An ANZAC tribute from Danni

Hello Crafty Peeps,

It's Dannii here again with a tutorial with an Anzac theme

April was a crazy month but hopefully you'll think this tutorial is worth the wait. 

Once again I have created a double lay-out in my Dyan Reavely ranger journal. I love this new journal. The pages are so beautiful, thick and smooth to work on and can really hold the wet, and the best thing there's no gluing pages together. You can buy them HERE

Now anyone who knows me, knows my oldest son has recently joined the Australian Army. This year was his First Anzac day as a service man and I am truly proud of him. Also being that this April we are celebrating the 100th anniversary of the ANZAC's in Gallipoli landing I decided that my page should be a tribute to our Anzac hero's past and present.

So I decided to sketch on the right side of the page an Anzac solider. This was drawn in grey lead pencil

Once I was happy with the sketch I went over the drawing with a waterproof fine liner.  This helps me to keep my basic line drawing when I start painting.

 I made a few adjustments to the portions on the face and then when I was happy with the drawing I rubbed out all my grey lead sketch lines.

Now was the time to start splashing some paint around using Southern Skies Fresco paint and a credit card. I blocked in the background and then using Tinned peas, I quickly blocked in the uniform and slouch hat. I then used SEMCO flesh paint from my stash to block in the face and neck area

Once again, I pulled out my trusty fine liner and went over the facial features again and blocked in the eyes with fresco paint chalk and then started to paint in the shadowed areas with Fresco chocolate pudding

Once the shadows were dry, another layer of Semco flesh paint was applied over the whole face and neck

and then I painted in the Iris with the chocolate pudding fresco paint.

Once this layer was dried I pulled out my Derwent ink intense pencils. I lOOOVVVE these pencils and I think they are a must have for any serious art journaler.They can be purchased at Crafters Cupboard

I like to use the earth tones in the ink intense pencils to build the shadows and flesh tones.

 and then activate the pencil's with an aqua water pen. The pupils were then painted in and lips coloured

At this stage I really just liked to keep working and building the flesh tones and building up the features on the face with the ink intense pencils and aqua water pen.

I really enjoyed this process and kept adding colours until I was happy with the finished face

More shadows were added with the purple red tones

and then toned down with a touch of flesh paint

The slouch hat band and hat badge were painted in

Then the final details were added to the hat badge and chin strap and details added to the shirt.

Once it was completely dry I added white highlights to the chin, nose, checks neck and forehead with a white charcoal pen and white possca paint pen

I was now happy with the finished details of the face

and it was time to start on the other side of the page.

I started with stamping and masking a poppy stamp from my stash

along the bottom half of the page

The poppies were then painted with silks paints and pit pens

Once the poppies were finished I added the 'lest we forget' ode.

I am really pleased with my finished page and hope you all enjoyed my tutorial.

I hope I have done our old Digger's proud and I know

it is by far my favourite page.

Till next time,

enjoy your art journaling