Mermaid Piece part 18

I haven't been given a deadline to finish this mermaid, but I do find myself wanting to get it done.  I put on the last layer of colored ink fairly thick.  Two weeks later, still not quite dry, not what I expected from a water soluble ink.  The thin layer that is transferred from wood block to paper in the printing process is usually dry in an hour or so, but this time I was applying it to cover the wood, and to work down into the carved areas.  When I was in the Studio yesterday I checked it again and decided it was good enough, at least the areas where I needed to add the next layer of color.

The next two areas to be done would involve carved textures with a first layer of color already on the wood.  I'd be taking advantage of that existing texture and using a brayer to apply the color just to the top of that carved wood.  First I took on the hair.  The design I had been given included two starfish and a sand dollar on top of the mermaid's hair.  I carved the block to keep the sea life at the highest level, with skin and layers of hair at a lower level.  Previously I had applied a darker colored hair (a deep orange color) all over that part using a brush to work the color into all the cut areas.  Since the plan was to use a hard brayer to apply the highlight hair color over the top, I had taken a print of the starfish area on a piece of copy paper, and planned to cut it out to use as a stencil mask.  Unfortunately I left that paper in something else I had not brought with me today.  I started going to the trouble of creating a new stencil mask, not so easy now that the ink in that area was mostly dry.  Then I realized I had an easier solution- a roll of blue painter's tape in the drawer of my printing station.  Tore it into small pieces and stuck them all over the areas to be protected from the new color.

Mixed up a new highlight color, and used a hard brayer to roll it all over the hair, while the tape kept it from getting on the small sea creatures.  No special efforts needed to do the tail- just a blue-green color that could be rolled onto the original surface and not getting down into the carved deep blue areas.  I removed the blue tape, squeezed out a little bit of titanium white, and used a brush to color the sand dollar in her hair and her scallop shell bikini top.  Results are shown below.

Still not quite done, but close.  I think I want to create a darker color for the starfish, so they visually separate more from her skin and hair.  And I will color the half inch edge of the wood around the tail with more of that blue green color, and there may be a spot or two to touch up with the brush, but all that will have to wait until the ink has time to dry.