A couple of studies

[pyraxis]

This one is from figure drawing classes and uses the new flesh-tone conte set that shashigai gave me for Christmas. I'm not really happy with it because it doesn't capture the light as vividly as it was in the scene, but I think these pastels are going to take some getting used to. They're hard like conte even through they're not traditional conte colours.



This is a study with Sennelier pastels and proper pastel card with a sandpaper surface made from cork (luxury! Shashigai found the pastels and paper on clearance!). The colours didn't come out very well, neither in the photo nor in the original. It's way too bright and sunny. I'm going to need a lot more practice mixing the colours... and then figuring out how to mix the highlights without making everything all blurry. It's only a 20-colour set so putting in the highlights raw means all the subtlety gets subsumed into these primary splashes, but without highlights the picture doesn't really jump off the page.

Comments

[yonjuunana.livejournal.com]

Wow, I really like the stuff you do with lighting, especially the vivid blues in the shading on the second picture, and how that makes the rest of the colors stand out more.

[thirteen-ravens.livejournal.com]

I love these.

The bottom one looks like it should be in an art gallery. :)

[tigerweave.livejournal.com]

Wot is conte? I do like that drawing :-) I never did any nude drawing clases. Was sick when they did them. Meh.

Even though you aren't happy with the mixing of the colours in the second one, the small number of colours creates a really vibrant effect, if you don't think about the shortfall between what you were trying to do and what you ended up with :-)
Odd perspective. Can't quite work it out. Am I on the ground looking up at the structure and the walkway? Or almost level with it? or what? The walkway looks like it is angled down but my brain thinks the logical way to have it is level.

I was watching an art show on the tv the other day about a dude who was trying to capture the light of twilight. It was hilarious. He was an upper-class Englishman and his whole way of doing it was so selfish and self-serving. Too tired to relate the story.
Anyway I didn't think the finished product was any good really. Like it didn't capture twilight at all. Not twilight like we have here, anyway, that glow across the falling dark.