Time frame: May 2024 – February 2025

Reference Photos: Wildlife Reference Photos

http://www.wildlifereferencephotos.com

Mouse reference :

https://wildlifereferencephotos.com/media.details.php?mediaID=109162

Jaguar reference:

https://wildlifereferencephotos.com/media.details.php?mediaID=16410

Pencils: Derwent Drawing Pencils, Faber Castel Pencils, Caran D’ache Luminance Pencils

Paper: Arches Watercolour Paper, Smooth 300GSM, Size A2

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Reference Materials

Picking out a reference to draw is always the most fun yet daunting. What can I pick out that will be give me the most satisfaction, challenge and gratification?

What textures can I draw? How will the animal look on paper? Do I allow white space or add a background? How do I crop the photo?

These are all the questions I generally ask myself when looking for artwork I want to create.

I found a photo of the Jaguar looking up to the sky and the texture of the neck hooked me in. This one would be a fun challenge.

To start the draft, I applied the grid method and sketched out the Jaguar. I then picked out the coloured pencils.

For this Jaguar, I changed up my preferences and favoured the Faber Castell pencils over the Derwent Drawing pencil. This Jaguar had detail that I really wanted to capture and I’ve found that the Faber Castell pencils can create finer strokes and lines.

The Derwent Drawing pencils I still used but instead, as a base layer for the drawing.

This time around I started with the eyes and face, working around the ears, then down to the body.

The neck area, I left to last colouring in the dark areas of the fur, in the direction of the fur. This area was layered multiple times to create a soft and messy look. I used a black pencil to add random hairs.

Change of ideas

Although you can put plans in place for your artwork, sometimes you can’t really see it taking shape until it’s actually on paper. And sometimes what you have in your minds eye, doesn’t really work out to be the same on paper…

At this point of the drawing, my original idea was to have another green coloured background. However, with so much white space above the face, even with a background, I felt the area was going to look a bit odd.

I needed something else to fill in that space. I had an idea that this Jaguar would instead be looking up something interesting, perhaps something tasty…?

So I decided to incorporate a little mouse over the Jaguar.

I used the Faber Castell pencils to add the little details in. My aim was not to add too much detail into the mouse as I wanted the Jaguar to still be the main focus.

I’m not quite use to adding in detail so small so this little guy proved to be a little trickier than anticipated!

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When things don’t go to plan

Now that the animals were drawn I could get stuck into the background. 

The original idea was to do a green leafy background, but I thought that it would be too much of a distraction so decided on a green / bluish blurry background instead.

Using the Faber Castell coloured pencils, I went ahead and coloured in the background. But once I had the base layer down, I just wasn’t happy with it.  

The issue I came across was the mouse disappearing. It blended in with the colours I had chosen and even adding more colour into the background to make it darker, it still didn’t work. The colours were quite distracting and were taking the limelight away from the mouse.

At this point, I wasn’t too sure what to do. If the drawing took me 2 minutes, then it could have been something I scrapped and started again. An A2 drawing that has taken me hours and weeks to do, that wasn’t going to be a choice.

I left the drawing for a while to conjure up a few ideas. One plan I had was to draw another Jaguar on black paper for a black background. Not ideal for this one, but at least the Jaguar and the mouse would stand out.

I went through 2 Faber Castell black pencils for the black background. If you look closely, It’s not as smooth as I want it but it’s as smooth as I can get it. I didn’t use solvents, although in hindsight I could have, but if absolutely necessary, can try to ‘fix’ it at a later date.

At this point I just stuck to what I knew.

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Final thoughts

This doesn’t feel like my best work because I didn’t stick to my original plans and tried a few things that didn’t work out. It wasn’t a complete and utter failure though.

The drawing did take a lot longer than anticipated due to other obligations and life in general. I had more time to think about what I wanted to do with this drawing which led to ideas continually changing.

For its challenges, the process of drawing the Jaguar did end up being a great one. It was great to draw the neck area and aim to achieve the look of messy fur. And the Jaguar itself stands out the way I wanted it to. With a bit more detail drawn in, I was able to practice a few new techniques while aiming to achieve a realistic looking Jaguar drawing.

Favouring the Faber Castell pencils also led for the drawing to look a little sharper, while the Derwent Drawing pencils would have created a softer, creamier look. Knowing me, I’ll most draw this Jaguar again using the Derwent Drawing pencils. Maybe a smaller version though…

The mouse, I think, adds a cute touch to the drawing but can’t be sure if I’ll draw something like this again.

I’m quite liking drawing the close up of animals , creating a lot of detail to make them look as realistic as possible. I still have a few more to plan out!

Thanks for reading,

Mel