Tiki Tiger Studios: Big long Egyptian trip report!

I have been looking over the art here on TC for a long time, and am frankly a little intimidated by all the massive amount of talent on here, but thought since time is on my hands it would be fun to try an attempt at a tiki painting. This will be a first for me in a lot of ways: my first big tiki art piece (I have done some small sized inconsequential things in the past), my first real painting on gesso wood, and my first attempt at using oils ( I am however doing all of the under painting in acrylics I am not ready yet for an all oil piece, but the acrylics just don't have the color vibrancy I am after alone so I figure both of them should work out).

I love underwater scenes, I have not done a lot of them but I have enjoyed trying to get the lights and shadows correct on what I have done in the past so figured I would make my first painting an underwater scene. Specifically a mermaid taking a "hot bubblebath" in a hydrothermal vent as a leering tiki looks on. Sorry if the picture of the pencils isn't very good I had to try and take it in the brightest room in the house (the bathroom) which is painted orange and makes everything have an orange tint. I hope I got the proportions right, I currently don't have an easel and have to tilt the piece in my lap to try and draw it. I still think the corners need balancing out somehow but overall the main pencils are in place so I will start painting on it soon. I am also going to put up a non-tiki cheesecake painting I did in sort of the same vein to give an idea of how the finished painting will look through my style. I still may re-work some of the non-tiki one (it is called "MS. Stacked Man!") so it's just to give an idea of style not really the final outcome. I hope it is okay to post the non-tiki one just for giving an idea of how the tiki one will look?

Let me know what you think please. I am excited to try and tackle this, I know it can't ever really be anywhere near the same league as many of the fantastic artists on here, but at least it will be a heck of a lot fun.

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[ Edited by: tigertail777 2014-06-27 00:49 ]

Looks like a nice start to me! Looking forward to seeing it progress!

The sketch looks great and I love the concept. Can't wait to see the finished painting.

Thanks MaddogMike and Zerostreet for the great comments. :)

I will be starting the actual painting tonight, but meanwhile thought I would share bits and pieces of some of my older Hawaiian themed work. I'll start with a bunch of pen and ink drawings I did that didn't wind up getting used for a college graduation project. These are tiger themed old school tiki bar drinks. Pen and ink is probably my favorite medium I love doing detailed cross hatching that resembles copperplate or wood block printing like you would see in old books. I use very old fashioned methods: quill pens that they stopped making sometime in the 60's, and an inkwell from around the 1930's, I even had a friend make me a rocking ink blotter to use. I am not sure anymore what all the drink names were except for the one with the grapefruit slice on top with three cherries impaled on toothpicks; its supposed to represent a tiger paw, so that is the name of it.

I still think it would be incredibly cool to have a "tiki tiger" mug like the one in this first set of drawings. I have never tackled making such a thing though and don't have the tools... perhaps some day.

The tiger Moai is a lot more subtle than most of them, if you closely on the upper lip you can see he has a little bit of a tiger muzzle, and his eyes are slanted like a felines.

Okay now back to work painting! Hope you enjoy the pen and ink drinks!

Well some modicum of progress was made. Not much mind you, but a little. I am going to need to paint in a little more around her to understand the light sources a bit more, especially the hydrothermal vents. Right now I think there may be a bit too much red in the underside high lights. I want to have some light shimmer from above as well as the red from the vents, I may need to make some deeper shadows. Ah well, it's a start.

Great drink sketches, add a little color and they'd work for a drink menu. But in keeping with the theme, the skull should be a sabre tooth tiger :D

The mermaid is coming along swimmingly

Now how did I miss something so obvious as a sabre tooth tiger skull? D'OH! Fantastic idea! Yeah originally these were for a mini portfolio that was going to look like a tiki bar menu. Time and money fell through before I could complete the project in time for my graduation evaluation. I also have some little Hawaiian themed tiger sculptures I did for the cover, I'll probably post 'em later.

