Bombay Bazaar
I have a collection of about ten thousand vintage slides: half of them are ones my family (or I) took. The other half are ones I've purchased and scanned.
I use them as source material for some of my more complex pieces. This one will be a 1960s market scene from Gibraltar — except the people will be chicken people.
I have a digital collage (1 hour or so of work) that I am now carefully tracing (1 hour 17 minutes and counting)
Three weeks ago, I was this far in the initial lining for my next street scene with chicken people. I should have shared it but didn't for some reason I have forgotten.
Tonight I worked more on the line work, the stuff you won't see once the actual drawing is done.
Save for a car and some foreground figures I am done with this step. This line work represents 2.5 hours of work, plus another 2 hours of digital collage prep-work.
I finished the lines last night but forgot to share my progress. Now I am colouring in the sunlit area of the street.
I haven't worked on any digital art in a fortnight because I was traveling. I do sometimes bring along an iPad but this trip I wanted to focus on my watercolour painting.
Now that I'm home, I've worked another hour on "Bombay Bazaar."
Bombay Bazaar - 4.5 hours of drawing now. I'm treating this one almost like a watercolour. I'm intentionally avoiding perfectly straight / clean lines.
When I do these complex digital pieces it's so tempting to aim for precision / perfection but that won't work here. The source photo (minus the chicken people) is old and somewhat degraded with time. If I aim for recreating exactly what I see I'll be representing the slide and not the moment the slide captured.
Bombay Bazaar - 5.5 hours of drawing now. I coloured in one of two wrought iron balconies as well as a shop sign.
6.5 hours of work now. I'm still avoiding the other wrought iron balcony. I worked on signs instead.
Another hour ... the signs which give the name to this piece are done. The pesky wrought iron is done.
Bombay Bazaar - 8.5 hours of work now. I've started working on the darkest areas of the shadowed areas.
9.5 hours of work now. More signs. The start of a car. The start of one of the chicken people.
10.5 hours of work. So many tiny details in the various windows and archways.
11.5 hours of work. I have maybe 2 hours left?
12.5 hours of work. Can I finish in only one more hour of work????
Bombay Bazaar - 14 hours from start to finish.
It was fun to draw but I am GLAD to be done.
Sarah Sammis
Deborah Preuss, pcc
Steph