The Oak Dryad (Texture Quest II)

The synthetic paper is... weird. It's made for watercolours; it does feel like painting on plastic. It doesn't soak at all, and paint lifts off it easily. I start with some spattering effects with acrylics and inks, which become muddy soon. After trying to get some other texture effects going which fails, i turn to simpler drip effects, diluted an understated cool green and brush it onto the long side while tipping the board to make it flow. Interestingly, it runs along the coloured pencil lines I had drawn, which looks nice. I work all over the piece with brushstrokes, trying to get a feeling for how much water to add and how to blend strokes. I scratch out some lines to help with bark texture with scratching knives. It's only slowly moving into a direction I like; I use a compass for some circles and find the pencil scratches down to the surface, lifting paint off. I drip some more wet paint around the place and finally use the alleged strength of the synthetic, and rub down to the surface with a rag. That is actually nice, getting the paper white back. To get going on the abstraction I am looking for, I add two circles in orange ink. Then I leave the image alone for a few days because I don't know how to continue. This is why, when working to deadline, it never hurts to start early. Finally, I decide to add white circles to suggest light and lens flares. Using a circles ruler with small gel pens, and tying string to a larger marker for huge circles, I vary the sizes and posiiton them with composition in mind, making some from dashed rather than solid lines. And - done. Sorry for only one progress shots, I get carried away when making a mess.