Category Archives: Paint Party Friday

Could it be an Acrylic Painting post? IT IS.

two painted beasts, omg. 11" x 14" Acrylics

two painted beasts, omg.
11″ x 14″ Acrylics

Wooo, I’ve been painting! And pretty big too, if you keep in mind I’ve been mostly drawing 2.5″ x 3.5″ art card size the last couple years.

Since my last progress shots post, some WordPress update business or another has removed my slideshow function. I may search out another for future posts, but here is a little gallery of shots. You can click on each to enlarge, but tragically you cannot page through them.

So, I was pretty happy at step seven. The next day, after a couple hours working at it (with some frustrations!), what a big difference! I still have to fix up the background. Might just cover the splatters, or might add something new. Or might start the next painting! Here’s a sneak preview:

11" x 14" sketch on canvas board

11″ x 14″ sketch on canvas board

Thanks so much for dropping in! Please, please feel free and encouraged to drop any and all acrylic painting tips in the comments. I’m a bit of a hack at it still, and probably will be for another few years. (But that’ s ok!) :-)

January One, Sketches and Musings

Horace with Friends, 6" x 6" pencil sketch

Horace with Friends, 6″ x 6″ pencil sketch (with lots of smudging, d’oh)

When she saw that Horace was feeling melancholy, Gina called in the troops to cheer him up. Just moments after this image was captured, Horace cheered up immeasurably, grabbed his bright green mandolin, and led them in a rousing rendition of “I Want to Be Your Friend” by 11 Acorn Lane.  Gina beakily provided horn accompaniment, while Oditi (far left) insisted on repeating the  Deedlee-doo, Deedlee-dee bit. They jumped and clapped and spun around.

Happy January 1! The year ahead is filled with promise, opportunity and undreamt surprises. New discoveries, rediscoveries and unwelcome news. Birthdays, lazy Saturdays, and days when the sun will seemingly fail to shine.

But you are here! Thank you for coming. I hope this year holds lots of the good things and less of the bad things, for everyone. More recent sketching below.

Two sketch Dec 26 2015

2 with Birds, 6" x 6" pencil sketches

2 with Birds, 6″ x 6″ pencil sketches

And then there were fish, and things became muddled. pencil sketch, 5" x 7"

And then there were fish, and things became muddled.
pencil sketch, 5″ x 7″

 

 

New Listings from the Fungus Architect

Nine More from the Renowned Fungus Architect
Each 2.5″ x 3.5″ Copics, fine liners (one with Prismacolor pencils)

For those who want to know the names of these stylish abodes, row one: Mr. Big Feet’s House, The One with the Walkup, Sunflower House. Row 2: Home of the Newlywed Astronomers, The Quiet Place, The Red Bench. Row three: Pixie’s Place (Prismacolor pencils), Double-Wide with Rooftop Isolation Chamber, Threesome.

So many new ATCs, mostly due to the ATC (Artist Trading Card) art-athon over at illustratedatcs.com last weekend. Lots of art and lots of trading is a fine way to spend a weekend. (Making art at breakneck speeds does not allow much slowdown for progress shots, but there are a few.)

Thanks for dropping in! Hello to Paint Party Friday! The posting has been sporadic. I notice the same with other folks!

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Tiny and Fancy Strikes Again (Strike Again?)

Three Fancy Women, One Treehouse
Each 2.5″ x 3.5″ Copics, fine liners gel pen

Maybe “Tiny and Fancy” should be my alternate blog title. The one on the bottom is not quite done – it will probably get some more black pen and gel pen. These are (left to right): Prudence, Yara the Soothsayer, keva (in progess) and Tonics Twenty-Five Cents.

Despite my repeated insistence I want to start painting, actually making myself do it is proving maddeningly difficult. I should stop talking about it. (I’m not sure if that will make it more or less likely to happen.)

I have made book notes which are a very very preliminary stage of a book project. Perhaps I will have more to report next time!

Hello Paint Party Friday! It’s been a while!

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The Cute Marches On, Robots & Monsters in Ink

www.theslumberingherd.com

Clocktower Sentinel, and Lance and Boo Boo
Each 2.5″ x 3.5″ Copics.

So, January was supposed to be painting month. But then cute atcs happened and when you get on a roll, you really ought to honor the roll. I am sure there is an education joke there but I am up past my bedtime. :D

I have often said as long as I am making new art, it’s ok if it’s not exactly the art I planned. And I stick by that. Particularly when being productive! It’s a bit of a bummer about the painting but I suspect the cute might make the jump to acrylics in February.

Tim and Madge
Each 2.5″ x 3.5″ Copics

Tag and As Yet Unnamed Beast
Each 2.5″ x 3.5″ Copics, pencil

Thanks for dropping in! Hello to Paint Party Friday! Tons of progress pics in the slideshow!

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Here and Back Again, Acrylics 2.0.

Hey, it’s a Hobbit reference. And I have not seen one of those films. Despite being slightly fanatical about the Lord of the Rings, both the books and the movies, (less than Colbert, more than your average fan).

I am embarking on a project which I thought I would chronicle here, at the art blog. I was asked about a year ago to do some Day of the Dead type faces on Patrón (tequila) corks. How we arrived at this request is probably not as interesting, but suffice it to say I agreed to this thing with the caveat that I would probably take my own sweet time. Which I have.

