Pan watercolors tend to be light on pigment, so it's hard to get rich colors. Additionally, they are a little chalky, because they are much more opaque due to the addition of white, or filler, or however they make them (I confess I'm ignorant of the exact difference, except in workability and appearance—and price!). In her case, however, it worked for her, because she was focused on building up somewhat painterly layers of pale pastels, and her entire palette consisted of pastels! Even the one she called "black" looked like a pale Payne's Gray. (I have to say I winced repeatedly as she scrubbed her brushes around in the color, trying to pick up enough on her brushes. With my Paul Jacksons, all I have to do is touch the tip of a wet brush to the color and it's loaded up.)
So my challenge was to mix and layer my more vibrant and much more transparent colors in a way that they would give approximately the same effect, without adding white or doing anything to make them either paler or more opaque.
I feel like I succeeded fairly well, with the exception of that ear, which I overworked to the point where it was not the same "color" as anything else, and I couldn't lift any of it. But I'm pretty happy with the rest of the face for maintaining highlights and using colors in the same way Nadyia did to define the light and shadows.
She is a little more eclectic than I am about her pen work. I stuck to my Uniball, and used a little judicious white gel pen here and there. She had about five different pen widths and colors on call, so hers came out looking more "mixed media" than mine.
I loved the model—his long head, his big, beautifully defined "schnozz," his curly hair and slightly devilish beard and smile. This was a fun one.
"Vida Claudio"—pencil, Daler Rowney inks, Paul Jackson watercolors, Uniball pen, Signo white gel pen, on Fluid 140-lb. coldpress watercolor paper, 9x12 inches.
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