Mini-Paint: Chewbacca Action Figure

Action Figure Painting:

Chewbacca

In memory of the late, great Peter Mayhew, here's a painting of a Chewbacca action figure.  When I was a kid, I always thought of Chewie as Han Solo's pet.  Nowadays, I have to wonder if Han was actually Chewie's pet... 

Alas, it is a little delayed, as I had to wait until I visited my Mom again to raid some more of my childhood action figures (I have a fist full of 'em to paint in the future).  Sure, I could have just pulled an image off the internet, but it somehow felt like cheating, so once I was able to get my filthy mitts on the actual action figure, I set to do another Quick Paint.  It was done with gouache--an opaque watercolor.

Again, I should probably be doing more of these Quick Paintings... and probably will.  So, look forward to more "Inaction Figures" in the future, sprinkled throughout!

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STEP ONE:  I used a mixture of light-blue casein (sort of like an acrylic paint, except it uses a milk-based protein as the binder) and matte medium as a sort of ad hoc gesso on a 6" x 9" piece of Canson XL (#140) watercolor paper.  I then used a colored pencil to draw out the image, as it would both be lighter to allow for it to more easily covered by the gouache, and would also smear less as it was painted over.  

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STEP TWO:  This is the first step in laying down a layer of warm colors over it's complimentary color (blue and orange/brown are on opposite sides of the color wheel... I won't bore you with color theory at the moment).  Laying down a light layer of gouache also gives the new layers of paint something to grab onto and do more opaque paints.

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STEP THREE:  And, after a **LOT** of painting and re-painting shadows and highlights, here is the finished painting.  It took an embarrassing amount of time to finish this (4-5 hours), but it turned out all right, all things considered.

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Done with gouache on 6" x 9" Canson XL (#140) watercolor paper.

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