Intro and Materials Needed

Welcome!

This is a mixed media course that will predominately use soft chalk pastels. There will be some light coats of watercolors and Faber Castell Gelatos on the face, but you could easily put down a layer of soft chalk pastel to get your desired skin color.

As this painting happens in real time, you'll see me use the watercolors and gelatos first until I change my mind and do the piece entirely in soft chalk pastels (which are different from hard chalk pastels; those are used for more detailed work but are occasionally soft enough to use in a piece like this).

We'll also be using gesso for highlights and some repair work, and a "Stabilo All" Pencil (the "all" means it can write on anything), along with an ordinary graphite pencil here and there.

Also, our girl here in "The Light Inside" is a three-quarter face, and I walk you step-by-step in order to get her expression.

Keep in mind that the cog wheel in the lower right hand corner of every video allows you to watch this course at various speeds without me sounding like a chipmunk. :) Therefore, I have not timelapsed any sections, as I do in my YouTube videos or sometimes in the Art & Soul School videos. You can use your own judgment as to when you want a certain section to go faster.

All videos run about a half-hour long, and in the third lesson, I'm pretty quiet while I'm working and thus play a lot of music in the background, all of which has been curated to create mood and inspiration as you work. All of the other lessons, however, have fairly constant verbal instruction, with occasional text appearing on the screen.

I'm honored you've purchased "The Light Inside"! Let's get started!

Materials Needed

We'll be using a fairly short list of supplies for this piece, which are listed below. Just FYI, they are Amazon Affiliate links, which means I make a few pennies (literally) if you buy using these links. They are mainly here for your convenience.

You can always work on this image using any supplies you have at home. You can substitute an ordinary graphite pencil or a black watercolor pencil for a Stabilo pencil, and you could even use watercolors (preferably gouache, which are more intense, meaning opaque) to get the same effects as the pastels. For highlights, you could use plain white acrylic paint instead of gesso, or even white pastel.

However, I would highly recommend that you have a set of soft chalk pastels to do this piece. Luckily, everyone seems to have a set of chalk pastels around the house somewhere. If you're wondering if oil pastels could be substituted, I honestly don't know as I've not yet worked with them. But I would think watercolor crayons would be great for layering to get these colors. (I work with watercolor crayons in some of my other courses.) But again, try to get a set of soft chalk pastels in order to follow along.

THE MATERIALS LIST

Black Stabilo-All Pencil - https://amzn.to/3gi1P6s

Faber Castell Gelatos Iridescents, 15 pieces - https://amzn.to/31dg2xq

Liquitex White Gesso - https://amzn.to/2IKdBZg

Mechanical Pencils, BIC 10-pack - https://amzn.to/2XdlsXa

Canson 11 x 14 Mixed Media Pad/Journal - https://amzn.to/2EpaOWO

Pelikan Opaque Watercolor Set, 24 Colors, $27 - https://amzn.to/3iQzlCV - see note at end

Pelikan Opaque Watercolor Set, 24 Colors, $32.50 - https://amzn.to/3cuVXqx - see note at end

Rembrandt 15-Color Soft Pastel Starter Set - https://amzn.to/3clIVLy

Creativity Street Pastels, 48 pieces - https://amzn.to/2FMhT4c


Note about pastels: The Rembrandt set has 15 pieces and is about $27, while the Creativity Street set (which I have not used) has 48 pieces for about $15. Rembrandt will provide much more pigment in its pastels, but if you can't afford them right now, Creativity Street seems to be getting good reviews on Amazon.

I was lucky enough to get a large Rembrandt set as a gift, but before then I used cheaper chalk pastels and was happy with them.

Note about Pelikan watercolors: Pelikan has its own store on Amazon and is selling each of the two items listed above at different prices, even tho they are exactly the same. I believe the cheaper item is in the box with the older design; it's listed as the price, about $15, along with $12 shipping. It appears the newer version (with the new box) is set at $32.50, which may or may not include shipping. So please evaluate these two listings if you want to buy the Pelikan set. I can HIGHLY recommend them. I've used them for years and they've never let me down and have never faded, either on the page or in the pot, even when they've sat around unused for a year or more.

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