Thanks for watching the progress I appreciate it. I have not done a lot of tiki oriented artwork because the large majority of my friends and family just don't get it, and it's no fun to make art that won't have some kind of audience viewing it eventually. I didn't think the tiki mania was such a widespread thing because I have never run across anyone who was much into it, and didn't really delve a lot into tiki central for quite some time because I thought it was just for historical tiki stuff. I also really am quite new to the world of fine art coming from a graphic design background, so never really knew that there was a tiki art niche of folks that love the old polynesian stuff. In short I thought I was the major weirdo out there. :wink:

I would love to go to a tiki happening sometime when I have the money, I was invited to the tiki crawl thing here locally through a email send out but didn't have the dough and am going through some health problems. So with this time on my hands and little else I thought I would finally release the tiki art in me and hope it finds an appreciative audience of some kind. I know it's not on par with much else on this site; I have never seen so many incredible artists crammed into one site like this, but hopefully it will raise a smile or two.

I kind of wish now I had made a more exotic sounding user name like "tiki tiger" or something. I did have a different account on here way back when with some other name but I can't recall what it was other than having tiger in it somewhere. But I posted even less, and as I said really didn't delve a lot into the entire board, I guess I just wasn't ready for all the different facets of the culture at that time, even now I find it pretty overwhelming. I absolutely love the art threads though it is so interesting to see all these different forms of art I never even considered, and love to hear and see the steps of what it took the artists to make them.

I guess as the B52's say: "There are others like you!" Okay enough with this gooey display of shi...emotions. Back to work. :)

Made a little more progress: mainly blocking in colors to get a better idea of how the lighting should be. The colors you see are under painting colors though they are far from what the final colors will look like. I am having a hard time deciding a few things; should the tiki be stone or wood, and what color should the mermaid's hair be? Any thoughts or suggestions?

I say RED hair for the mermaid! - blonde would blend in with the loofa, black or brown would blend in with the shadows. Looks good so far

I like what I see so far! Thanks for sharing in-process pics with us too :)

Thanks for the advice and kind words Maddogmike and TikiG, it means a lot to know there is someone watching. Unfortunately for a few nights I may not be able to work on the painting I have had a flare up of gout in my ankle. I have been seeing the doctor and an acupuncturist clinic, and been on an elimination diet to determine what foods trigger the gout...looks like wheat is one so I gotta remove all wheat from my diet. The trouble with trying to determine the causes brings on the gout (it has to logically so I know what works and doesn't) so right now the pain is mind numbing and I appear to be allergic to both medicines the doctor gave me so will have to tough it out and hobble around the house till it gets better.

Again, thanks for watching the progress and helping it means a lot to me right now. :)

Well it's been a little while. I was working on another little project which I will post here soon. I got a chance to get back to the painting last night. To be honest I am a little depressed with the outcome so far, I keep thinking how much better the anatomy would be if I just had a real model to work from. I can handle not having an easel, and not the best paints in the world, but oh if I only had a model, the photos I found online just are not cutting it.
Ah well, we make do with what we have right?
Something I think I really need to do for this painting is have a softer focus since it is underwater with hot light sources. This is going to be a challenge for me; I have never successfully done a soft focus painting, all of the ones I have done have always been sharp focus. But then again, what about this painting HASN'T been a new challenge? :wink: I also need to find better reference material for the tiki, not happy with it so far... too cartoony. I wanted it to have a little cartoon feel, sort of a Tex Avery "take", but with decently authentic tiki details. I sort of stopped on the tiki for now until I can find a photo to work with.

At least it is progressing. More updates soon.

:lol: is that a subtle hint that you want some buxom babe to volunteer to be your model for this painting? I'm starting to get a pair of moobs (man-boobs) in my middle age but I don't think I qualify :lol:

Looks like progress to me, I think soft focus and somewhat muted colors is good for underwater. I have only been an "artist" for a very short while, but I don't think you are supposed to ever be completely satisfied with your work. If I ever did a piece I thought was perfect, I would probably quit while I was on top.

