Cardinal in pastel on watercolor paper

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Having a problem. I drew this with cheap no-name soft pastels on watercolor paper and to stop the dust I used Workable Fixative about 3 times between sessions and noticed it killed the highlight and lighter areas. Then when I put the matte finish on it, it wiped out all the whites and yellows leaving me with a muddy image. Is this normal? Should I really scrub on more whites and pinks to keep them visible under the finish or should I not used the finish at all?

Also, hello again! I’ll be re-upping membership as soon as I have spare money. Didn’t know if I was in the mood for drawing or not so this is like the first thing I’ve done in a couple year and a bit rusty, figured starting with pastel would be easier/faster than colored pencil. Vertical dimension is 9" and about 4-5" wide. Not important enough to frame or put under glass or some portfolio to save it raw, hence the krylon finishes.

On a side note, has anybody tried the pastel ground by Golden? Would a more aggressive tooth to the paper help eliminate this problem? This drawing paper is already packed/blended flat. The photo looks a lot brighter than it appears by eye. Also, when I look, it also cropped off the left most half inch when I took the photo He does have a full breast, I’ll try To-Do a better pic later.

The white highlight on his eye is from Liquitex Acrylic White Ink and a dip pen out of frustration to at least get some highlight to stick.

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Another photo that got all of drawing but the light is blowing out the left side shining on the matte finish

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Another edit… The Reference Image, I was so frustrated by highlights on wing and cheeks and beak not showing up, I didn’t want to muddle it further by adding shadow of beak down onto the wing. Same goes for eye highlight, artistic inspiration to try and save something.
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Hi there. Yes, fixative can alter the colors of pastels significantly. Since the tooth of the watercolor paper is filled up, you won’t be able to get any more highlights on there with pastel. You’d have to use another medium that will lay on top of the pastel in order to get highlights at this point–like you did with the liquitex pen. Yes, a paper with more tooth would allow you to put on more layers. I do like using pastel on watercolor paper too, but you get very few layers, like only 3 layers at best, on watercolor paper.

I’m sorry the process wasn’t what you were hoping for. It takes a while to get used to how different materials behave on different surfaces. I haven’t tried the pastel ground by Golden. My best experiences with pastel on watercolor paper is when I do an underlayer with watercolor or ink and then put pastel on top of the watercolor or ink. That’s because watercolor and ink add color, but won’t fill up the tooth of the paper, so you can still put 2-3 layers of pastel on top of watercolor or ink.

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