Light at the End of the Tunnel

At this point, it was time to make decisions about the rest of the background.  I decided that one of the edges I already had on the carpet area would be the actual edge of the carpet and that I would add a fringe.  I would have liked to add the fringe to the top edge, but I knew that's where I wanted the division between light and shadow, and it wouldn't make sense to overlay that division with the division between carpet and bare floor.  So, the fringe edge would be at the bottom.

Getting the angles right at the bottom - not just the edge of the carpet, but also the lines dividing the planks in the wood flooring was important.  At first I tried a "scientific" approach working with my photo of the carpet sample at an angle.  But, not only was it complicated, but it was doomed to failure because I took liberties with the carpet pattern when I did my drawing.  So in the end, I just drew in various lines until I thought I had it right.

Wow!  That carpet was a lot of work!  I drew the pattern for the rest of it on my original drawing then enlarged it and transferred it to the paper.  That chore alone took a couple of hours. 

Then there was the pastel phase.  At first, I tried working with darker colors but realized pretty quickly that that approach wasn't successful.  So I continued the original colors then glazed over the part in shadow, first with the dark turquoise that's in the carpet then with a dark brown.

Next was the wood floor and the carpet fringe, working with a little NuPastel then switching to the softer Rembrandts.  There's still work to do there, but this is a good start.  Then I strengthened the colors in the sun-lit part of the carpet with Rembrandts and added the dark green outlines.  I want to lighten the background color a bit. And I may darken the shadow part with more glazing, but I'll see what I think once the rest is lightened. 

Aside from that, I'm ready to get back to the cat - clearly the most fun part!  I'm not sure what to name this painting.  Two possibilities are "The Red Mouse" or "An Easy Truce."