Sketching to Painting, continued

June 15 -

It just isn't possible to draw and paint one dog without doing the same for his "brother."  The second dog presented two challenges for me.  First, he is predominately black and second, his shiny wet nose is also black.  I could capture the curvature of the top of the nose and the nostrils with simple line drawing, but needed the help of both the highlighting pastel pencil and the dark, soft graphite to get the contour I was looking for.  I learned from painting the first dog on gessoboard, that changing the background color can help the image "pop" as well, so tried that with brown graphite.  It helps with the top contour, but really just adds some texture.

Pencil sketch of 2nd dog with pencil, white pastel pencil, brown pencil and 6b graphite pencil on tan paper.  Click image to enlarge.

I still had to tackle the biggest challenge; Rocky is almost all black.  I have observed many painting, photographs,and drawings over the years that turn  black cats and dogs into inky blobs of dark mush.  I wanted to be sure that the energy and vitality of this dog is refected (yes, pun intended,) in his painting.  Adding his actual white markings on the sketch of the muzzle helped me see the dimension of the snout more clearly and think about ways to create energy and depth.

Acrylic paint on gessoboard.  Click on image to enlarge.

Adding a little pink where the actual skin color was visible around the mouth opened the window for me to add more color.   I think the color also helped define the top of the muzzle better than the shading, alone, in the pencil/pastel sketch.  Although the pencil sketch had added background, the intensity of the background color here not only adds to the dimensionality of the dog, it also help convey his personality and energy.

Acrylic on gessoboard - cropped.  Click on image to enlarge.

In addition to his natural, white markings, adding addition color to the otherwise solid black coat, help bring Rocky's vitality into this painting.  Is he really blue, purple, green, hot pink and ......well not really, but his energy comes through loud and clear!!