Something new

My garden is now finished and looking great so things can go back to normal. My 2 chocolate labs have had an undercoat of Burnt Sienna acrylic paint to seal the pencil drawings and take away the white of the canvas board. They are now ready for the oil paints which I plan to start tomorrow if I can pull myself away long enough from looking at my garden.

And for something new (to me that is) ....... scraperboard. I was made aware of this by another artist on a great pet and portraiture art forum - www.pet-portraitartist.com/forum - and was immediately taken by the amount of detail that could be achieved using it. From what I gather, scraperboard is paperboard (or clayboard) covered with a layer of white clay or chalk and then coated with India ink. A sharp point - I used a craft knife - is used to scrape through the black ink to expose the white.

The process actually took me back to my college days when I did etchings in Printmaking. I could go back even further to childhood when you would cover paper with coloured wax crayon followed by a layer of black ready for your picture to be scraped into it. Whatever scraperboard reminds me of I am really enjoying the results and love the fine detail that can be achieved.

Many artists leave the finished image white against the black - stunning in itself - but you can use watercolour paints, inks or acrylics to colour it if preferred. I plan to do the latter when I complete the cat I am currently working on. I have attached a couple of pictures, and a close-up, to show you how it is progressing although they fail to show the amount of detail there actually is. Keep checking back for more updates on it's progression.

Will definately be looking to complete more pictures using this method to become more familiar with it as I'm sure there is lots to learn.