This is the couple of my previous “Partridge in a Pear Tree” origami piece. Maybe a little more unrecognizable, but that’s where the title comes in to clarify . It’s called “Two Turtle Doves”! Now there you go. Both are oil on panel.
I decided to photograph some of the main steps as I did this one…
1. I always start off any serious project with sketches for composition and sketches for color. If I have a good color comp, it makes the painting go so easy. I’m not fiddling around with color anymore because I already know what I want. In this case, I really wanted an overall blueish painting, as my partridge was overall yellow.
2. Then I follow my sketchbook sketches and sketch out my painting on the surface I chose (this one is a gessoed wood panel)
3. I did a blue acrylic wash to encourage color harmony before I started painting.
4.Next is some rough acrylic painting. I know I don’t have to get all the details in perfectly because I am going to go over it with oils. It’s a lot easier to get those smooth blends in oil painting than acrylic anyway. So I am just getting the main colors in – that way if I don’t paint all my oil layer completely opaque, the color showing through works.
5. Oil time! I started off similarly to my acrylic layer by doing a blueish/whiteish glaze over the whole thing, just to make it wet (I used Liquin, which dries kinda fast). I prefer starting with painting wet into wet to make easier blending. I started building layers upon layers with different glazes and smaller and smaller brushes…
6. Then I finished off the smallest details with the most opaque of oils and painting wet on dry. Voila! (you may have to wait a day before you can paint on dry surface) It is finished!
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