As with all artists and crafts people, pet portrait artists are a thrifty group and, if they can save some money by making their own materials, they definately will. As with paints, pastels can be very expensive to buy and the best ones always seem to run out more quickly however, it is possible to make your own at a fraction of the price of shop bought ones. It is also possible to achieve better results, often manufactured pastels lack the intermediate greys, grey-greens and the half-tone required for rendering flesh colours.
Pastel sticks are soft, medium or hard according to the amount of binder incorporated into the paste. The greater the amount of binder used the harder the pastel, but colour intensity is diminished, the better pastels are the softest but they tend to be more brittle.
This is the method
1. Start with one pigment this will need to be lightened with an equal amount of zinc white or finely powdered whiting to get the desired colour. It is best to start with the darkest shade select some of the mixture for the pastel and reserve the rest to make the lighter shades.
2. Getting to know how much binder to use only really comes through trial an error. There are several possible types of binder, a mix of gum arabic and water (commonly in a ratio of 1:20, however weaker solutions may be required for some colours) or leaf gelatine (melted into distilled water) can be used (again experiment to find out what the minimum is required to do the job). A gum arabic binder tend to produce harder pastels that form a crust on the outside, so that pastels need to be ‘started’ by rubbing with sandpaper. Gelatine creates a friable pastel, however it is more difficult to shape.
3. Place the pigment for the pastel on a slab of ground glass and pour sufficient binder solution to work it into a thick paste. Use a palette knife to mix the materials together, the final mixture should be moist but not sticky.
4. Select enough mixture to make one pastel, form it into a sausage shape using the palette knife and lay it on a strip of blotting paper. To create the crayon shape, roll the mixture by alternately lifting either side of the blotting paper, it is best to avoid making it too long or thin.
5. Once the first set of pastels are complete, you can use the reserved pigment mixture to make up the next colour shade. Add sufficient whiting to achieve the tint required, separate some of the mixture for the pastels and reserve the rest for the next tint in the range and so forth, until you have all the shades you need from that particular colour.
6. For darker shades the same process is used with black instead of the whiting and greens can be made brighter with yellows.
You’re now in command – give it a go! It will be possible for you to create stonger, brighter colours with the texture that suits you best.!
Tags: art, artist, painting, pet portraits, portraits