix. That didn't help darken it up much. So I went to painting over it with some straight diluted blue. That gave me the green color I was looking for.

In the last picture, I also started to color the cat tail leaves. I did this the same way I did the bigger cat tails on the back side. Started with a coat of diluted yellow over the whole leaf. This was followed with some diluted tan to give some shadow. Then diluted green mixed with yellow was used over the whole thing.

The seed head part of the cat tail was then colored with acrylic just like the bigger ones on the back.

Now on the water, I dry brushed a light coat of acrylic white followed by a light coat of very light blue.

The beak I colored with acylic. I mixed red and yellow to make a pale orange. Then I used payne's grey (really close to black) for the area in front of the eye and whatever that growth over the beak is supposed to be. Also to shadow the beak and nostril. For the eye, I started out with a coat of yellow, then dark brown leaving a small outline of yellow, then filled in most of the center of the eye with black.

Here's what it's looking like at this point. I went back and added a small drop of black to some white to make a pale grey and tried to add some shadows again. I'm still not really happy with how it looks. Needs some more shadows behind the neck. If anyone has any comments or suggestiongs at this point, I'd sure appreciate them!

To finish up a little more on the back, I went over the border areas with a mix of tan and yellow eco flow dye. Then I went over all the colored areas except the cat tail seed pod things (what ever that part is called) with Block Out. I put on several coats. Then I went and carefully dabbed Fiebings medium brown antique into the small corner areas, and even more carefully wiped it out. I think when I get closer to being finished, I'll use the same antique over the whole outside area of this album cover.

That's it for now.

[CitizenKate]

I'm about to crash for the night, but I had to squirt in a quick comment. I really love how this is shaping up, so far. WOW! I know a lot can happen between now and the finish, but if this turns out even half as good as it looks so far, you should send a photo of the finished piece to Lora.

Kate

[ClayB]

I know a lot can happen between now and the finish, but if this turns out even half as good as it looks so far, you should send a photo of the finished piece to Lora.

Kate,

Are you starting to doubt my abilities?????? If you are, you're not the only one. I keep waiting for that big that I can't cover up. So far so good. That is a good idea though, if I can find an address for Lora. I've used a couple patterns from her now and they really work well on leather. Not sure when I'll get my next chance to work on this, dang nice weather. Now I have to actually go to work. I'm really looking forward to when it's close to done and I can put the high gloss varnish on the eye and beak. That's when most of the animals really start to look alive.

I'm glad you like how this is going so far. I'll keep you posted.

[ClayB]

I've finally got the shading on the swan to look what I had been seeing in my head. I put some white paint in my tray, dabbed in some water to make it pretty runny, then just dipped the tip of my brush in payne's grey. I mixed that into the white, and went over the areas of the swan's feathers and head that I wanted shadowed.

Then over this, I went back to stright white, really watered down to just blend in the dark colors a bit. I dry brushed striaght white very lightly on a couple spots of the black part of the head. And I think I'm happy with the swan now!