material development

I did some experiments with the gold leaf, I found that if you stick it on with glue and then rub at it, bits scrub off and leave quite a subtle sheen which could work well. But after scanning this in, I see that the gold leaf doesn't have quite the same shine on screen, and so probably won't translate as well when I print the final illustrations. So i am thinking that it might be better if I just do the illustrations in watercolour, scan them in and edit and then once the book is all binded, i work straight onto the images with the gold leaf so to keep the shine. 






attempted close up of fish scales using watercolour:

this hasn't worked as well as I wanted, where it should be detailed and delicate, it seems very plain and not clear what the painting is of. Also tried the gold leaf directly onto the painting but it has come out looking rather tacky and unsubtle. Think the use of watercolour would be more effective if I focused on whole fish.

I had a go painting from my chosen photographs, Im not sure yet if I will use these for my final illustrations but I do like how they have come out. I didn't use the gold leaf for either, but might try adding now and see how I will look. I found it a lot harder painting multiple fish compared to the single parts of fish I have done, I feel the painting quality isn't as good as it could be. Although I think I have explored the colours well and brought out some colours that aren't usually seem at first glance. These have been edited slightly in photoshop, I didn't want to change too much as I like the analogue style.