celebrates the end of a long, long project.
After the brown is dry, I mixed some orange into my brown - this lightens and alters the color somewhat (check out the photo to see what I mean). I painted this pretty liberally onto the horse-muscles, again trying to leave some of the earlier colors showing.
I allowed the previous layer to dry while I mixed some light tan paint into my orange-brown mix. I used this new color to, again, highlight the horse-muscles. As before, I've allowed the previous layers to show – I've also begun highlighting toward my imaginary light source. For the most part, I've concentrated on the top portions of the muscles.
Next, I mix some white into my (now pinkish-brown) mix. I use this to highlight the top and sides of the muscles to help define them. I looked at pictures of well-cared for horses, and saw how shiny and "cut" their muscles are. That's what I'm going for, beginning with this stage – Lyria must get someone to brush her from time to time!
In photo 8, you can see that I've completed the skin bits, and the horse-parts look a bit different than they did in #7. Because I knew I'd be giving the skin and the horse-parts a wash of brown ink, I went ahead and completed the skin so I'd be able to wash both areas at once – this saved me time and ink! The ink wash was 1:1:4 brown ink, Future, and water.
At this point, Lyria's horsey-bits are done. The muscles are very well defined, and she's looking all glossy and healthy! (Too glossy for me! Inks often dry shiny – I'll knock that down with matte spray when the whole figure is complete.)