Day 8 on the Bullock mural - repainting the bullock driver

Above -  Here is the mural as it was end of day 7 . 

The bullocks are all roughly done. The man and trees and sky all need to be redone and everything bought together. This photo was taken first thing in the morning.

It's hard to get a decent photo of the mural in the morning as you are looking into the sun and the mural is in the shade and looks much darker.It comes to life in full sun of an afternoon so plan a visit for then to see it at it's best!

 

The bullock ' driver' is Peter Avery of Mulbring.

 He was the last one to have a working bullock team in the Watagan mountains. When I first painted the mural in 2005 they had just been retired but were still going out for public displays and had even been in a shot for a scene for the film Oscar & Lucinda.

 Here I am repainting the dark colours on his body, face and whip.

 Below - the darks done .

Now I've started to paint the slightly lighter colours - the browns.I'll keep adding layers of lighter colours ( 4 in all) to build up the form / realism.

 

 Now some lighter 'pink tones/ colours.

Below -  I've redone his face.

 The lighter 'pink/yellow  of the original mural had faded to a yellow green and I ended up being able to use this as my lightest colour - leaving the wall colour to show for the highlights . Over the years Red/ pinks / oranges are the first colours to fade and disappear with sunlight . The mural faces West and gets the afternoon sun so it gets the harshest exposure of any direction.

 I've redone his shorts but his shirt will have to wait for tomorrow.You can't see it in a photo but it was mainly the yellow green wall colour and a bit too bright to fit in the painting.As things get further away they get duller and greyer and this colour was too bright for the distance he was away.

Below -  Here is the mural as it was at the beginning of the day- Peter and the whip faded.

Above - At the end of the day - Peter and the whip almost finished and sitting in place better. The trees are still too bright and need to be dulled / blued back a bit to give the painting depth.Tomorrow as I need scaffolding to reach the top of the mural and I need to redo the sky colour first.