Early Bird ~ WIP

Early Bird woodcut with Pan Pastels.  First pass.

Knight's Tale ~ Canterbury Tails ~ Pan Pastel

Scan.  On printmaking paper.  Nice tooth for Pan Pastels.  Not quite finished I think.

Toothy Paper

Toothy printmaking paper takes Pan Pastels better than sketch paper.  (Kind of a duh, but nice to know it pans out.)  Richer color on the toothy paper.

Top: printmaking paper; bottom: sketch paper.

Toothy paper is richer for taking more pastel.  Sketch paper looks more like a a book illo.  Interesting.

Knight's Tale ~ Pan Pastels

Pan Pastel over woodcut ~ Canterbury Tails ~ The Knight's Tale.  I like the composition but I've never been happy with the print, burnt sienna w/ black tapped in.

So I added pastel.  I like it as a first try.  I'll work on the color next time, but at least now it has depth.

Early Bird and Pan Pastels

My next pan pastel project is more complicated.  I always intended to carve a second background block for my Early Bird.  Now I'm thinking I'll add a garden view behind the guy with pastels.  I'm googling garden scenes to spur a composition.

Tina is fond of paths and trees.  Maybe I can get something like that in the pic.  

I'll be coloring the bird brain too.  I expect he'll be rather colorful.

Paleo-Ponies ~ PanPastel on Ghost Monoprint

Latest PanPastel experiment ~ ghost monoprint.

Horses were barely visible; background wholly lacking.  So it was a whole-cloth opportunity.  Horses look good, but the rock face still needs more work.  Striations and fissures in the rock.  the sort of thing I usually carve, but am unfamiliar with drawing.  Odd that.  ;- p

Metallics

Playing with my metallics ~ PanPastels.  They shimmer but that doesn't come across in a still pic.  Maybe I'll take a movie with my phone.

It doesn't.

Here's another one:

This one's a scan.  Still no shimmer.  Oh well.  It's purdy in person.  ;- ]

PanPastel Woodcuts

Two more pan pastel woodcut prints.

Paleo-Basilisk, my cranky chicken.

Paleo-Catfish.  Still not liking the background.

Paleo-Dragon PanPastel 2

Today's pan-pastel paleo-dragon.

More pastely.  I like this one better than last week's.  Also I discovered it's a crisper print to begin with.  I started with a taupey-gray print.  Tina had me lighten up the cave opening 'cuz it was competing with the dragon.

I picked up some more pastels.  I need a couple more.  Of course I do.  ;- j

PanPastels and Paleo Dragons

Colored a bw Paleo-Dragon print with PanPastels.  Learned a lot.

I used 3 colors:  yellow, red & purple.  I'd like something darker and something lighter to play with.

This is more or less what it looked like before I colored it.  It was a little more tan and lighter.

Loscon41

Woodcuts ~ and tapestries ~ at Loscon41.

Another set of pics:

Cards Came 8-]

Vista Print thumbprint image

Yay!  Cards came back from Vista Print and they're great!  Thumbprint doesn't do them justice.  I can scan one in, but basically it looks like the woodcut.

"Christmas Snack" for Schuyler House 2014

I ordered 100 blank cards for my growing collection.  One of these days I'll remember to offer them on etsy in time for folks to buy them for xmas.  I have 4 different cards available now.  ;- j

I'm really pleased with this approach.  I carved a black and white image ~ my wheelhouse ~ and then added pastels afterwards.  Works best with a print that isn't saturated.  A lighter print than I'd be happy with.  Worked great for the xmas cards 'cuz I could saturate the colors on the scan before I submitted it.  Worked great.

I'll have to see if  I can add pastels to a darker print now that it's had time to dry thoroughly.  I'm liking the pastel approach.  8-]

Ready to Upload to Vista Print

This is the image we'll upload to Vista Print shortly.  I framed up a print for the Loscon Art Show this weekend.  It was nicely positioned.

Pastel on Light Print

It had to sit for a day so I could appreciate it.  Right after I printed I wasn't sure I even had one good print.  Typical.  ;- j  This is a slightly lighter print, but the pastel really makes it pop.

And on a dark print:

Print is too dark for my taste, and is difficult to color with pastel.  Cray-pas can do it (on the brown) but it isn't a smooth-looking.  I can see if more drying will help the ink.

And on a "perfect" print.  Still harder to color.

Interesting experiment.  No wonder Belinda Del Pesco colors pale and ghost prints.  ;- ]  Much easier.

I have a couple more lighter prints I can play with.

Here's another one:

Paper

Broke down some more paper ~ Rives BFK this time.  I'll print on it and see if I like it better than the Arches 88.

I'll be adding pastel to the prints from yesterday (if they're dry yet).

Playing with Pastels

I printed out an image and played with cray pas and pastels.  I like the pastels better ~ finer control.  I'll color up a bw test print and see how that looks.

Pastel on an actual test print.  I had to switch to a brighter red to overpower the black ink.  Ditto gingerbread brown.

Now to print on Arches 88.

Pastel plays into my need for clean lines.  Tapping in color while printing is just too messy for my finicky nature.  ;- j

Bill measured his scanner bed ~ just about the right size (but that's ok, I already accounted for the xmas card being more narrow and long, and I already plan to lose some from the top and bottom).

Coming along.  8-]

First Test Prints

Not liking it at this stage.  Typical but not fun.

Test prints on sketch paper.  Tapping in is proving to be irritating.  I may try something else:  adding color afterwards.  Works for Belinda.  ;- }  I know, I'm not Belinda.

Breaking Down Paper

I've broken down the paper ~ Arches 88 ~ for a smooth finish.  If I decide to play with watercoloring afterward, I'll switch to BFK Rives for texture.

In the meantime, it's black and white ~ and tapped in color.

Slightly narrowed faux print, closer to the xmas card shape

Ready to Test Print

Looks done to me.  Ready for a test print (then any recarving necessary).  Tho I was pretty good at not carving too fine of lines this time.

Mirrored bw faux print.  Need to scan it (this is a photo).

Back to Carving

Back to carving.  Lots of fiddly bits.

Mirrored bw faux print.

Time for a break.  Not much left to do.  I'm really liking this bw version.  More my preferred style.  I'll tap color in (or wipe areas clean and watercolor them later...).  ;- .  Lots of ideas.