Deer in Richmond Park wip day 5

Chip,chip,chip....I think best explains today's progress. I'm still working further into the pastel layers adding texture. I had a go at the body and legs today, and pondered the background. I've got a new daylight bulb after my accident yesterday, so the photo taken today resembles a better colour likeness.

Deer in Richmond Park wip day 4

I'm still chipping away at this. The gremlins have been out to get me the past couple of days. Its a miracle I still have a working camera after yesterday, I managed to not notice it following me out of the car, shutting the door on the strap. My husband was alerted by an on-looker that the camera was hanging out of the door, by which time he'd dragged it across the forecourt of the petrol station. Today I've managed to knock my daylight easel lamp off my easel onto an opened draw, smashing the lamp....I've started to work in the texture of the fur, I'm still mainly using hard pastels, and getting some finer detail with a purple tinted charcoal pencil.

A chilly Painshill Park

Even after several days of warmer weather, today was a scorching 8 degrees, the lakes were still frozen at Painshill Park. A family of swans were taking a stroll across it!

The ice was beautiful in the sunshine. It was lovely today not to have cold toes, a sure sign things have warmed up!

Deer in Richmond Park Wip day 2

Spent another hour on this, have started to work out the bone structure of the deer's head. I'm still mainly using hard pastels. Now all the snow has gone here I'm enjoying drawing this snowy scene, as it reminds how beautiful the park has been.

Deer in Richmond Park WIP

Just started this pastel today spent just an hour roughly blocking out the main colours in a hard conte pastel. I was lucky at the weekend when I was up in the park with my camera, the deer were up for a camera shoot! I think they were too busy nosing around in the snow looking for food to notice me. The colours at the moment are bright, these will tone down as I work in the texture of the fur with softer pastel.

Things are starting to thaw

I visited Richmond park again today, this time with my camera and without the boys. Things have definitely started to warm up, I was walking around the park, it's not looking quite as solid. The shrubs are shedding their covering of snow and I could hear the plopping sounds as chucks of snow fell to the ground.

I felt guilty that I'd not thought to bring some bread with me, the ducks and geese are now fed up with the big freeze, the ponds are still frozen solid except one pond in the Isabella plantation. This pond has a small fountain set up by the park keepers to keep a small part of their pond from freezing.

For the past year or so I have been trying to get a decent photo of a heron that hangs out in the park. I truly believe this bird is having a laugh at my expense. He knows when I haven't got my camera, he'll pose himself in the most picturesque scenes, and not move when I approach. One glimpse that I have my camera he's gone! I will continue to pursue this bird, today he played with me briefly allowing a shot at full zoom. Two steps nearer, he was off. I think I need a super zoom one that's about a foot long!

Here's the one I got today, the same as many others, not bad, but not quite good enough, but promising enough to make me continue my quest to photograph this annoying bird. To end on a more positive note, the deer today were being most obliging I think I have got a series of shots that will make a good painting, I'm thinking a pastel one would work well. With the thaw starting the schools should be open tomorrow, so hopefully I can crack on with this new project.

The snow has finally arrived in Kingston!

We had escaped the 'big freeze' much to the disgust of my kids, and I guess myself, I'd been jealous of all the lovely snowy art posted on lots of blogs. We got it yesterday. We are still fairly well off compared to lots of folks, but being Southern softies the schools are closed, even though all major roads are clear and public transport is running. The kids were obviously pleased with the closure of the schools, my husband made it into work so the responsibility of taking the boys sledging was down to me. I know we don't get snow often but why does it have to be so cold? I loved watching all the sledging, the children had such fun, I even had a little go! But after an hour or so there was no getting away from the fact my feet were freezing, even with my newly purchased ski-ing socks.
We went up to Richmond park which was beautiful, its also just about the only hill around us. The park has had a dramatic transformation in the last month, the beginning of December it still looked very autumnal.



Today everything was frozen solid.