Give or Take a Penny

Yesterday I had a really great day in the studio. Which is surprising, since the only reason I went in was because I hadn't been in all week and I felt, hey, if I'm paying for it, I should go.

A couple of things happened that never happen: To start with, I was the first one in the studio. This virtually never occurs, because the others I share the space with are actually getting paid for their work. I'm the only one fucking around. So I was in very early for me. Second, I saw Ulises Farinas. I've been sharing the studio with him for the past six or eight months -- I'm not sure how long because this was the first time I'd met him. As far as I knew, he was an invisible presence leaving cups filled with inky water around the place. Our studio time had never overlapped because he only comes in at night and I'm only around during the day -- kind of like the lovers in Ladyhawke. Only much, much less attractive.

What those things mean is that yesterday I was in the studio earlier and I stayed later than I always do. Which means things must have been going well. And they were.

I did something I haven't tried before. I'd underpainted the pennies for this painting I've been working on and I'd reached the point where they needed the final layer, the detail work. The trouble is I'm not very good at detail painting on an easel. It's really hard for me to work upright like that.

The good news, however, was that our studio has a really big old drafting table in it. And the usual denizen of that table, the talkative comic historian, inker, and model painter (among other things) Chris Irving, was away in Virginia delivering models and visiting people. Which meant I could lay my painting flat -- also now that the background paint had dried -- and do the detail work in the way I'm most comfortable.

I also took an idea from Mike Cavallaro -- an idea I'm sure isn't original with him, but of which I'd never thought or seen. Last week I'd watched him doing some detailed background inking while resting his hand on a wooden ruler to which he'd glued some rubber washers or erasers or something, so the ruler wouldn't touch the paper and smear the ink. A painter's bridge, he called it. So I borrowed some rubber bands and a couple of gum erasers from Chris and a piece of scrap wood and made my own bridge and it worked wonderfully.

The final result: An aching back after ten hours of painting but some lovely pennies. I can't wait until I can varnish this baby. (These photos were taken with my crappy mobile phone camera, so the colors are off -- trust me, they look better in person.)