Title Page and Dedication Page, Finished Illustrations

I finished painting the title page a couple days ago.  The dedication page was finished about two weeks ago.  I worked on adjusting all the colors of the scans this weekend.  Not too many adjustment layers were needed and I am getting faster at the process.  Only three illustrations remain!  I will work on the special thanks page next.

Page 1 Finished Illustration!

I finished painting page one yesterday and got it scanned tonight.  Luckily, I did not have to do that many adjustment layers.  It scanned quite well so what you see in this digital image is very close to the original.  All of the interior pages are done!!  I am quite happy, only five more pages to go and the book will be almost done!  I start teaching next week but I still hope to complete two illustrations in September and two more in October.  Hopefully I will be able to finish the final illustration in November. 

Lesson planning for teaching takes a considerable amount of time so I am not sure if I will have all the art done in November.  Friday's and Saturday's are exclusively lesson planning days which shortens the amount of painting time I have in a given week.  Regardless, if I do not have all the paintings done by the end of November, it will most certainly be finished before the end of the year arrives.

Pages 24 and 25 Finished Illustration

I finished painting these this Saturday, got them scanned and adjusted all the colors today.  Not a whole lot of adjustment layers needed on this one thankfully.  These are the final interior pages of the book, I only have to finish page one and then all of the interior pages will be done!  All that remains after the last interior page is done are the front cover, back cover, dedication, title page and special thanks.

Page 23 Finished Illustration

Finished another painting this weekend and it has a similar color scheme like the previous page.  The main concern with this piece was to make sure the door behind the fox was painted very lightly to make sure the head of the fox stands out.  The next two pages are the final two interior illustrations as well as a double page spread.

Dakota Johnson Portrait - Suspiria (2018)

I am a big fan of the new Suspiria film starring Dakota Johnson and I really wanted to try and paint a portrait of her.  Portraits are one of my weaknesses as an artist so this was certainly a challenge.  I first did a line drawing using a col-erase blue pencil.  The paper is coldpress watercolor paper and all the paint is transparent.  I only used five colors - primary cyan, permanent violet dark, dioxazine purple, alizarin crimson hue and primary yellow.  I don't think I nailed the likeness, but I still learned a lot painting it.

Page 21 and Page 22 Finished Illustrations

I finished both of these recently, forgot to post them here.  I am almost finished with all the interior pages - just four more to go!  After the interior pages are done, I have five more illustrations to complete which includes the covers, dedication and title page.  Almost done!  I hope to have most of my book completed before I begin teaching fall classes.  I want to have my kickstarter up and ready to go sometime this fall. 

Page 20 Finished Illustration

Painting this illustration was fairly simple, it was adjusting the scan that proved to be troublesome.  Pretty much all the colors had to be adjusted.  I did a lot of color balance adjustment layers and I managed to get the scan to match the original as close as possible.  The colors in the scan always seem to be slightly darker than the original.  Still, I am happy with the results.  When painting, I just treated the dragon as part of the background, almost as if I was painting a landscape.  The fox is the only area of the painting with absolute darks ( paynes grey ).