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.