I'll pass on the moobs (though it does vaguely sound like a tiki name). :lol:

I just have always had a MAJOR struggle with anatomy. My dyslexic brain reverses things so looking in a mirror as most artists do really messes with my head. I recently read that Norman Rockwell not only had models, but he used a simple light projector to TRACE a lot of the details in the photos he used. No wonder he could do proportions and details so realistically. I kind of envy his having that sort of tool available. My anatomy is always off and it drives me crazy. I know if if I had a model to work from I could achieve so much more of my goals.

Of course to have a model, I would probably need a studio first. :wink:

After finding this thread: http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?mode=viewtopic&topic=31087&forum=1&start=0&hilite=1920s%20hawaii
I am terrified of admitting to whether I am truly creating tiki art or not, and want no part of the firestorm discussion regarding Hawaiiana VS: tiki, so have re-named my thread hoping and praying that my work is not scrutinized too much. I will be posting art I create related to tiki, but it may or may not actually feature tiki's in it. A lot of it will have some attempt at tiki's, but I can't guarantee they will actually meet specifications.

I know this sounds like "lawyer-ese" but seriously that thread had me wetting my pants and I don't want that kind of scrutiny in my work. Call it "Hawaiiana inspired Polynesian pop with an occasional attempt at tiki". Hopefully that is a loose enough term to apply.

Another update, finally making some headway and getting closer to what I envisioned. Kinda seriously hating the tiki though I may wipe him out altogether and put a different tiki in there.The colors of course are much richer than what my camera can capture under our poor house lights; just imagine it deeper and richer in tone.

Love the red hair :D Looking good, I think you'll be happier with the tiki if you change the eyes - just my opinion

Hey Tigertail!
Lovin the lighting on this one so far....
as for the tiki-google Marquesan
or Easter island Moai
They're both are carved from stone and would make for a nicenod to
the actual tikis we all garner inspiration from....plus you can add
coral and moss and stuff to it and have some textural fun....
i painted some Moai and Orongo (birdman) carvings with some mermaids a few months back and it was really a delight and a learning curve,texturally!
Anticipating your progress on this!
Thanks for being so eager to share the process
and VELCOME!

Hey LLT, thanks for the comments. I am trying hard to get the lighting right so I appreciate the compliment. I think you've struck on a great idea there, I think a Moai would work a LOT better. Originally I was going for a Hawaiian tiki, but didn't want a typical Ku. I see though I need to get my hands on some more research before I attempt something like that again. I have my eye on a (currently in my budget) book of tiki on ebay, so am hoping it doesn't go too high. I also am looking for books on actual historical museum type tikis that are cheap for future projects. I think however I have decided what my next painting will be since this one is getting so close; I'd like to do a painting of a real tiki bar interior back in its prime. I think it would be a lot of fun to paint the Tonga Room & Hurricane bar in San Francisco as it looked back in its original hey day. I can imagine the soft glow of lighting on the pool as the fake rainstorm is going and all that wonderful ambiance. I will just need to find some good close up details, like high res pictures and all that so it will take a bit of research to get it right.

Meanwhile, I thought I would share my other project that happened while I was doing the mermaid painting. See, I like the "Lost in Paradise" show that Chris is doing but every time I saw him interview folks with that mic that has the weird fuzzy windsock on top I kept thinking what a shame it was that the thing wasn't themed to his show. So I contacted Chris and told him I had a surprise for him. He should have it by now so it should be safe to share. When I saw that black fuzzy windsock I kept thinking it looked like hair and then BAM the idea struck me and wouldn't let go. What if the mic looked like a shrunken head, and the windsock was the hair? Without further ado here is the progress shots on "poor Mike"...
Raw Sculpey stage

Baked just a little too much (one of his thread holes around eye cracked from the heat)

Using unraveled twine pieces for the stitches took some patience.

Stitching underway.

Operation finished.


Adding a bit of feather ju ju.

Bad lighting, but his nose bone says: "Speak clearly into Mike".


