Whirling dervish with coffee

I have been meaning to paint a whirling dervish for a while (my wife is a big Rumi fan) so I thought I would start with a simple study in Coffee...yeah right, anything but simple. It all started when my coffee maker decided not to work, and I figured I could make coffee on the stove. Well I quickly managed to burn a pot of coffee. I have tried painting with coffee before (Leopard with Coffee) and realized that normal coffee won't do, it has to be a very thick consistancy, and well, I was almost there with my burnt coffee...definitely not drinkable at this point.

Once I had my "paint" made then it was just a matter of finding the right values to capture shadows and highlights. Other than my pencil lines in my sketch outline, this is completely painted with coffee.

Boba fett, photo progression

I guess I've got a Star Wars theme going here. Here is some retro Star Wars for you: Boba Fett. I started this portrait as a quick pencil sketch (not shown) with the intention of tracing it onto watercolor paper so that I could do this in watercolor. But then I just kept adding on to the original sketch which was on copy paper.  First I added in all the shading with just pencil...

Then I started to add in some color with colored pencil...not something I work with very often so I wasn't too happy with it at this point, so let's keep working it...

Smoothed out some of the colored pencil lines and added in a background but the shading originally done with pencil has lost its some of its effect...

What do you think?  I still like the one in just pencil but it is interesting how far a simple sketch can go!

Stormtrooper mixed media

In keeping with my New Year's resolution of taking risks with my art, I have taken my Stormtrooper and transformed it into Finn...or is it FN-2187? (is that a spoiler?) Using some watercolor paint, I put in a black background as well as blood on the helmet (yes, I applied it mostly with my fingers... what fun!) Since I was still working in my sketchbook, I had to be careful to not use much water because the paper does not take moisture well.

Champagne watercolor revised

As a New Year's resolution, I have decided to take more chances with my art, and not worry about ruining it.  So I decided to revise my painting of champagne in watercolor by adding black to the background. Now I hear watercolorists say they don't like using black, but with the background wash, it really isn't black. The previous background still shows through to make it far more than just "black". I think it really makes the bottle and glass stand out better.

Original

Stormtrooper: Star Wars pencil sketch

I got some new pencils for Christmas and decided to take them for a spin. I am always sketching with a #2 pencil and that is what I am used to. The new pencils range from 2H (hardest) through 8B (softest).  It was almost like learning to draw again. I was able to get some deep blacks with the soft pencils but I thought I struggled with smearing before with a #2. These smear a lot. I tried to use it to my advantage. The soft pencils don't erase as well either. The erasure just smears it also. I guess they will just take some getting use to. I can already see that the pencils have created a much broader spectrum of values than my last Star Wars sketch of Kylo Ren.

Duck face pencil sketch

Of all the trends in 2015, I thought this one was quite silly. So let's commemorate duck face with a drawing!

The biggest challenge I had was with the hair, definitly an area I could work on. I kind of cheated on my last portrait, I've got a secret, by enlarging the face to the point where there was very little hair to deal with.  The eyes were my favorite.  Finding reference images for this was fun and quite hilarious!

Happy new year, champagne watercolor

 Happy 2016! Since I planned on staying warm and cuddling with my wife for a calm and mellow New Years Eve, I had some rime to start this painting. I actually didn't finish it until this morning though.

I'm not sure about the background that I put here. It seems to wash out the bottle and glass. I actually put the background after I sketched it but before I started painting the bottle and glass. I had another case of "paint first, plan later".  Maybe I just need to go darker on the background? I really like the effect of the bubbles I got in the champagne glass but the bottle still seems unfinished...
Another effect of my paint first, plan later is the question of "Where did the champagne in the glass come from if the bottle isn't open yet?"