Wednesday, May 16, 2007

And an Onion Makes Three

Welcome back, dear reader! So now that the excitement of Bill is over, and because I need the practice, I’ve decided to do another WIP of an ACEO this time of our newly acquired barn cat, Onion. I’ve only done one other work featuring Onion so you’ll have to bear with me on this one since it’ll only be my second time drawing her.
Little background on Onion: She came to us around early February and I found her hiding/ living in the hay mow of our barn. The only reason I knew she was there was because 1- she sounded like a herd of elephants running through the roof and 2- her ‘meow’ is shrill...and very loud. I’m not really sure how old she is but I suspect she’s pretty young and she has no fear of other animals, particularly dogs whom she loves to go and rub up against, much to the utter confusion of the dogs. Our other barn cat, Sushi, would sooner lick a frozen metal pole rather than cuddle up with a dog.
However, like Sushi, Onion is also long-haired...a trait I was looking to avoid in our next barn cat (Sushi is about 14 years old and will be “retiring” to live I the house this winter). Me, being a sucker for rescuing animals, decided that I would just have to live with another long-haired barn cat and so Onion was taken in. She’s been a loyal little weirdo (think, if Sushi is Moe, Bill is Larry and that makes Onion Curley) and as such, has fit into our little animal menagerie quite nicely. Without further ado, let’s get to her second feature in an ACEO:


So as you can see I’ve just done my line drawing and laid on a few colours. To be specific I’ve used White, French Grey 10%, Black (in the eyes), Pink (for the nose) and Goldenrod. I’ve also used Dark Umber in the darkest areas of her coat. Unlike the ACEO I did of Bill, the photo I have to work from is good for this one. The problem? My printer is running out of ink and I can’t get any more until next week so the printout is crappy. This has forced me to work form both the printout for detail and from my monitor for colour. *Sigh* The excessive work us artists must endure...


Here’s stage two. As you can see I’ve done a fair bit more. I put in my bg at this point because it’s such a small space and in my ref photo it’s actually just back space. For the sake of complimentaries I decided to keep it dark by using Indigo Blue and I’ll probably go over that with Black or one of the 90% greys. I’ve gone and marked in more of the highlights on her as well as some of her facial markings. For the markings I’ve used Sepia and on the highlights I’ve used mostly French Grey 10% and some White and I’ve gone over a few of her really orange-y areas with Mineral Orange.
I’ve also started on here eyes which you can see in the close-up below:


Now, I know what you’re thinking: “Rita...what's with her eyes? Have you gone mad?” The answer is an emphatic “Yes” but that has nothing to do with what I’ve done for her eyes. You see (get it, ‘eyes’...‘see’...okay, bad pun) the shadows I’m working with in this particular piece are pretty dramatic and while her obviously different eye shading doesn’t make much sense now it will in the grand scheme of things. For her eyes I’ve used both Jade and Celadon Green (more Jade tho) as well as Sky Blue Light for the catch-light. For the darkest parts of the eyes I used Dark Green because it was the darkest, coolest green I could use without getting into the blues. In this close up you can also see that I’ve added a touch of Raspberry to her nose on the dark side.

So that’s the start of an Onion. This ties in nicely to my gardening post for tomorrow because I’ve named my cat after a vegetable. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I love it when an unintentional plan comes together.

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