Blog January 25 - how to make a dachshund's coat shiny?

Dear subscribers,

First of all, I wish you a very happy new year, a year full of happiness, joy and above all good health. And so I start my creative year with a pastel drawing of this sweet short-haired dachshund, drawn with Pan Pastel in combination with pastel pencils.

The smooth fur of a short-haired dachshund already has short, shiny hairs and little or no undercoat, and it is precisely this shiny effect of the coat that constitutes the challenge of this design. How do you get the shiny effect from a fur?

In this blog I would like to give you a little more explanation about this.

As usual, the layer first receives a base of different colors of Pan Pastel, a combination of Burnt Sienna Shade, Yellow Ocher and Orange Shade, which is best applied with the sponge provided.

It is important to only apply a thin layer of Pan Pastel. If you apply a thicker layer, the surface of the drawing sheet will become too smooth and it will be difficult to blend fine lines because the pigments will no longer be absorbed onto the smooth surface.

Small lines are then drawn in the direction of the hair of the coat, with colors such as ochre, rust and brown tones, this way you also create the shadows in the coat. You can then achieve the shine of the coat by drawing light gray, soft pink and white lines on top of the lines already drawn, taking into account light and shadow. This fine line drawing is often called hatching.

All I have to do now is draw the collar in the checkered fabric. After drawing the rectangles with the titanium white pencil, they are filled with purple, brown and lilac shades, the shadows become more visible in the necklace using the Indigo color.

Only after drawing the collar do I draw the rest of the coat, so that the collar retains its fresh colors.