This amicable beaver didn’t mind our comings and goings on the dock at all as he sat on a submerged rock munching on his lunch only a few feet away.
Besides the great fishing, Canada is a splendid place to view wildlife. This animal drawing which I am rendering in Pastels is from a photo I snapped just coming in to the pier off the shores of the resort, down from the cabin where we stayed.
I’ve a stash of photos from a variety of little journeys we’ve taken that I can work from. Sometimes it’s hard to decide what medium I will portray each in, and sometimes it happens to be just what’s close at hand when I step into my workspace.
This particular piece is done on a textured piece of Mi Teintes. In preparing to write this blog I came across a conversation about the pros and cons of working with Pastels on Mi Teintes
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Some people disliked the difficulty of working on the textured surface and preferred it’s smoother side; others touted it’s affordability. As for me I’ve come to enjoy working on it. My bigger conundrum was in the use of the pastels. I use to be afraid of working in pastels. Their brilliant colors seemed overwhelming. But I forced myself to add them to this lovely set of warm toned pastel pencils that I was given as a gift. I didn’t want to go through the pencils too quickly and I was sure I could cover more area with the pastels. Evenutally I learned to blend the pastels into more muted colors that didn’t shout “Look at Me!” and I became more adept at creating rich works of art that shouted ‘Look at Me!’