The Reptile Eye

I'm beginning my reptile eye. The first thing I did was make an outline of the black center. I paid close attention to where my highlights were, as I want to leave those white so I need to make sure that they don't get colored in.

I'm filling the eye in slowly with black. It's easy to rush this step but I've found that slowly building up the color makes for nicer results.

Another layer of black.

I used solvent to make the black smooth. Using a Q-tip I gently rubbed the solution into the cracks within the papers surface. I like using odorless paint thinner for this. I buy the kind for oil based paints and it works just fine. I use it in small amounts making sure that it doesn't seep into the paper and I use small circular strokes.

Now I added in some detail surrounding the black. The black circle gives me a good starting point to judge the position of everything else. This reptile has a lot of detail in its eye, so I'm slowly adding in all the white spots so they don't get colored over.

The brown lines look a lot lighter now that the other elements of the eye are in place! I'll have to darken them.

I've darkened the lines as well as the outside edge of the eye. This has helped me get the illusion that the eye retreating into the cavity and the iris is protruding.

This is as far as I've gotten so far. I'll be working on this piece as much as possible so it will be ready for the show. I'm kepping my fingers crossed.