Cape Buffalo drawing update

Had a few days away from the drawing board celebrating my birthday weekend but after 24 hours 'r n r ' i'm back in the land of the living and scribbling at the board once more.ive finished toning the background for now,i may go back into it later but i didnt want to go too dark initially until i'd set some tones on the animal.as you can see ive been layering busily here and have put down two layers of H grade pencil in the lower half of the drawing and worked part of the animals coat to near completion.ive used several layers of graphite in each grade from H thru to B and then added directional hair strokes in 2 and 3B to finish off the coat.

New pencil drawing started

My latest drawing has been on the board now for a couple of days.in this time ive managed to layer the beginnings of the background 3 times with H and HB grade pencils,i'll now start to add some random blurry-ness with softer grades to give me a semi-photographic style of background which will help to lift the animal from the paper.the subject of this drawing is a cape buffalo which i have wanted to draw for ages and have finally pulled my finger out and got started.its quite a large piece for me and so is likely to take some time to complete.i have several projects on the go right now and so i will be chopping and changing amongst them and i hope it will keep it interesting for you.My show season is finally upon me at last and my first outing will be on my publisher collier and dobson's stand at Badminton Horse trials which get underway on the 30th april.new for this show will be 2 largescale limited edition prints featuring my giraffe and calf piece entitled 'watchful' and my brand new drawing 'shadow hunter'.these can both be viewed on my publisher's website www.collierdobson.com

Avocet study 11.5"x5.75"

This drawing is now complete.The foreground has been layered using every grade of pencil from H thru to B grade,details have then been added using a 2B pencil.In this instance the details have been added by scribbling and directional strokes rather than my usual circulism method as i'm not overly worried about acheiving a high level of detail in this area rather the 'impression' of detail.This drawing will join my previous egret image at my forthcoming exhibition at Titchfield Haven.

Avocet study update

Progress so far today on this little avocet study.The background has been worked up further with another layer of H grade pencil followed by a layer of HB then some detailing in place with a B grade.You can quite clearly see the incomplete layering process as you look towards the foot of the image.In the foreground i intend to add some vegetation from the marshy surround to the scrape.The bird itself is now pretty much completed,a little tinkering here and there once the foreground and background is complete is all thats left to do except of course for those lovely long legs!

Avocet study

This is the start of another small drawing for my forthcoming exhibition at Titchfield Haven.It's a study of a lovely Avocet on the mudscrape at titchfield.So far ive layered the background twice with an H grade pencil and worked some areas up further using HB and B grade pencils.The water was layered only once with H grade and then i blended it using a paper blending stump to make it appear smooth.I completed the avocets head by layering with all grades from H thru to 5B to get the very deep black required here.i'm going to be working on this one from top to bottom because it's so vertical in it's format and because i fancy a change!

Shadow Hunter-Black Leopard 12"x11"

This is a better quality scan that ive received from my publishers of my black leopard drawing.limited edition giclee prints will be available soon through my website http://www.clivemeredithstudio.com/

Little Egret sketch 9.5"x5"

I have an exhibition later this year at the Titchfield Haven nature reserve which is very close to where i live and work and i can frequently be found there binoculars and camera at the ready watching the local waterbirds.I wanted to show some smaller works as well as some of my larger more detailed pieces as it will be the first time that a collection of my bird works have gone on display.i cannot think of a potentially more appreciative audience for my work than the hoards of birder's who descend on titchfield haven during the late summer and autumn and so i wanted to have works on display to potentially suit all pockets.This sketch was completed in one day and shows one of the most popular birds found at titchfield the little egret,i have depicted this one backlit on a sunny autumn day with loads of shadow and a lovely dark reflection.

Black Leopard 12"x11" complete

A little bit difficult to capture with my camera the true darkness of this piece but nonetheless here it is.i will post a better image once it's been scanned.

Black Leopard drawing almost complete

A great day's work in the studio today,one of those blissful day's when everything's right with the world and nobody around to disturb my train of thoughts,few and far between nowaday's but welcome nonetheless.The nose of the cat is almost complete with just the lower jaw to go and the actual nose itself.My hand is really beginning to feel tight after so much layering to get these deep blacks and it was the cramp in my hand that curtailed today's studio session but not before i'd had time to draw the eye's of this magnificent animal and now it's sparkling with life.

quick update on black leopard

this is yesterday's progress as i'm not going to get into the studio today,off to titchfield haven nature reserve for a little birding and photographing.ive been working on the cheeks of the cat and am almost there having used all grades of pencil from H thru to 3B to acheive the results so far.the right hand side cheek has only been layered twice thus far in H and HB.ive also added some more tone to the whiskers of the cat on the left hand side of the picture as they were too white,i shall do the same to those on the left once ive finished the cheek there.Happy easter everybody!

Black Leopard drawing update

had a very busy few days since my last posting but i'm back at the board again and have been busy building up areas of tone on the cats head.ive pretty much completed the top of the cat's head and am now starting to work on the cheeks,much layering to go here.i'm using all grades of pencil from H through to 5B in order to get that lovely rich,velvety black in the darkest areas.