Daily Sketch Reprise: A Dozen Shades of Gray

It’s still surprising to me that this is one of the most popular of all my daily sketches.
I love, love, Jelly Bean’s shape. He’s not fat, he’s not even too round, but somehow when he sits in certain positions I just want to pick him up he looks so pleasingly rounded.
In this case he was simply sitting on the table in front of the window looking out. Very little direct sun was shining on him, but it was shining around him, so he was almost in silhouette and just a few swatches of direct light, but a lot of reflected light, described his shape.
I have a set of 12 gray pastels and decided to work with them for this after yesterday’s sketch when the white charcoal just would not sketch boldly enough. I also thought I’d jump on the “Shades of Gray” bandwagon. Everyone is using that phrase now.
My scanner over-scanned this, and I scanned it several times to see if I could change how it came up. All those little white specs are not actually there in my sketch, but they are thin areas in the pastel. When the scanner light shines on something that’s not quite opaque, it will shine right through it depending on its opacity, and so it did here. I find the little dots irritating because I worked hard to work them out of the sketch. But it think the relevant details are still visible.
The original has been sold, I offer archival-quality digital prints of “A Dozen Shades of Gray” in my Etsy shop, and can order a giclée as well which is barely distinguishable from the original.
Click here to see other daily sketches.
For a gallery of the ones available for sale, visit my Etsy shop in the “Cat Art and Prints” section.
Read about the reason for the daily sketches in One Year of Daily Sketches.
And download your free desktop wallpaper calendar for computer or mobile, usually based on a daily sketch.
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All images used on this site are copyrighted to Bernadette E. Kazmarski unless otherwise noted and may not be used without my written permission. Please ask if you are interested in using one in a print or internet publication. If you are interested in purchasing a print of this image or a product including this image, check my Etsy shop or Fine Art America profile to see if I have it available already. If you don’t find it there, visit Ordering Custom Artwork for more information on a custom greeting card, print or other item.
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Love this! No surprise at all!!
Thanks, Carolyn!
It is not surprising to me… it is so good! You got the shades of a shiny black coat just right.
Thanks, Maru, what would I draw without them?
impressive!
Artisoo, thanks so much, and thanks for visiting.