Thorne Scratch: Part 1

UPDATE: Now finished! It only took a year and a half...

Remember last Tuesday's post about practicing acrylics? I'm not quite finished yet with the painting (I just picked up some extra small brushes, yay!), but here's my progress so far.

First, may I reacquaint you with the rough digital mock up?

Stock credits can be found here.

 Okay, here's my real progress:

It is still very much a work in progress. I like the face, though I may need to darken the nostrils and tone down the earlobes. The head-hair may need some highlights and the yellow beads need...something. The braid needs work. Don't get me started on the hands and the "stage left" elbow. I was waiting on getting tiny brushes so I could do the details justice. The shadows of her neck may need to be darkened, and definitely her belly button. I don't have her arm tattoos or the thorn canes up yet. The tats need to wait until I have her arms finalized, and I'm mainly being a coward about the vines. I hate painting over things. But I will preserver!

I would love some tips, critiques, and advice! This painting has a long way to go.

This painting would not be nearly as good without the lovely stock of Jagged-eye (who's art can also be found at DMAC Studios).  Donato Giancola's excellent "mud puddle palette" method of painting skin saved my sanity. I also read Muddy Colors (the blog where I found the tutorial) while waiting for paint to dry. More than ten excellent artists contribute to it. If you're interested in illustration, realism, making a living as an artist, tips on setting up a healthy, ergonomic studio space (including in a hotel bathroom), go read their blog.

Lessons learned:

• I'm not as bad at acrylics as I thought, yay!
• Creating the rock texture was fun and involved paint, water, black ink, and salt. Some of the lighter sections of the rock are salt lime, and the rock sparkles in person. *insert vampire joke here*
• I desperately want to outline things, even when it would unattractively flatten the painting. I need to work on slowly letting go of that crutch, at least in acrylics. Or adopting an Art Nouveau style ;)
• However, using heavy outlines on the sketch then over-painting enabled me to do the fine details in the face with a fairly large brush. Most of the shadows in the face are outlines with a light wash/glaze over them.
• Hands and skin are very, very hard to paint.
• Night skies, however are easy with some paint spatter!

And a cool animated GIF of my progress from line art to now:

Quick run down of my process:

• sketch image directly onto 11" x 14" canvas board
• tape off sides (the painting measures 6" x 11")
• ink pencil sketch
• do a yellow ocher wash over entire painting
• paint sky, moon, and spatter on stars (the fun part)
• paint lights and darks of boulder
• go crazy with a wadded up paper towel, paint, ink, and salt
• paint skin while cursing how fast the paint dries and mainly failing at wet in wet painting. What I get for relying on oil painting tutorials.
• paint hair while wishing desperately for something smaller than a fine-liner brush

Disclaimer: Wen Spencer still owns everyone in Tinker-ville, including Thorne Scratch. Baen (they of the talented marketing folks) are also involved.

Those that can, Do; Those who can't, Teach

I have good news and bad news, internets.

Good news: I now have a job teaching 2nd-5th graders art once a week for a month, and perhaps adults as well, through the Vermillion Area Arts Council. A paid, art related job, yes!

Bad news: I'm not quite comfortable with opaque paint, aka anything that is not watercolor. The classes I'll be teaching focus on watercolors but will also include tempura for the kids and acrylics for the adults. I've worked with both before, but I'm not nearly as comfortable with them as I am with conte or watercolors. Classes start on March 13th.Which means I have exactly three weeks to cram as much knowledge of acrylics into my head as possible.

Challenge accepted.

In between weaving and pet portrait commissions, I have been longing to do some fan art. I like to experiment with new media when I do fan art because there is no "portfolio pressure." I'm unlikely to sell a piece of fan art or to put it into my professional portfolio. Also, the character, setting, and situation are already predetermined. I just have to pick a scene and/or character that suits my fancy.

Having just read Elfhome, Wen Spencer's newest sci-fi/fantasy romp of elven deliciousness, I decided to do a portrait of one of the characters, Thorne Scratch on Stone. Since I read the advanced reader copy ($15 until July 1st, then $5), I want to do a portrait that includes no spoilers. I decided on a literal interpretation of Thorne Scratch's name.

Here's my (really) rough digital mock up:

Things that should be in the mock up but I'm too lazy to do with a mouse: intricate black spell tattoos on her arms and thorns on the multiflora rose canes (aka the red things). And maybe black or yellow beads in her hair? I don't remember them in the book, but most folks with her job have them.

What are your opinions, before I put paint to canvas-board?

The beautiful stock is provided by the following:

Woman by Jagged-eye, who can also be found at DMAC Studios
Stone texture by ShinimegamiStock

Thank you!

Disclaimer: Thorne is owned by and copyright Wen Spencer. As is anything Tinker-Wolf-Elfhome related. I just visit, a lot.

Winter Picnic: Plarn Placemats

Today there was snow! And I finished my plarn placemats (which are up for sale on Etsy). These combined in an awesome winter photoshoot. Not that I'm a professional photographer by any stretch of the imagination, but I'm trying to use natural lighting and color theory. Thank you, Pink Lady Apples, for being both colorful and delicious.

Technical information:
Plain weave
Warp: Royal Blue Cotton Rug Warp
Weft: white plarn ("yarn" made from plastic bags)
Pics per inch: 10 ppi for the 1' blue warp stripes; 5 ppi for the middle
Size: 12.5" x 17 " (18" including fringe)
Number: 4 placemats
Each end has a half inch solid cotton header and footer.
Finished by knotting the ends to make the fringe.
Loom: Kromski Harp Rigid Heddle loom (30 " wide)

(In plain English,  the skinny blue threads are the warp, or what goes on the loom first. The weft is the thicker white yarn and is added while weaving. PPI means how many warp threads there are per inch.)

Lessons learned:

•  Leave more warp free for fringe than two inches. Two inches is really hard to knot.
• For plarn, 10 ppi would be good for emphasizing the warp but can look messy when the knots in the plarn disrupt the pattern. 5 ppi is perfect: flexible enough to shrug off the knots.
• I miss the beater on harness looms, but I had a wide toothed comb that I beat trouble spots with, and it worked out.
• Might make the header and footer only 1/4" next time. The cotton weft takes a lot longer to weave with than plarn.

Magic, Wonder, and Valentine's Day

Hello there fellow internet traveler. Welcome to my blog of magic and wonder! Well, mostly art and weaving, but surely there's a bit of magic and wonder in that right?

Quick intro to my life: My name is Hana (hah-nah, Japanese for flower), and I currently live in South Dakota but have in the past lived in Japan (where I picked up the name and a love of rice and stir fry), California, Georgia, and North Carolina. Surprisingly, my parents were not in the military: they were English teachers. I've just graduated from college with a spiffy art major degree and am launching myself in to the wild world of Making A Living Through Art, whoot! My focus is fantasy art, but I also love to weave and garden, so you will be seeing lots of art, craftiness, and growing things.

Whew! In more current news, in celebration of Valentine's Day, I just posted some cute, somewhat Japanese themed ACEOs up on my Etsy page. Check them out!

Here are some images to whet your appetite:

Dragons Kiss

Ginkgo Spirit

Sweet Nothings