Life Drawing

We were drawing yesterday at Adrienne's with Bob for a model. I felt he had an interesting character face so I concentrated on mostly the head for the long pose. Again, I am using "wilder" colour - and really enjoying it. Actually the pastels work together nicely and the colours are quite effective. I'm beginning to think I prefer the darker papers to work on-- I think this colour is called "tobacco" so I will have to pick up more of this shade. It is easier to get the edges to stand out when there is a contrast with the background. First, I work on the drawing- placement, proportions and so on. Then I like to block in some lights- figuring out what is the lightest light- and then the shadow areas- and keep on working from there. This is a two-hour pose and I think the timing was right. That is, I had enough time to get as much done as I wanted. The background is just paper colour as there was enough contrast. This was all done in hard pastels with just a bit of pan pastels at the beginning to block in lights and darks. I didn't use pastel pencils at all as I was working large enough that I didn't need them for fine lines. And, I forgot the few soft pastels that I have- so they didn't get used on this one. It was a good drawing session- with the usual variety of styles and media by the different artists - all good, all different!