I love working on masa paper. It is inexpensive (about $2 a sheet of 20x30) and it practically paints itself.
I love how you can get beautiful blends and textures almost effortlessly.
In this more realistic version of the elephant, I used masa paper. After marking an X on the BACK side (shiny side) of the paper, I wrinkled it and soaked it for a few seconds. I then spread the paper on an absorbant surface (I use doggie pads) and applied washes of color. This dries much lighter than it seems when you first put it on because both the paper and color contain a lot of moisture.
I traced my sketch using a lightbox. If you are drawing with permanent ink, as this version is, you can actually draw the picture on BEFORE you wrinkle it and paint the wash. If drawing with pencil, be sure it is dark enough for you to see well.
I worked on the sides of the elephant first. I want to be sure the face and trunk stand out from the rest of the body, so I be sure to use darks around those areas. The paints I used for this are burnt sienna, magenta, some transparent Pyrrol Orange, and French ultramarine.
I emphasized the warms for the face and trunk so they would stand out a little more.
I always try to paint as much as possible BEFORE gluing the masa paper to another surface. I usually choose to glue it to a cheaper water color paper that is acid free. Occasionally I paste to a prepared gallery board.
When I've painted as much as I think I can, I paste it to another white surface. It has to be completely dried. Then I can work on details, because gluing it down makes the paper smoother to work on.
What glue do I use?
In the past, I have used YES paste to glue this down because I was told it is archival. And very strong. I still like it, but it is expensive and not as archival as I was told. If you don't want to spend $ on a good glue, you CAN use modge podge, Aleene's glue, or matte Medium. I used heavy gel medium because it is archival and is good to glue down even heavier paper. If all you have is Elmer's glue, try to NOT use the "school glue." What happens is it can separate the masa paper from the support if it gets wet. So if all I have is that, I try not to paint on it any more. Using bits of ink is fine.
If you want more info on this process, here are some of my other blogs on masa paper:
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