The ears have holes in them for strings or elastic to be threaded into so it can be tied to the base of the microphone. I can't wait to see people's reactions the next time Chris interviews someone. :o His forehead looks like a rubber stamped image that says "Lost in Paradise". Two unfortunate things happened with him though: I didn't have any matte sealer so I used glossy... big mistake too shiny for my taste. Secondly I was not able to get him to Chris in time for the Oasis as I had planned due to more gout problems (Sorry about that Chris). I felt pretty bad since he paid for the shipping and even paid extra. Well, I hope Mike works well on the Mic. :wink: Not too shabby for my first shrunken head. :)

Looks very cool Tiger, can't wait to see it in action. You might be able to recoat it with a matte finish to knock down the shine.

Cool, luminous stuff! The Ms. Pac Man piece is very unique. I can't wait to see where you go!

Hey thanks for stopping by Robb! I love your velvet paintings. "The Mrs. Stacked Man" painting was originally going to be one of a series of pinups with a vintage arcade theme. The next one was going to be based on Asteroids with a sexy black mama sitting astride an asteroid and wearing a space suit/helmet while shooting at other asteroids. I will come back to the idea some day when I can afford to get either models or better reference material. I had contemplated selling prints of some of these at a local vintage video game convention, but I have nary a clue how to go about the scanning and printing of high quality giclee prints.

Work on the mermaid has stopped for now while a friend is staying over, but will resume soon. Meanwhile my new art site is finally finished: http://www.tigertailart.com be aware there isn't much tiki stuff other than the design of the site pages (it's themed to look like a 1940's WWII tiki bar in Honolulu, and there are little clues here and there to the "back story").

Good news and bad news... Good news is I have been invited to do some graphic design/art direction for a fledgling magazine and it may work into a full time job eventually. Bad news is this means that I am going to have to put off finishing the little lady for a little while (but hopefully not too long). Meanwhile I thought I would share some more sculpture stuff. These were pieces that originally were going to be used for a custom portfolio sampler of my work, it was going to be themed as a tiki bar drink menu. The tigers are flat relief in parts so I could move the arms and legs. I made little tiny props for them both: the male has a itty bitty coconut drink that I made by molding sculpey around an olive and he also has custom painted pineapple designs on his shirt because I could not find a fabric that looked good to scale. The female tigress has a hand made lei (as does the male, but it doesn't show up as well) that was created by stringing a few hundred tiny paper flowers together, and she also has a hand made hula skirt which was not easy to get the dried grass stuff (sorry its been too long I don't remember the name of what I used) to lay flat. I also took about one hundred photos of them both under different lighting conditions so I could get the exact lighting for combining the entire scene in photoshop. I even photographed the volcano under black lights to pick up the glow of the florescent paint I used for the lava. I ended up not using any of this because I ran out of time before graduation, but always thought I would go back and use it for something eventually.

Raw baked, and just painted forms:

Male tiger under different lighting schemes

Female tigeress under different lighting schemes

Tiki and palm tree props

Tiki, palm tree, and volcano, with test photos of hand painted cloth

Cover and back cover to the final piece, you might notice the tigers foot is turned around. I had to do that in photoshop because after the arduous photography session was finished I realized I had shot ALL the pics with the foot wrong...GRRRR!

Well hope that tides you over till next time. Looks like I finally got to use the project for something! :wink:

Very nice work! Especially on the tiger!

Congrats on the work Jesse, money is always a good thing. Great work on the tigers and the photography, the thing with the foot is hilarious :lol:

First meeting with the magazine people went well, and I think there may be a future in it. Since I posted my new tiki bar themed art portfolio site earlier, I figured I'd also post my new business card which has a jungle explorer theme. The pen and ink was a lot of fun on this, I always love to do a lot of dark shadows. The hat is supposed to be a pith helmet and hopefully comes across as one. My dad keeps insisting on calling it a "construction hard hat", but hopefully to those in the know it reads as what it is supposed to be.:wink: I don't know why but a couple of my friends swear up and down that the tiger looks just like me...it must be the glasses, or maybe I just have been drawing caricatures too long now. :D

