Black-Footed Rock Wallaby

Sandi and I encountered this black-footed rock wallaby a few weeks ago on one of our many forays along Yardie Creek. As is so often the case with these creatures, he seemed more indifferent than alarmed and we were able to sneak our kayaks close enough to take as many photos as we liked, one of which features a wallaby mid-leap which I look forward to painting in due course. In the meantime, I'm keen to begin this painting which I'm inclined to think is a little less ambitious.

With careful attention to the sharpness of edges and to colour and contrast, I hope to push the rocks on the left hand side of the image into the background slightly, the goal being to emphasise depth in what could otherwise appear to be a continuous flat expanse of rock wall.

Having flirted briefly with masonite and dabbled unhappily with canvas, I'm back to using watercolour paper, a support I've enjoyed working with in the past - this time it's rough 640gsm Arches. After spending the best part of a day and a half on the preparatory drawing, I've applied acrylic sealer to the surface in readiness for my acrylic paints. Tomorrow, before I make a start, I'll experiment with colour mixes on some offcuts and hopefully be well prepared when paint hits paper.

I made the mistake recently of relying on the digital image displayed on my laptop, with less than ideal results. As I came to realise, tonal values and colour can vary significantly depending on the angle of the screen. As you can see, this time I'm following the lead of fellow blogger Grahame Butler and have printed out two copies of the image on high-definition paper as reference, one in colour and one in black and white.

Cheers

Pete