But I am going to be seeing this person in about a week so I thought, since I finally cleared a space to do acrylics again – for Thirty Paintings in 30 Days, in January – I decided now was the time. Here is the beginning.

Patrón Corks Project, Step One!

At the bottom left you will see an unaltered Patrón  cork. In the middle, two corks with gesso. The third thing is some other cork that looks like a doorknob, also gessoed. Stay tuned for further developments!

I also wanted to post, in advance of January’s marathon, my favorite acrylic paintings from last January (and some from February). I stopped painting after that. I think because my job got busier but I hope to continue this year.

Various Acrylics, Jan-Feb 2014

Left to rightt:  Danielle and Sinbad (6″x6″), Flower Girl (5″x7″), Josie Fuchsia (5″x7″), The Harvest Oracle (6″ x 8″). Loads of process pics for The Harvest Oracle here.

And below, Rocco and Harmony (12″ x 12″), which hung for several months at my local Dick Blick’s! Here you can see what they looked like at the end of the first day, and then the finished painting with one more day. Amazing how much difference the extra day made!

Rocco and Harmony, 12″ x 12″ Acrylics on canvas

Lots of progress pics for this one here. Thanks so much for dropping in! Hello to Paint Party Friday – and I sure hope some of you are doing 30 Paintings!

Merry Christmas and Happy all the other holidays, too!

More for Inktober, with a Princess in a Bottle

My goodness, post every day did I say? No, that’s not possible, it turns out! However, I HAVE been managing lots of little ink projects as Inktober continues to continue!

Uli With Familiars, and Mausoleum for Mona
Each 2.5″ x 3.5″ pen and ink

Actual black and white and also some grayscale – these are noteworthy details as you don’t generally see either around these parts. Perhaps that will change. Perhaps a “Grayscales Project”. Ugh, but no time right now. Will put on back burner. :)

The Princess in the Bottle
2.5″ x 3.5″ Copics

The Princess in the Bottle

Once there was an evil queen who loved nothing but jewels. It is said her heart was a hard, tiny diamond. They say she caused the riding accident that took the life of the king as punishment for impregnating her with their only child, a daughter. When the baby was born, the queen was repulsed by its soft helplessness, and without so much as giving it a name, she sent it away to live with a childless crone living in the dusty hills.

Unbeknownst to many, the crone was a witch,. She named the child Marta and taught her everything she knew,  all the while filling her with tales of her mother’s greed and evil nature. When the child was thirteen, she set out with a pale amber bottle she had prepared for her mother.

When Marta arrived at the castle, she found the queen a sad, lonely wreck of a woman surrounded by her jewels, who could not even keep a hound for more than a week before it ran away into the forest. She admired her daughter’s beauty, and wished some for herself. Marta agreed she could have some, so she added a few words to those she had prepared, making her mother young again, as young as Marta herself, before capturing her in the amber bottle, and sealing the lid with a waxy resin she’d made from boiling her own hair.

Marta invited the crone to live with her in the castle. They threw open the heavy curtains for the first time in years, and tamed all the half-wild hounds that roamed the forest.

None of the hounds would go near the room that housed the amber bottle, the one with the sad, tiny princess who was once an evil queen.

(c) The Slumbering Herd, 2014

***

Thanks for dropping in! And super late hello to Paint Party Friday. :)

Lulu with Paper Lanterns, Copic Markers

 

Lulu, 6″ x 6″ Copic Markers

Once again I was not able to stay away from the edges. Sometimes I sketch out a frame about an inch or half inch from the sides but then I ignore it! Will have to work on that. Lulu is the latest in my horse drawing adventure Season of the Horse.

I think I will do more paper lanterns because they are really cool. I’ll probably have to figure out how to make them glow, so let me know if you have any tips!

Meanwhile, I have been sick for three days and it is super sucky! I am drinking tea and hope to recover soon. Totally sucky to be sick on the weekend. Alas!

Hello to Paint Party Friday! Thanks to everyone for dropping in!

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Blue Buckskin Pony, Copic Markers

 

Buckskin Blue, 5″ x 7″
Copic markers, Prismacolor, Staedtler, Uni and Signo fine liners

I like the name Buckskin Blue, but originally I called this one the Festival Pony. (Please tell me if you have a strong preference one way or the other!) :)

As I mentioned previously, I am going to have a table at a small fantasy convention in November, which may help explain all the horns and bright colors. Perhaps it should have been called The Season of the Magical Horse!

Season of the Horse, the first six 5″ x 7″
Copic markers, pen and ink

Maybe you’re wondering, when will she get to like, a leg? A body? Aaaaaah, I don’t know! Soon.

Reference horse for Buckskin Blue.

Linking to Paint Party Friday a day late! Thanks for dropping in!

Otherworldly Equines with Serious Ears

The Solstice Foal, 5″ x 7″
Copic markers, Staedtler and Prismacolor fine liners, gel pen

The Season of the Horse continues in fine form. Though, a very few attempts at  a whole horse body have been feeble at best. One of these days!

Guardian of the Glade, 5″ x 7″
Copics, fine liners, gel pen

Reference donkey. (I usually use a photo as a very general guide. The final product is not meant to look like the photo. I think most people know that!) I had trouble with the fuzzy ears, probably needs more shadow. Will need to do more of those.

Both of these have bits of wonky perspective, but overall they are rather happy magical equines. Happy Paint Party Friday to folks visiting from there! Loads of progress pics. Thanks for stopping by!

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