Brown Horse

Portrait of a Brown Horse (Inktense pencil, 10x10)

The inspiration for this portrait came from Inspiration All Around Us - a photo taken by Dana Marie called "Modesty" that she posted on her blog. It was a realtively quick one to do. Drawing horses is easy for me - I've been doing it for 30 years now... I really liked the pose of this horse. I cropped the original image in my quick sketch and then after I transferred it to Stonehenge paper I got going with my inktense pencils and water. I piddled around for awhile with light washes and underpainted with reds, yellows and purple and then I added the top layers. The underpainting actually changes the way the top colour comes out. The body of the horse is a bit rough in this photo and I've reworked it a bit now, not sure which way I like it better... If I decide I like the new version better I'll change the picture.

I'm happy with how this turned out though. I think I kept it loose and not too controlled. My horse is a little heavier than the one in the photo but I guess that's OK. Thanks to Dana Marie for providing such great reference photos, this is my first attempt at interpretting one of her shots and I hope to do it again.