Finding a better way...

Removing finished painting from the stretcher board

I don't have any affiliation with the folks who make this product, but I've found it so useful that I wanted to share my experience with it.

When I got back into watercolor, I painted on watercolor blocks at first. I eventually started using 140 lb. paper, stretching it by stapling it to hardwood-faced plywood that I bought at the lumberyard, cut to size, and finished with polyurethane to prevent the wood from staining the paper. Those boards provided a solid working surface, if a bit heavy. However, removing the staples at the end was a considerable effort, not to mention high risk -- more than once, the little screwdriver I used to pry up the staples slipped and skidded toward my finished painting. And there was the sickening experience of actually having the screwdriver skid *across* one of my paintings, gouging up bits of the image. But the advantages to using stretched paper were enough that I continued using the boards.

This past winter, I bought an Incredible Art Board to take to a workshop and, as a result, will be switching to them for all of my painting. The boards aren't cheap, but they're worth every penny in my opinion. They're lightweight and sturdy and hold the staples firmly in place. More important -- it's SO easy to remove the finished painting. What you see above is an inexpensive plastic palette knife that I use to remove the paper from the board. By simply sliding the knife under the edge of the paper and lifting it up, I am able to free the painting with almost no effort and no worries that I'm going to damage it. The staples lift out with the paper and are easy to remove.

The boards are available in both a full-sheet size and a half-sheet size (both are slightly oversized), but can be cut down with a utility knife -- if you work on quarter sheets for plein air painting, for example. Even if you don't stretch your paper, the boards make a great, lightweight support.

Starting from scratch...

Capt. Hook in progress, 4" x 4"

I've been preoccupied with concerns for my dad and what's going to happen to him when he finishes his course of rehabilitation therapy. We're at that point where "assisted living" enters our vocabulary -- to the great resistance of the ones who need assistance. To say my mind has not been on painting is a definite understatement. So I thought that I would force myself to get back into the studio by taking you on a step-by-step walk through the creation of one of my little birdie saltshaker paintings.

What you see here are the first, second, and third steps in the process. I start by creating a drawing that I transfer to tracing paper using a Pigma Micron pen. I generally use the 02 pen (0.3 mm line) unless I have an extremely detailed drawing, in which case I use an 01.

Then I tape the tracing paper to my lightbox and tape a piece of 140 lb. cold-pressed paper over it. Using an HB pencil, I lightly trace the image. When I'm finished, I "blot" the excess graphite off the surface using a kneaded eraser. That prevents graphite from contaminating the painting and also makes the lines faint enough that they don't attract attention in the finished painting. The next step -- soaking the paper to stretch it -- permanently fixes the pencil lines, so it's important to make sure your lines are quite faint before you soak the paper. You won't be able to erase them after the paper dries.

I soak the paper for 5-10 minutes in cold water, let the excess water drip off, and staple the paper to a support. In this case, I'm using gatorboard, but I sometimes use wooden boards that I've coated with several layers of polyurethane to make sure they're waterproof. (Just a note of caution -- the polyurethane must be fully cured before you use the board. I once had a student who attached her paper to a still-tacky board and ruined both the paper and the surface of the board.) I lay the board flat, someplace out of the way, and let the paper dry thoroughly.

I'll post more pictures as work progresses. Stay tuned.