Old Post Office

This is the NOVEMBER 2008 Monthly OIL PASTEL CHALLENGE posted in Wetcanvas forum. It took me sometimes to decided whether to take up the challenge. Here is my initial sketch.



I work on the scenery outside the door first. Refers to the reference photo, I observed that scenery outside the door is brighter compared to scenery inside the building.



Well, I told myself, I gonna improve the contrast between inside and outside later.



This is final, I layered a tint of light yellow for the outside scenery for the contrast. The challenge thread is here. Thanks for looking at it.

Acheen Street and the Malay Mosque

The Acheen St. Mosque in Georgetown, Penang, is also known as Masjid Melayu Lebuh Acheh (Malay Mosque) was founded by Tengku Syed Hussain Al-Aidid in 1808. The entire complex is historically and architecturally important as it reflects the earliest Muslim urban community in Penang comprising of the Malays, Indian Muslims, Arabs and the Achehnese.
Quote from http://www.hbp.usm.my/townplg/heritage/acheen.htm.

The Mosque is located at the place near to Khoo Kongsi, which is walking distance.

The composition of buildings and the street is a challenge for me, I have no confident to sketch it directly with OP. With the help of colour pencil, I have done my initial sketch. It is easy to correct the mistakes on colour pencil compared to oil pastel.


My focus is to express the historical view on entire street, which I do not concentrate on the details in very fine manner.


Finally, I had completed the sketch.

Hai Kee Chan, Penang

Hai Kee Chan (海记栈）is a traditional mansion which located in Georgetown, Penang. Not like others Chinese traditional building which likes to paint in red, this building painted in green. If you are interested for visiting it, feel free to get further information at here.

I am using cray-pas expressionist OP, and painted on drawing block's cover that have coarse surface. Not like others Penang building painting that I usually sketch the details using color pencil before applying the Oil Pastel. But this time, I sketch it directly with OP.

I started with the door, lamp and the signboard.


Then I outline the rest of the objects such as windows and lanterns.


Next, I finished off the green wall.


Final!

Teo Chew Association in Penang

Teo Chew Association in Penang is also known as Han Jiang Ancestral Temple. It is a building that won the Award of Merit from the Unesco Asia-Pacific Heritage Award for Culture Heritage Conservation like Khoo Kongsi.

I have drew the outer hall of this temple. I am using mostly Faber-Castell creative studio oil pastel, as well as blending with some cray-pas expressionist OP on white drawing paper.

This is the initial sketch that I have done by using color pencil and few stroke of OP.


My focus on this building is the roof as well as the depth of the interior part. Therefore, I start my painting from the roof.


I use a lots of dark color to express the layer depth of the interior of the building, dark color consist of dark brown, dark blue, dark red as well as black.



And finally, it is done. Here I present you the Teo Chew Association in Penang. Thanks for looking at it.

An old auberge in Penang

This is an old auberge located at Georgetown of Penang, Malaysia. Georgetown is the capital of Penang, has been added to the UNESCO World Heritage List recently. Although this tiny little auberge is not as famous as Khoo Kongsi, but this simple aging building is beautiful for me.

This is the first time I use Faber-Castell creative studio oil pastel into painting. I am using coarse surface orange card, as well as faber-castell color pencil for the initial sketching.

First, I am sketching this building in brown.


My first impression on Faber-Castell oil pastel is the price, it is expensive compared to cray-pas expressionist. Both of them provides 36 colors, Faber-Castell gives quite interesting range of colors for me, they have many light tone which is close to white, and it gives me two gray color. Well, they do not provide gold and silver.



I realized that Faber-Castell Oil pastel is quite dusty, and I prefer cray-pas white color compare to Faber-Castel one.



I am using cray-pas silver color for the gate, as well as some dark brown for the darker area of the wood window.



And finally, It is done. This is the second painting dedicated to Penang, my home neighborhood.



I have tried applying Faber-Castell white to cover the light yellow (102 cream), but it failed to cover, it seems opaque to me. Therefore, at last I choose cray-pas white.

Well, it is still too early to tell whether Faber-Castell oil pastel suits me or not. I will do more painting using Faber-Castell OP.

Step by step: Brighten your life ACEO

I still remember two months ago, I am surfing the net for info of creating ACEO, as I have some doubts such as what kind of paper should I use? what paper color is suitable for oil pastel? Should I use pencil for sketching before painting it with OP? What are the additional tools do I need to create this mini size of art.

Today, I have done more than 30 pieces of Art trading card, I have my doubt answered, and continue to accumulate more experiences on creating Oil Pastel ACEO. While enjoying the weekend and waiting for more cards to reach the destination for the exchange project, I created another card and take photo shots my work in progress.

This is my first ACEO WIP post, I would like to do it as details as possible. I welcome any comments and suggestions regarding where to improve as well as tips and tricks.

For creating ATC, the card size is important, it must be 2.5 x 3.5 inches. I couldn't find any ready made ATC size paper from the art suppliers, therefore I bought a large black color mounting board and cut them into pieces myself.





I realized that, graphite pencil may blend with OP and produces dirty color, and also it is hard to see on black color mounting board. Therefore I bought a white pastel pencil.



I can't draw something from nothing, well I always need a photo for a reference. Fortunately I can get the photo of the object I wanna draw from the net. Here is a good site that finds me a series of images from flickr based on the tags I specified.

Study the image I picked, the color tone, the shades, the focus point and the beauty. This is important, I may have to love the painting before I start the painting. After that, I sketch it with white pastel pencil.



Next, I picked out the OP from the box to another container, those are all the important colors I need it for the painting.



I am quite new to cray-pas OP, although I have using it for quite sometimes. Still, some of the colors doesn't blend well on black mounting board, which I have yet to discover. Therefore, I usually trying it out for a small portion to build up my confidence.



Alright! It seems to goes well, so I continue ...


I like to use white a lots, I find it blends well with any other colors.



Yellow is always a headache for me, because of the opacity it gives, it looks dirty on black. I don't have any other materials for underpaint, I heard acrylic is good for underpaint, but I am yet to try.


This is not yet final, I will come back for the details. But at the moment, its time to go goes for the background.


My intention is to create a blurry background where some how you can feel the flower is surrounding by other flowers.

I have mixed various colors at various portion by circling it, then I blend them together, with the help of grey color OP.

After done on background, I come back for the details of the main object.


This is the secrete tool for details on a mini card. It is call tortillon, but I call it color blender, which I helps me blends colors to produce the intended textures.


I come back for the background, adding white color at certain portion.



Finally it is done, I hold it with my hand to feel the size as I always do.



Lets have a closer peek!



Alright, hope you enjoy my step by step walk through. I hope this will brighten your life as well as my life too.