- Chrome Rising - Reference Photo 1
Here's the original reference photo. You can see the hood was white, but without a dark background, the contrast situation wasn't distracting. - Chrome Rising - Reference Photo 2
To give me a better idea of how to re-work the hood, I took that section of the reference and made it darker. That brought up some details that I could incorporate. - Chrome Rising - Final
"Chrome Rising" - 6" x 6" scratchboard. 1941 Cadillac hood ornament, from my own reference photo.
Scratched with a #16 X-acto & an eyebrow tattoo needle (on the hood of the car), re-inked (stippling) with a technical pen.
I was mostly happy with the previous version of this drawing, but the contrast between the hood & the background in the corner bothered me. It pulled the eye right off the edge. I re-worked the hood to make it darker and now it reads better. I stippled with a technical pen to make the entire hood darker, and then scratched to blend & add highlights.
Part of the reason I didn't anticipate the issue in the corner is that I usually erase the backgrounds in Photoshop to save printer ink and avoid distraction from the subject. This a case where that worked against me, because in the photo, the background was white, so I wasn't seeing that contrast between the hood & the solid black background until I was finished. See the next 2 images - my reference photos... - Chrome Rising 4
I thought the drawing was finished at this point, but the contrast between the hood and the background was bothering me! See the next image for further discussion. - Chrome Rising 4 - Detail
Detail of stage 4 - Chrome Rising 3
She's all blocked in at this stage! Plenty of fine-tuning left to do... - Scotia 8 (Final)
Scotia's finished portrait 7" x 5" scratchboard, with watercolor from my own reference photo - Chrome Rising 2
She's lookin' pretty shiny at this stage! The lower section is the most tedious - where I worked to get a smooth, light value (but not pure white) on the hood of the car. I used an eyebrow tattoo needle to pull off some of the black (the rougher parts that are still visible) and a #16 X-acto blade to carefully blend the rough pattern. You can see the final value in the upper left section of the hood. - Chrome Rising 2 - Detail
Detail of the 2nd stage - Chrome Rising 1
Early stage of this one, plenty left to do at this point, but I was happy with how it was going. 6" x 6" scratchboard drawing of a 1941 Cadillac hood ornament. From my own reference photo. - Scotia 7
Scotia's portrait with watercolor added to her fur & nose. Nearly finished at this point, but it needs some fine-tuning here and there, and to be a bit darker overall. - Scotia 6
Scotia's portrait with scratching to soften the ink I added in the previous stage. Also new: highlights in her eyes! - Scotia 5
Black ink added with a technical pen. I inked more places than I had originally planned, but I let the drawings tell me what they need. I'll scratch as needed to better blend the inked areas. Watercolor on her tongue, eyes, inner ears. Next I'll add watercolor on all of her fur and her nose. - Scotia 4
Scotia's portrait is "all scratched". She's much too light at this stage, I need to go in and add dark areas with a tech pen, then I can add color! Once that's done, she'll look like a black dog. - Scotia 3
Update on Scotia's portrait. That large black blob area needs to be scratched...