Jesse, I think years of heavy drinking you caused your dad during your teen years may have burned up too many brain cells (just kidding) but that's a pith helmet if I ever saw one. Nice card

Well it's been a while I know. Been busy with other projects for other folks, but I really needed some ME time and have been craving insatiably the idea of getting back to the painting. Finally I found a little time the other night and put a little more work into it. Still have not tackled the destruction/reconstruction of the tiki into a Moai as suggested by Little Lost Tiki, but it is coming very soon. Mainly what I worked on was trying to get the bubbles and some more of the lighting corrected, for instance I put the coral on the left side into a bit darker shadow so it recedes a bit more into the background. I also added some more texture here and there and defined some of the mermaid's muscles a little more. This one is getting close, the main part that remains is the Moai, and adding more reflections to the bubbles, finishing the mermaid's hands, and a bit of softening on some of the harsher edges.

Some close up details:

Good to see you working on this project again, get a little time in to relax and create for yourself. Looks great, hope your other projects are coming along too.

Hey thanks Mike, it's good to be working on it again. Yeah I am going to have to set aside time to do art I want to do, or I may go a little crazy. Still not making much money on the client work just yet, so it might be a while after this one is done before I can start on another as I need to buy supplies...running low on paints, and need either new canvas or wood pieces to paint on.

Meanwhile I painted more on the little lady last night, with the beginnings of the Moai filled in, and a lot more of the reflections on the bubbles. Getting super close to finishing this one, just need to muck up the Moai with seaweed/coral/barnacles (plus add more lighting effects) and some little touch ups here and there and finishing the mermaid hand.

I think I have a title for the piece now: "Voyeur in the Bubble Bath" well it works for now I may change it, any suggestions anyone?

Some close ups:

Texture on the Moai head

I had been using a cookie sheet for a painting palette, but it seems to have disappeared. I wanted to get painting right away, so I found some old vinyl floor tiles I am using for palettes right now. I really need to find some kind of palette surface that is easy to scrape off the paint it is always a pain to pry the old dry paints up so I can start on something new, and I don't like the idea of throwing something away with each painting unless it can be recycled somehow; I can picture landfills full of painting palettes. I had thought it would be easy to pry the paint off the vinyl tiles...boy was I wrong. I will have to figure out some kind of art to turn the vinyl tiles into after this.

The Moai is looking cool!

As to your palette issue. Have you looked at the Mastersons Sta-Wet Palette? That's what I use. I love not having to worry about acrylics drying out. With very little maintenance you can keep your paints and palette wet for weeks!

The Moai looks much more natural in the setting than the other tiki. I also like that it runs off the canvas, I'm sure there's a term for that but my art education is pretty sketchy (pun intended :) )

Zerostreet-- WOW! Thanks that Mastersons Sta-Wet Palette thing looks incredible. I bet I could save a lot of money on paint as well. Soon as I can I am getting that.

Maddog Mike-- Thanks, I am Moai pleased with it too.:wink: Heck if I know it has a name or not...cropping, framing I dunno, but I kind of wanted part of his reaction "off screen" so you have to imagine what is going on with his eyes. I thought it would be too cartoony to have them bugging out of his head, but wanted that kind of reaction so opted for this.

Once I get more art materials I am anxious to do a painting of the Tonga Room as it was in it's heyday, I think I may even do a before and after tiki version and make a second painting of the earlier nautical version. I can just imagine all the atmospheric lighting and am jazzed at the idea of painting it. Of course I am going to need to find a lot of reference photos from various angles if possible to do it justice. I also kind of want to do a painting of the old Clifton's with the neon palm tree, but I think that one will come later. My favorite era of poly-pop is the 30's and 40's and I really want to do some paintings in those time periods. Of course painting like this is pretty new to me, I am used to painting backdrops for theatrical plays and the occasional mural, but hey painting is painting and it is all tons of fun. :) :drink:

That Moai's looking good!
try a thick piece of glass as a palette
easy to scrape off....

