Sketches and Studies by Craig Houghton

Craig Houghton February 28th, 2007

thus far

• acrylic , women , oil , portraits
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Craig Houghton February 26th, 2007

I’m starting an oil over acrylic portrait of my girlfriend. I’ll do a step-through once it’s finished. Well, I will if it comes out half-way decent. It’s about time for a more detailed portrait.

rougher drawing on super smooth rag

then, refined contour drawing right over that using lightbox — I’m not going for a drawing here, just looking for confident lines to guide the initial block in

out of curiosity, I changed the rough to blue and contour to red to see how different they really were. They weren’t, really.

I applied three or four sanded layers of acrylic gesso to my canvas. it’s 14×18. here’s a before and after

I then transferred my drawing exactly as is (that was the point of the contour) onto the toned canvas by printing it in five sheets (in order to enlarge), rubbing black pastel on the back, and pressing that into the canvas like I was using graphite paper. The fifth paper, with just the face, was used to transfer the facial details so that I didn’t have to worry about the overlap from the 4 papers.

Then, I sealed the drawing in with a layer of matte medium. It smears the charcoal a bit, but the lines are perfectly intact, and that gave it some character. In the morning I’ll sand that back to keep things smooth and then I’ll do the acrylic underpainting. After that comes more acrylic and then the oils for a smooth finish — I hope.

• acrylic , women , oil , portraits
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Craig Houghton February 26th, 2007

Here’s a shot of the relatively new studio corner. Offscreen there’s more junk to the left and right and paints and pastels in shelves and under beds, and there are canvases tucked away, trays of paper, and a shelf with every sort of wood-encased medium imaginable. I friggin love art supplies — I have issues.

• photography , studio
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Craig Houghton February 25th, 2007

a no ref slightly caricatured acrylic sketch using Bob Kato’s techniques from his gnomon painting vids.

and a bunch of sketchbook crap that I wouldn’t normally post, but it’s been a busy week

Here’s a detail of the acrylic sketch. Kato’s method involves a very loose underdrawing and then a series of easily digested setps. It’s a good time.

Thanks for looking!
Craig

• cartoon , graphite , acrylic , figures , women , illustrations , men
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Craig Houghton February 20th, 2007

Here’s Berberis thunbergii before the last of the berries fall off and spring begins. There’s one growing in my front yard. It’s considered an invasive exotic species. I have no idea how the berries manage to stay attached all winter, but they take quite a bit of wear before they lose their shine, dry up, darken, and fall.

8×24 acrylic

detail

-Craig

• acrylic , plants
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Craig Houghton February 17th, 2007

Here’s a row of navel studies carved-out in Painter IX.

in charcoal

pencil and water-soluble marker

I know, exciting stuff.

-Craig

• digital , figures , women , navels
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Craig Houghton February 17th, 2007

I spent a bit trying to decide what to do with a small box frame that’s been in my way lately. I contemplated a navel and went with it.

Belly Button Box, a 5×7 acrylic navel

It’s really meant to be viewed from across a room, where it’ll look more like this:

And, here you can see the box frame.

-Craig

• acrylic , figures , women , navels
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Craig Houghton February 14th, 2007

Last night I watched the Carlos Huante Gnomon Creature Sketching and Design Video. He demonstrated a drawing technique that included colored pencil, marker paper, and rubbing alcohol. Once he had the basic forms down with some selective detail and value, he splashed alcohol on a cotton square and rubbed out the work. He then lifted out the lights with an electric eraser and reapplied the darks. From there he used the mid-tone to help him carve out a creature. I tried out essentially the same technique, but I did make use of a white colored pencil as neeeded.

I apologize for the marker tree there. This started out on my scrap page of marker paper — I didn’t expect to go anywhere with it, but the technique felt comfortable enough to keep me going. I didn’t expect the colored pencil to be so forgiving (in terms of getting things initially hammered out), but when you wash out the light lines using the alcohol, it cleans it right up.

-Craig

• birds , techniques , colored pencil , other artists , figures , markers , women , plants
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Craig Houghton February 12th, 2007

This is running along with an Earth Day story/press release. The mountain range is Sleeping Giant nearby in Hamden, CT. The lake and man-made waterfall are local as well. Really, the expanse would be filled with blacktop, apartments, and chain restaurants, but that’s not at all what I like about Hamden.

Here’s the run sized version:

And, here’s a link to the larger: Earth Day Hamden 2007

detail

I was going to start working on the mid-ground since I barely touched it, but I’d already taken too long and it looked decent enough when resized.

-Craig

• pen , digital , illustrations , landscape
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Craig Houghton February 7th, 2007

I started a new toned fabriano sketchbook today. Here’s an edge of the woods sketch from during lunch today.

Thanks for looking

• charcoal , pastel , plants , landscapes , plein air
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Craig Houghton February 5th, 2007

just this

• cartoon , digital , women , illustrations
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Craig Houghton February 4th, 2007

Let’s talk about something with absolutely no weight or substance. Let’s talk about Newsweek. Here’s the blurb for their cover story:

“Paris, Britney, Lindsay & Nicole: They seem to be everywhere and they may not be wearing underwear. Tweens adore them and teens envy them. But are we raising a generation of ‘prosti-tots’? “

A far direr indicator is that a legitimate news outlet like MSNBC made this sexist opinion piece from Newsweek their front page article. More or less, Newsweek just called a generation of young women whores. Do they really think so little of women that they’d expect a whole generation to emulate Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan just because the msm assumes it’s their mission to plaster the front covers with images of empty aristiocratic debauchery?

Newsweek even helped to bury their reputation entirely by including a 15 page spread of “bad girls.”

Right now, the U.S. is preparing to knock down the already tottering Jenga tower of international stability in order to score strategy points and barrels of oil in the Middle East as the collective jaw of the scientific community drops before the staggering evidence that man made climate change is going to radically transform our planet. Right now, damning evidence in the Libby trial seems to implicate both the vice-president and the president. But, right now, Newsweek thought it would be great to instead keep alive the age-old premise that failing to meet some standard of purity makes one a “bad-girl.”

An apt commenter on the article called Newsweek on the underlying premise:

“Labeling any female a prostitute is a millennia old device that some men and most religions have used to control women. Then when women use the label it is women-on-women violence. That should be the discussion; that and why Newsweek chose to use the word. Newsweek kindly explain, please.”

Way to go, Newsweek.

• women , media
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