I See You Dog Portrait, Graphite

This Aussie dog portrait is almost finished. I love working in graphite pencils on a favorite dog breed, the Australian Shepherd.

This girlie's eyes say "I see you, you are loved" to me :) It is the message that shines from our companion's eyes whenever they look at us.




The Faber Castell 9000 pencils are awesome and I'll finish the darkest areas soon for contrast.

I See You, Dog Art Portrait

Playing with my new Faber Castell 9000 graphite pencil set. The smooth leads stay sharp and leave rich marks, shading beautifully.

Also using a .05 Pentel hi-polymer lead in a mechanical pencil with a 4B lead helps get fine lines without sharpening. I love drawing animals. It's great to flip to drawing after the marathon mosaic mural :) Drawing is my foundation since forever.




This Aussie girl lives in Switzerland. The graphite is a study for a painting to establish the main values (lights and darks).  I was going to use it as an underpainting, but decided to let it stand on it's own.

A Grisaille underpainting is really helpful when painting.  It is a technique many of the old and new masters use.
The main work of composition and values is established in black and white. Then it's just a matter of coloring or painting over it.

I like to establish the darkest areas first in relation to the lightest. Then it's easier to find your middle values. The eyes are usually the focal point in portraits. Get them right and the rest falls into place... usually ....

Reading Helper, Pencil Drawing Progress

Young Australian Shepherd Linus is a good reading buddy!
Pencil drawing on Stonehenge paper, about half finished.

Mastering Inking Skillshare Class

One of the Current classes I am in: Mastering Inking with Yuko Shimizu.

She is an amazing illustrator and I'm having fun revisiting/learning inking again.
Yes, I will submit my class projects in her contest! (you will read about it in the class description link).

First pen and ink of fawn with Micron pens instead of brushes. Next ones will play with brushes.
Pens offered soft, fine blends. (Scan is from a laser copy so kind of rough)

Fawn Ink Drawing - Sue Betanzos " A year from now you may wish you had started today." ~ Karen Lamb

One of my very favorite ♥ treats to myself ♥ this summer is enrolling in the Skillshare Classes site.
Technology is a beautiful thing since it allows access to Anything you want to learn. For those of us who can't dash off to attend workshops, these online classes are a wonderful gift.

Skillshare is a site where one can take a wide variety of online classes. There are many online class sites and I chose this site because it had instructors I admired and knew I would benefit from.
Plus it is well within my budget and there is unlimited access to the classes you take.

Tons of free stuff also on Youtube, so between the two I get to "go to class" every morning starting at 5 am when I am mentally at my sharpest via a giant Cup O' Joe :)

Want to expand your skills or learn new ones? Then check out budget friendly Skillshare  - do some window shopping :) for your brain.


Screenshot of the Ink Contest from Yuko's class:
Work that shows the important artist questions; "Who you are, What you want to express, Effort you have put into your work"

Illustrated Children's book

The other day at the library I was researching and came across a little book that I illustrated for the botanical gardens thru a grant about three years ago. It's a bilingual children's book about planting a garden to attract wildlife. Also a coloring book. I thought it had faded after it's first printing. It was such a small project that was not really promoted in the gift shop.

So imagine my surprise when I came across it/ME. I burst out laughing and pulled the copies they had and literally checked myself out - ha, ha. So now I can be found under call number 625.9525