Thanks for the tip LLT, if I could find a good thick piece of glass I would. Originally I used a square glass dish cover I picked up in Goodwill, but because it had curved edges it was a absolute pain to get the paint scraped off. I would be terrified with my clumsiness of having a normal sheet of glass, especially with edges. Once I get money I would like to get the stay wet system Zero pointed out I think it would save money on paints too because they tend to dry awfully fast.

On another mermaid note; one of my nephew's kids wanted Little Mermaid painted on her nails. It's been years since I tried to paint this small, but I set to work and one hour 45 minutes later she had almost the full cast in miniature on ten tiny nails. I tried to photograph it close as I could, but it is difficult to take pictures of something that small clearly.

I tried to convince her to let me slip in a tiki, but she would not hear of it. :wink: Well, I tried.

Hi tigertail777, my husband loves topless art, I love sculpey clay. Your thread has something for both of us! The nails are just darling. Wendy

Hey thanks Wendy (and Dan) for tuning in! Glad I can keep you both entertained. By the way I am loving your missionary downfall women right now, especially the details you are painting on each one.:) Well I went on an all night marathon to try and finish her lady mermaidness, but didn't quite reach the finish line. I have just a few more touch ups to do, and then some experimental new paint stuff (I bought some water based oil paints to try and bring out more of the vibrancy of the colors, as I find that even straight out the of the tube unmixed most acrylics really lose a great deal of brightness and vibrancy when they dry. So I thought maybe if I touched up acrylics with oils it might help, and I would not have to use the more expensive oils for everything). A little nervous with my "experiment" as it does have the potential to ruin it to some degree.

After this, I am afraid I am going to have to halt the painting for a while until I can find some way to pay for new art supplies, including an easel. I could never figure out why artists used easels... after last night I know why. I woke up with such an incredibly stiff and sore neck and back from looking down painting all night, I know now I just have got to get an easel if I continue this. Plus my paints are running low and I am afraid I have grounded several of my brushes on mermaid reef just a little too much: they are mere stubs now. The magazine job is not a paying job right away (at least not more than skittles and rum...if that), like many art jobs these days it's the old idea of working on the ground floor of a fledgling company in the hopes that said company gets "big" and then being paid accordingly. Not much better than "spec" work, but hope rises eternal in today's economy. Meanwhile bills do stack up so I have to scramble to find ANY illustration/graphic design work I can do that pays. So pardon if I am absent for between painting bouts; that is just me trying to swim.

So all that said... on with the show!

Now for some details...

The main attraction blissfully watching another attraction in the foreground. You can see the pitted details/barnacles/seaweed decently in this pic.

And finally, since the lighting is utterly horrible in the dining room where I paint these things, I figured a tilted angle might show the colors a little truer to what they really are.

Next time I part the curtain, she should be finished. This is a wood panel I am painting on, so I am debating what to paint on the sides: just plain blue...more sea life details...or what? Also I really don't have a lot of experience in painting on wood panels, so am wondering if I should use some kind of sealer on it (matte of course if I do). I have a 11X17 Epson scanner, so I am hoping on the final version it will scan the colors much nicer than the camera has been picking up. Well, gang until next time thanks for dropping in to see the tiki mermaid show.

[ Edited by: tigertail777 2011-09-19 21:58 ]

"Water based oil paints" - isn't that an oxymoron? :lol:

It's really coming together Jesse, great textures and colors!

Hi tigertail777, best wishes for a good situation to come out of all your hard work. The painting is very good with interesting colors and content. I really like the stone effect on the moai.

I was once told that you can't paint any other medium on top of oil paints because the oil will cause the other medium to peel off. Since you are painting oil on top of acrylic maybe it will be fine.

I was also told to wait 3 months before sealing an oil painting or to not seal it at all. All this information or misinformation must be on the net someplace.
Best wishes, Wendy

homeboy is NAILIN it!
it's reeeeeaaaaaaaly geetin a great vibe now...
the Moai turned out POIFECT!
what a delight to the eyes!

