- Ranger 4
First pass of color on Ranger. This will need more scratching to blend, bring up lighter areas and add variation in tones. I also need to work out the lack of contrast between Ranger and the water next to his face. The water is dark enough that I'll render Ranger the way I would a dark subject against a black background. Here's a video of scratching part of his fur, which is the next step after this stage: rumble.com/vs2w66-ranger-scratchboard-drawing-wip.html - Ranger 3
More scratching on Ranger has softened his fur and blended some of the values. Some highlights scratched into the water has cleaned up the streaky look from when I initially added watercolor. Now Ranger is ready for color! - Ranger 2
First layer of scratching on the dog is finished. Also some re-inking in a few places to add darks back in. Watercolor on the water too. That's streaky in places, but scratching in select areas will fix that. Next steps on Ranger will be scratching/re-inking to fine-tune and build depth. Then I can add color to him. - Ranger 1
Early stage of a 12" x 9" portrait of Ranger the German Shepherd Reference photo provided by my client Ranger loved the water, so that's what's going on in the background. It will taper off into black at the top, but otherwise it will look very much like the water technique I developed on "Determination" See it here: www.annran.com/website/gallery/pet-portraits/dogs/determination - Ranger in Progress
This is a cell phone photo I took during the scratching process. It fits in between Stages 1 & 2 of the scanned images. - "Safety" - Final
"Safety" 7" x 5" Claybord (white scratchboard) with India ink, ink wash, watercolor (eyes), Pitt Art Marker (shades of warm grey) and a 7B pencil. I used the pencil near the end to add a layer of light shadow to the fabric on the right side. Scratched with a #16 X-Acto. This one took a LOT longer than I had planned, but I'm really happy with how she turned out. "Safety" received a Silver award (2nd place) in the Master's division of the 2017 International Society of Scratchboard Artists' Annual Exhibition. It also sold from the Exhibition. - "Safety" 4
Getting closer, the left side of her face needs more work, as does the lower right corner of the sleeve. Instagram where you can see me using a Pitt Art Marker marker to add grey: www.instagram.com/p/BIhG627BlO7/ - "Safety" 3
Washes of ink over the previous round of scratching. With the scratches underneath to provide texture, this layer of ink is smoother than the first layer. Still rough, but becoming more refined. - "Safety" 2
At this stage, everything has been scratched back to blend the rough look from the previous stage. I added watercolor to her eyes. The background is finished - through a process of scratching, stippling, scratching, stippling, etc. to get that textured look. It's much richer and almost velvety compared to the first stage, where the background was simply a layer of India ink. I posted this video of the scratching process to Instagram: www.instagram.com/p/BIYm9c4hROX - "Safety" 2 - Detail
A detail of the 2nd image in the series. - "Safety" 1
Here's the first, sloppy stage of "Safety", 7" x 5" The reference photo has a lot of light values in it, so I used Claybord (white scratchboard) for the drawing - that way, I didn't have to remove a lot of black. using artistic license I chose to make the upper and lower left sections dark instead of showing the dog's body. The shape wrapping around her head is an arm in a fleece sweatshirt. At this stage, I blocked in the values by painting with full strength India ink & ink washes. It looks really rough here, but all this became detailed with scratching as I worked through the process. I used a Rapidograph (technical pen) filled with India ink to draw the eyes and to scribble the stripes of her brindle pattern. At this point I had just started "texturizing" the solid black areas by scratching. Here's an Instagram video showing stippling on a portion of the background: www.instagram.com/p/BH4aLolBaqP - "Safety" - Framed
"Safety" framed I'm really happy with how the framing turned out. The 5 x 7 scratchboard is glued to an 8 x 10 Ampersand Gessobord that I airbrushed with warm grey mix of inks and then distressed (using various methods that I will probably never be able to replicate). The frame is simple, black wood. - Off Duty? - Final
Finished! 5" x 7" scratchboard (Ampersand Scratchbord), with watercolor and some India ink for re-inking & drawing long, black hairs. From my own reference photo taken at a dog play day many years ago. - Off Duty? 4
With color (watercolor). I didn't spend a ton of time on color-correcting this scan. The dog looks pretty accurate, but the water isn't quite right. I'll take more time when I scan the final. At any rate, in the home stretch at this point. Next:scratching to add highlights on the dog, and separate him from the background. - Off Duty? 3
Border Collie is all scratched, ready for color! That will help pop him out from the background. He won't have spooky eyes either. After adding color, I'll scratch as needed.