For this painting I'm returning to one of my favorite subjects - foxes. I've also enjoyed doing foxes in ceramics and needle felting, but I haven't found, in either of those media, quite the "just right" color for fox fur, so it's nice to be working in a medium where I have - for better or worse - complete "color control."
I forgot to take a photo after the first painting session. At that point I had blocked in basic colors, but that was all. I think this photo is after the second painting session. I did a lot more work on the distant trees and also on the foxes fur. Come to think of it, this photo may be after three painting sessions because in the second session I would have put more local color for the highlights and shadows in the fox. Then in the third session I would have added all the white fur texture that you see here.
My method on the fox fur is to block in color, paint texture with white, then I'll wash over it again and continue building texture in that fashion. The fox colors are transparents - Burnt Sienna, Raw Sienna, and Burnt Umber (although the legs are Van Dyck Brown and Black - and mixing them with white for the texture just gives you chalky looking color - yuck!
I really liked the colors in the distant trees. I used various mixtures of Dioxazine Purple and Golden Ochre, along with Van Dyck Brown, Burnt Umber, and a little Burnt Sienna. It seems to work well to mix the colors for the distance from near opposites on the color wheel. I really like painting snowy woods and snow scenes although I haven't really done very many of them.
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