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4/4/22

White to Bright Challenge - Colored Pencil Magazine

After reviewing Colored Pencil Magazine, I treated myself to a subscription, starting with the March 2022 issue. In it, there was a contest announcement. The White to Bright Challenge asked readers to use their all-white inspiration photo to create a colorful piece of artwork. 

As a beginner, it was daunting to enter, knowing full well that my artwork would be among the worst. But everyone starts somewhere, and I thought it would be fun to challenge myself. I took inspiration from the owl in the original photo to turn each of the six items into something you'd find on a farm. 


I started by printing the inspiration photo twice on a piece of copy paper, then playing around with shapes and ideas. As you can see in the top photo, I started by making the pitcher on the left into a pig and the owl on the right into a chicken. I ended up reversing those in the bottom photo, then added the calf, mouse, bunny, and egg. 


I traced over my shapes with a black pen. 


Then I used my light box to lightly trace my design onto Bristol Vellum. Then I jumped in with my Prismacolors. I started with the pig, then moved to the cow and the chicken. I did the egg next, then the bunny, and finished with the mouse. 


I didn't start out with a plan for the background and obviously needed something to ground my levitating pig. So I added hay, then the blue sky. 

I see plenty of things in my drawing that need improvement. But I'm happy that I completed it and entered it. Progress, not perfection!

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Update: I was awarded Beginner Honorable Mention! I'm shocked. And thrilled!

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