The Peacock (c) Leslie D’Allesandro Hawes
I drew The Peacock as part of the group, Monthly Sketch Project, and have used it as one of my Drawing A Day pieces. I thought I might make this drawing serve another purpose, too, of giving me a new step by step demonstration for Leslie’s Art Blog.
The Peacock is drawn with Derwent Artists colored pencils, and measures 2.5″ x 4″ on a taupe colored alpha mat board that measures 5″ x 7″.
The colors that I have used are:
- Chinese White
- Gunmetal
- Light Blue
- Chocolate
- Ivory Black
- Zinc Yellow
- Emerald Green
- Raw Sienna
- Ultramarine
- Venetian Red
- Imperial Purple
This is the reference photo, provided by Jennifer at Fuzzydragons. Thanks so much, Jennifer, for the great pic!
I placed a standard sized 5″ x 7″ mat over the taupe colored alpha mat, and drew an outline with a regular graphite pencil, just slightly smaller than the mats’ pre-cut 3″ x 4.5″ opening. I have a tendency to draw “outside the lines”, and I have to make a conscious effort to draw an outline first before sketching, or I wind up with a drawing way bigger than will fit inside any mat! I have trouble with straight lines, too, so my borders have, as aptly described by a friend, an “organic” style.
Once I had my area defined, I drew my sketch, using a regular graphite pencil. ( Couldn’t keep the peacock head feathers inside the lines! )
When I had a sketch I liked, I lightly redrew over top of those graphite lines with the Gunmetal colored pencil. Then I used my kneaded eraser and rubbed all over the drawing, removing the graphite and leaving the Gunmetal sketch. I do that to remove the graphite which tends to smear. The colored pencil doesn’t.
It’s a bit of a trick to decide how dark to make the Gunmetal overdrawing. Too dark isn’t what you want , but it has to stand up to the gentle erasing. You’ll figure out how dark to make it after the first or second time you erase your sketch completely. Ask me how I know…
After the erasing was done, I started to lay in color. I began with Chinese White, and got most of it in place on the face, the eye highlight, and beak of the peacock. The chest feathers on the left side were in sunlight, so they got Chinese White, too.
I added some of the bright Light Blue to the right side of the neck…I wanted to see if the color was bright enough, and it seemed to be.
Then I chose the Chocolate colored pencil ( isn’t that a great name for a color? ) and began to shape around the eye.
Next, I colored the eye with Ivory Black.
Then I colored the background with Emerald Green. It was the first of a few layers of different colors on the background.
I got busy with the Chinese White making the shapes of all the chest feathers, and then filled in around the Chinese White with Light Blue and Chocolate. The trick for me is to not go over the white with another color. I colored in with Raw Sienna on the top of the head and on the head feather tips.
I became happily involved with coloring at this point, and could have shown one or two more steps here. By the time I thought about it, I had added Ultramarine blue on the neck, and bits of Zinc Yellow and Chocolate on the background. More layers of Chocolate went on the neck, and I darkened the outline of the drawing with Imperial Purple.
Venetian Red was added to the top of his head and the tips of his head feathers.
The last thing I did was add more layers to each color if they needed to be brighter. I added more Zinc Yellow to the background, more Light Blue to the feathers, and a splash of Imperial Purple right in the center of the neck. I gave the whole peacock an outline of Chocolate to make him stand out a bit. Then I signed in graphite pencil, because it makes a nice sharp point to write with. I spray fixed with Krylon Crystal Clear fixative held at a good distance so the drawing barely got misted. Usually two coats of very light misting with fixative.
That’s it!
If you ever have any questions, please email. leslie at lesliehawes dot com
Now go sharpen those pencils!
Leslie
