Drawing Flies 52 – 06_Muddler
Drawing Flies 52 Muddler Minnow. Almost blew it today, but saved it last second with something unexpected (and that I’ll now be using more for sure). I used the entire 30 minutes right to the *ding*, but the final drawing shown only took a few minutes.
Tech info: 9″ x 12″ Canson tracing paper. Mechanical pencil, pen, and watercolor crayon (and one wet rag at the right time). Wanted to do a piece like the Boss, on tracing paper with watercolor (I like what water does to the tracing paper). Got 25 or so minutes into it, and found myself in the ugly position of having overworked it and getting worse. I thought of just putting it up and letting it stand as a testament to blown projects, but I just couldn’t leave it like that.
So, I grabbed a wet rag, and on a leap of faith wiped the painting clean with a couple of hard smears (you can faintly see the wet pen streaks radiating back on the paper). I was left with this ghostly, cool-looking image that retained key areas of detail and shading. I had only three minutes or so left on the clock.
I grabbed a brush, grabbed my blue, purple and green watercolor crayons, and went for the wash effects outside the pencil and pen lines. I did a few quick spatters as I laid in each color, and then saturated the brush to get some deep purples (and eventually blues). I got one small wash of deep purple at the head/collar juncture and *beep.*
Well, 30 minutes is 30 minutes, and while I didn’t quite get the “pop” that I wanted with the wash (needed just another 60 seconds!), I still got something unexpected that I’ll use again going forward.
Lesson for this fly: Don’t give up too easily!
Available for purchase? No.
Jeff’s Muddler is here. I love charcoal, and the light effects that Jeff got on the muddler head/eye are just great. The whole piece is cool—with its reverse-out style—and I think Jeff got the feel of the classic pattern down in a way that he really knows how to do! The dark background makes me think of those tea-tinted, northern Great Lakes streams, and fishing the swampy areas late at night with #4 streamers. Definitely has a mood…
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Jason-Digging the happy accident on this one. It is amazing how fast the 30 minutes go! When I am working on the DF52 fly, I swear I can hear the clock ticking faster as the 30 minutes approaches.I cannot tell you how many times I ran into situations where I felt like throwing in the brush during the DF365 project. 9 times out of ten it always ended in something good. Now that the fly is posted, you should go back and add the washes and repost! So what is up for next week!
Jeff—I have this one scanned, so I guess I can go back and pop this one up (I’ll scan it in hi-res, too, so there can be a comparo for the book). I’ll probably take more than 60 seconds on the washes, but I’ll keep it tight time-wise, while getting the color I wanted around that ghost image in the middle.
We could do that Hex dun we talked about for next week…artist’s choice on pattern within that fly category, so sky’s the limit! Or…?
Hex Dun it is!Sky is the limit. Looking forward to the revised image.
Okay, Hex dun it is. Even more of a surprise when neither of us knows the actual pattern, just the pattern category…
I’ll probably mess with the image tonight. I might just give myself, say, five minutes to adjust the wash, but I’ll post both the image and the actual time used to alter it.