amberdreams | SPN Eldritch - Shadow's Disguise art masterpost

It's spooky time again! My first

spneldritchbang is for AnOddSock and a beautifully creepy story that hit lots of my buttons...
May I present Shadow's Disguise (link will be live soon)

None of the art is really spoilery.

The main pic

Sam comes back from his morning run and talks to Dean, who's been chopping wood.

The banner without the text

The art journey! (Everything's a journey these days, after all)
The main picture is in my cold pressed Etchr sketchbook. Drawn in brown coloured pencil then inked, then coloured with watercolours in a limited palette of just six colours.
Sketching

There's a video of part of the inking but it's normal speed, so if you want to watch but don't want to wait forever, you can speed up playback on YT. I didn't video the painting because my set up isn't great.

Early stages of the watercolours

I used the some of the same colours for the banner - Mayan green, Mayan blue, carmine, indian yellow and iron oxide - on a watercolour paper block rather than the sketchbook, because I wanted to do a lot of wet on wet. I threw some salt at it too. The centre was masked with tape then I inked and painted the wee house. The centre pic is about 2.5" across, in case you're curious about the scale. 😁

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Beautiful! I love the house in the banner and the main pic is stunning. The trees! Shirtless Sam! (*drools*) And Dean looks gorgeous, too. I love his expression and the motion is incredible; I really feel like I can see him moving.

Thanks very much! Glad you enjoyed (shirtless Sam...😂)

WOW, you are really rocking the lovely watercolour. Beautiful work here, so much texture and you've got the boys down cold. Lovely work.

Thank you! So happy you think I caught their likenesses.

I adore that texture you achieved for the banner! I love the striking blends of red and black but what really grabbed me was the wonderful gritty texture, it’s just so atmospheric. I was wondering how you did that and then I read further down that you used salt! That is so cool, I have heard it gives great effects in watercolour but I haven’t ever tried it. (I don’t often use watercolour very often - I work in acrylic so I don’t have to plan what goes where 😂 and I have so much respect for people who have the patience and planning to use watercolour! 😄)
And the cabin! It’s wonderful. So much detail! The smoke, the trees, the grass, the log panelling! 🙌🏼🤗 - and all inside 2.5 inches??! 😮 (doffs cap! The patience and the steady hands needed!! 🎉) — definitely worth it tho!
And Sam and Dean chopping wood 🥰🥰 - I know the scene is set against a dark ominous background but let me just be distracted by Sam’s chest for a moment please 😁😁. Lovely. Plus I really like the detail of the wood grain in the tree stump! Oh and their hands too! You gave both of the boys lovely elegant hands 🥰🥰
And thank you so much for including the video! I love getting to watch other artists work and squirrelling away methods and tips! And what I learned from you here is that I need: a finer nibbed pen, steadier hands and about 10 times more patience! 😁😂 but seriously, it was awesome to watch in real time. I know many people don’t have the attention to watch art in real time but it’s great to be reminded that detailed work like this does take time! And the results definitely show the care and attention.
Absolutely gorgeous artwork. Wonderful to look at. Thank you so much for this 😄🤗

Thank you!!! 💕

Some of the texture is salt but that black grittiness is the iron oxide paint — when it dries the graininess of the pigment really separates out. I'm not a great planner so my watercolouring ends up 90% experimental. But then most of my stuff is like that too — whatever the media! 😆

Gosh thanks for watching the video! It was my first one. LOL

What I've learned about patience is — if I'm doing something that needs me to work more methodically and slow, I'm much better. Getting loose tends to mean I get angry quickly and want to just scribble over everything with my eyes shut. It's weird. (I'm weird).

Ohhhhh I hadn’t heard of iron oxide paint! I’ll definitely look into that! And using salt too. However you managed it, that’s a great texture and definitely something that would be fun to play with! 👍🏻 Cheers 😄
And Yayyyyy for experimental art! 🙌🏼😁 it’s a philosophy I live by. “Hmmmm what would happen if I used… insert random art supply or even household object. 😂 But I also accept that I could save myself a bit of trouble if I didn’t just jump in head first all the time 😂 so yep definitely thank you for the video and the by product of encouraging me to work on my patience 😄

I've really got into hand made paints. So much fun — this lady on Etsy is one of my faves and I think the black iron oxide is from her. She also has a gorgeous one called Scarlet Magnetite which uses the mineral magnetite in a fabulous red to give that same gritty granulation. Though there are a bunch of excellent US based makers too (like Poems about You)

Ohhhh those both look really interesting! I’ve never tried specialist paints before. I’ll check them out! Cheers for the tip 👍🏻😄

SPN Eldritch - Shadow's Disguise art masterpost

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