New Year Oils in Progress

Two glorious days this week, I got to immerse myself in oil paints. As usual it always seems like I get more paint on me than the canvas. Two more pairs of jeans have been officially baptized into the world of art. Here are the in progress images of what I've been working on for your viewing pleasure...

One of the things that I do and why I have SO many unfinished paintings, is I rotate through paintings, working a layer on each one and then switching to the next and the next. This allows me to keep working while one is drying. It also prevents me from getting my hand in the paint and messing it up from dragging it across other wet areas, or getting bored and pushing it which usually ends up in a lower quality image.

The first painting is a portrait done from LockStock's Mucha reference pack. Lockstock is one of the amazingly generous stock photographers on Deviant Art who posts pictures for artists to use in their work. Learn more on her DA site at http://lockstock.deviantart.com/.

The next one, was a painting that I had been working on of Morgan le Fey. I was focusing on the sky at the time. Eventually the ground will be snow covered, and possibly the signs of battle will be evident around her.

Just in case you are curious, my daughter was not named after this particular Morgan, but she did inspire to keep going with this piece.

The next was a canvas that had been previously painted on, but as I was not happy with the original image, I took it and recycled it into this image.

It is inspired by my horse, Destiny, who died around this time last year. Although there is a little reference used on this image, it's probably a lot more free form, driven by the emotion of missing an animal that was closer to me than most people. Most of my adult life, she had shared with me. The figures are facing away from each other signifying the passing, but also, I used to hug her neck and lean on it. It always seemed like she hugged back by lowering her head, so in that respect it's just another expression of my love for her and how much I miss her...

This next image is a portrait of my dear friend Stacy, and is an experiment in texture. Using gesso and oils to create a tactile experience to the image, I wanted to express the rich nature of the image that I was going from.

First I did a layer with gesso canvas primer, blotting it on with a paper towel. Next a layer of oils was painted over the gesso and blotted to have the gesso show through. As this is an experiment, I'm not entirely sure how it's going to turn out. I'll be sure to post more pictures so you can see the results.

More pictures of the beautiful Stacy are available for other artists to use at my stock site http://linzstock.deviantart.com as well as many other images of other wonderful models available for use.

The last two are different ends of the spectrum of finished. The knight is nearing completion while the one on the right has just begun. The knight is painted from model Thomas Willeford who also posed as Thor for me. The woman on the right will be the norse goddess Freya. She still needs her feathered cloak.

Often I start off most oils in this fashion. It starts with a pencil drawing then rendered in black and white with black gesso paint / acrylic and then painted over with the more opaque oils. It helps the under layer to shine through as a guide.