Foxy Magic (in progress)

 Hurrah - I managed to get some decent pieces of wood!!

Went up to the Yandles Wood Show last weekend and bought a box full of offcuts to play with.

So here is my first real experiment in progress. First thing I've learnt? Sand the surface of the wood before you start. It removes any oils on the surface as well as smoothing out any lumps and bumps, both things that can slow down the burning and cause an uneven line.

I knew from the start that I wanted to colour this one so I didn't worry about too much detail with the fur etc because it would get lost under the pigment.

 To begin with I laid down some colour in watercolour paints. They actually take surprisingly well on the wood, though the water darkens the wood as you work, so the colour is always paler than expected once it has dried.

The colours do bleed across lines slightly, but given the subject matter I was quite happy with this kind of little happy accident!

 Here I've started to build on the colour using soft Sennelier pastels. I sooo love these pastels, you really cannot beat them for consistency and pigment - the colours are astoundingly bright and vibrant.

They are gorgeous to use on a rough surface like this wood because they deposit so much pigment, much better than a smooth surface. The highlights on the fur, and the primroses, are so bright, they really do shine.

I've now picked out some highlights on the rabbit (based on Eva), and added some beautiful turquoise blue and some stars to the background.

Also at Yandles I managed to pick up some gold leaf flakes, and some mica flakes which I'm going to use on the circles. I was hoping to finish it tonight but I don't have any suitable glue - so frustrating!! I'll try and grab some tomorrow...