Mike: Yeah, I know first time I heard of water mixable oils I really thought they were pulling my leg. Evidently they have them down to a science now though so much so that many hardcore turps and oil painters have switched over. Thanks for the compliments, your stuff rocks too! :)

Wendy: Thanks for the advice, I never thought twice about it but have done research on it now. Looks like you can indeed use oils over acrylics if they are thin (mine are since it is on wood panel). I am still unsure about the sealing part, but will call my local art store and ask them to be sure. Really appreciate the heads up on all that I would have been devastated if a "Da Vinci distaster" happened.:wink: On a side note, I have been wondering what kind of paint you have been using on your downfall hula girls for the fine details? I mean what kind of paint can be painted over glazed ceramics and not peel off??? I gotta know, it's been driving me crazy trying to figure it out. I can't say it enough by the way, those downfall girls are just incredible.:)

LLT: Thanks so much, truly high praise coming from someone so talented. Although I feel like a piker after seeing how fast you can knock out such great stuff. :wink:

The painting is finally done, but I am waiting for the oils to dry enough to put it on the scanner. Just as well, I kinda feel like crap right now... touch of the flu I think. Will post the final piece soon as I can. Going back to bed now...

Well tiki gang, miss mermaid is finally done and almost dry. Maybe a week more and I can seal her. But meanwhile since the paint was only a little tacky I plopped her on the scanner so you can finally see her true colors in all her glory. I think this has to be the longest I have ever spent on a single painting and probably the most "new" things I have tried in a single piece (oils over acrylics, my first painting with a specific tiki theme, my first full wood panel painting, my first Moai). I think before I move on to another highly intensive painting, I am going to do a more simple fun one I have in mind: a "Wacky Packages" style parody of the Puffa Puffa Rice Cereal box with a hula girl.

Alright, now on with the show... I am happy to present to you ladies and gents: "The Bubble-bath Voyeur", a 16 X 20.5 inch piece showcasing luscious mermaid flush ogled by a lascivious Moai.:P

Some close up details...

Nice Job! I really like the feathery brush strokes on the Moai!

That's what I'm talkin' about! Turned out great - makes me want to join her for a quick bath! :D

you nailed it,tigertail!
the lighting
the movement
the algae on the Moai
Great piece!

soooooooooooo
what's next?
:)

Ditto to that. Wendy

Next up is the Puffa Puffa Cereal parody, then I would like to tackle the other one I talked about: a moody interior of the Tonga Room as it was in it's Heyday. First I need to scrape up some money for supplies (canvasses and brushes mainly) and do some research: going to need as many photos from as many angles as I can get. I am really having fun with the whole pin-up girl thing and would like to do an entire series of those but not sure what form it will take yet. I am toying with the idea of doing a full series of cereal box parodies with pin-up girls which I think would be a lot of fun. Like "Lucy Charms" showing a lovely lady in a scantily clad leprechaun outfit, "Trixy" showing another lovely lady in a bunny costume etc you get the idea. Not sure if I do those if I should post them here though since they have nothing to do with tiki, probably only the Puffa Puffa one would show up here.

Thanks for the compliments everyone I really appreciate them.
Zero St.- Those feathery strokes were so hard for me to do, I am not at all used to being subtle in my art I am glad they worked out well. Loving your "Ku in Blue", I cannot possibly keep up with you and LLT's paint'in speed, you folks are just too much. :wink:

LLT- Yes, in some ways this was another first for me with all the many lighting sources under the water, and the movement in water as well. Might seem kinda silly, but I filled up a pitcher of water in the tap and used a straw to blow air into it to sort of study the movement of the bubbles and how the light reflected on them with two light sources. I still didn't get it exactly right, but it is a fair illusion of how it looks.

Wendy- Thanks, I eagerly am watching your downfall girls posts. :wink:

Mike- It may seem enticing, but them mermaids have got supernatural abilities to stand extreme temperatures; that "bubble-bath" is probably around 200 degrees where her fanny is. :wink: