Monday, May 4, 2009

Spring Flowers - Finishing it up and spraying it

a good reason to work from photographs

I've finished up the spring flowers. The last step I did was use a drybrush to really soften some edges where I felt like sharp edges  would keep the focus away from where I wanted it - mostly on the left side. I also didn't put as many details in the vase, particularly the foot of the vase, so the attention would stay up at the flowers. 

I've gotten a lot of questions about what the varnish does to the colored pencil colors so I decided to put below the drawing not sprayed (above) and sprayed (below). The varnish spray intensifies the darks, which I usually find is a good thing. Sometimes it will also darken a color I want clean and bright - like my yellow flowers. What I believe it is doing is making the pencil more transparent and allowing more grey board to show through. If it darkens the light colors too much, I'll let the first coat of varnish dry and apply more yellow colored pencil, then finish spraying the piece. 



9 comments:

Unknown said...

I laughed when I saw the photo of the drooping flowers. Thanks for showing the before and after spraying results. There is a subtle difference and I think it helps a bit with the contrast. I love the way you have the water looping around the stems. beautiful.

Ann said...

This is gorgeous! Do you spray fixative first or varnish directly onto the cp? What kind of varnish do you use?

Jennifer Rose said...

gorgeous :D thanks for posting a before varnish pic and after varnish pic :) neat to see the small difference it makes

ale balanzario said...

gorgeous!! thanks for share with us the steps, yes good idea to work from photos, sad to see flowers die.

Ale :)

Jo Castillo said...

This is lovely, I think I am repeating myself, but I do love it. Thanks again for all your tips. Sheila is right about the drooping flowers and water. :)

Carolina said...

Well, those flowers will last much longer on your painting!
Thanks for the tips, especially the one about readding light colors after the fixative if they turned too dark, goog idea.

Unknown said...

haha I'm glad you liked the dead flowers!

Ann I used Lascaux fixative first - darned if I know if it helps or not though! I do find using a colorless blender over the whole ting first helps keep the colors from changing. I use Krylon Kamar spray varnish.

Thanks everyone!

Unknown said...

hey nicole!


u make the complex drawing look so simple.....its just awesome....stemslook perfect....and the photo with the drooping flowers is funny.

Veda

Unknown said...

Thank you Veda!