A WIP - Part One

I love trying out new supports to work on when I can - cue Ampersand Pastelbord. I have various sizes and colours of this sitting around waiting to be used and thought it was about time I tried it out.

For those of you who may not have heard of Pastelbord it is, and I quote, "a clay and gesso coated hardboard panel with a granular marble dust finish comparable to a sanded pastel paper except more durable and more versatile." Sounds like it could eat my pencils but I was eager to try it out all the same and see what it could do. And why not have my efforts shown as a WIP. So here it is.....

Stage 1: Adding the darks. I wanted to start with an acrylic underpainting before adding any pencils - this would/should reduce the number of hours spent using coloured pencils. Was pleasantly surprised with how the paint took to this surface and really liked the effects achieved when doing wet in wet. Also found the washes stayed wet for longer which gets a big thumbs up from me.

Stage 2: The underpainting finished. At this stage I know I should be thinking about a background and have this washed in but, as is usually the case when it comes to backgrounds, can't decide what I want to do so leave it as it is for now. I do know I want to do a lot more painting on Pastelbord.

Stage 3: Adding coloured pencil. Start with the eyes, as always, and work on her nose and mouth. I was right, it does eat my pencils! Not sure yet if I like working with coloured pencils on this support.

Stage 4: Adding yet more coloured pencil. Nose and mouth area more or less finished apart from the inevitable tidying up here and there at the end. Building up the colours on her face and ear - not having to do as many layers thanks to the underpainting. STILL thinking about a background, even when I'm not working on it!

Stage 5: Latest update. This is the stage I am at now - working my way down the neck area. Next step is putting in that background.