Start to A Portrait

 

For tonight’s painting session I decided to make a start on the portrait for my study group.

I used some of my new brushes that arrived today. I absolutely love my new “mural” brushes….the two inch flat is my favorite, just a wonderful way to lay down a huge swab of color.

Before I head off into the weekend…

Valerie, one of my Fine Art Friends has a new Etsy store. Valerie is clever with a colored pencil. She is also very good with a sewing machine. She has some unique products for sale – if I had a daughter she would get one of these for sure.

Spring’s Calling Card

Spring’s Calling Card

Purchase information to follow once it’s varnished

This is my entry for the Virtual Sketch Date this month. Thanks to Stacy Rowan for the reference photo and doing the admin work this time.

As I don’t do many bird paintings or drawings (maybe one or two so far), I decided to just experiment. I took branches from one side of the photo, put them under the bird on the other side, and flipped the whole thing horizontally.

I put in a wash of bright red as the ground as I knew I wanted to have flecks of red showing through the gray background. My original background was too cool, so I added in some yellow ochre…then splashed in some white to break up all the warmness…then decided it was done!

New Brushes

Royal Lily,

click here for purchasing information

There was a 40% off sale on Robert Simmons brushes recently at my local store. Naturally, I raced down there and bought a couple. Their “white sable” brushes have fast become my favorite to use with acrylics. I now have two flats, two filberts, and a round.

The question of edges has come out recently in relation to my art. There are plenty of decisions around when to have hard edges and when to soft ones. The choices you make create movement or slow it, give new direction or maintain it. In short, it’s a fascinating part of art making, one that I have only begun to appreciate.

A Great Blogging Tool

Single Tulip

4 in x 4in, open acrylics on Gessobord

not for sale

On my break recently, I made a discovery. It's not like it is a big secret, I just had never taken the time to think about it. I have discovered MS Live Writer. It's a software tool, like Scribefire, to help you blog.  I never imagined that I would use such a thing, seemed like just another complication. But honestly, I love it and wouldn’t be without now.

What you get:

• Write locally, then publish online.
• Great image handling software - I have been trying to put images in a table for the "pages" on my sales blog (such as my flower gallery or portrait gallery) - it hasn't worked until I used Writer.
• Lots of integration with other online apps, plugins etc.
• My current favorite plugin asks you if you want to update twitter with your new post – you click yes, it goes to twitter puts in your blog title and a shortened url. If you have things set up between twitter and facebook then it will go publish the same thing on facebook. All for one click, awesome!
• Here’s the official list of features
• Life Hacker’s ideas about how to use the features

Now, it is true that you wouldn't want to edit the code it generates, but you can edit old posts with it, so you shouldn't ever need to look at the html. It is really helping me dress up my posts, I'm thrilled!

February VSD Entries

Lake Louise, Canada

colored pencil on card,

8in x 4in

Above you see my entry for the February VSD. This was my third go around (becoming a bit of a habit for me when doing the VSD!)

Below you see my two “studies”.

acrylic on gessobord, 5 in x 7 in When I was painting this I grew so disgusted that it wasn’t matching what was in my head I just stopped – a fairly unusual occurrence for me. Looking at it now, it’s not as bad as I feared, it’s just in an ugly stage, needs some work – not sure if I dare to pick it up again or not!

markers on card, 4 in x 8 in After I abandoned the painting I left the project for a few days. When I picked it up again and looked at the reference photo I suddenly saw a vision of the thing in pen and ink. I decided I wasn’t up to the detail that I saw in my head, so I picked up my markers for value studies and just had a scribble. It was satisfying enough that it lead me to see the reference in all blue – which is what you see above in the CP version.

Thinking

Thinking lots about edges, looseness, detail, form, value, color temperature, unity, etc...this is last night's effort at teasing out the image in my mind. It was based on this study.

Two Knights

Two Knights
open acrylics on gessobord
6in x 6in

I was reading about drawing from casts a few months ago. The author suggested spending lots of time in the school's cast library to learn...well, I don't go to art school, so I don't have a library. But later on it did occur to me that I could use chess pieces. Ideally, I would be able to find extra large pieces, but for a quick Friday night painting, the mini-cheapy ones worked.

This was a good exercise for me...finding that balance between detail and looseness. Interestingly, achieving both of them is equally difficult...rendering detail takes an observant eye and interpretative skills...being loose and free takes a creative "otherly" vision and intuition about when enough is suggested. I hope to continue learning the balance.

Top Ten To Dos for 2009

Delicate Beauty,
7in x 5in,
open acrylic on Gessobord

(Purchasing information to follow.)

On Friday, I posted my general plan for 2009. Today I am going to flesh it out a bit with my top ten "to dos" for the year.

I will still be doing my monthly goals. They will be drawn from this list and anything else that comes up. At the end of each item, I'll name the area of investment it's attached to. This list of ten gives me some measurable goals to achieve, without overwhelming myself. If I finish all ten early on in the year, I'll add to it! :D

Top Ten To Dos for 2009

1. 50 Paintings - Fairly straight forward, I'd like to average one painting a week. They need not all be finished to the same degree. The idea here is to be painting frequently. Reading about painting only gets you so far. (painting)
   
2. 100 Sketches - Sketching is a joy for me and so I put this in here as an easy goal. (drawing)
3. 10 Drawings - These are more polished drawings than a sketch. I imagine that most of these will be my VSD entries. (drawing)
   
4. Create Business Images - This year I want to expand my image manipulation skills - both so that I can create references for myself and so that I can design my business images. So, I will be scheduling time with PS Elements and my new camera. "Get better" isn't a good goal, I'll choose to create new business images (a measurable goal). (business)
   
5. Make prints and/or cards available. (business)
6. Writing project - I hope this comes through. If not, I'll replace this item with a similar writing goal. (writing)
7. Complete my book list - I have an embarrassingly big stack of books on my night table of books half finished. I'd like to finish them before I start any new books. They are: Capturing Radiant Light and Color, Practice and Science of Drawing, Oil Painting Techniques and Materials, Portraits from Life, Paint People in Acrylics, Art of Pencil Drawing. Other possible additions to this list are Elements of Drawing and Creative Perspective for Artists and Illustrators. (drawing, painting)
   
8. Make X dollars from my artwork - a measurable goal. (business)
   
9. Marketing Advancement - If I'm going to sell online, I need to know how to do it well. So, some sort of advancement is in order. I need to do some SEO work (labels and image tags). Also, I'd like to give Twitter and Facebook a go. (business)
   
10. Do 12 portraits - this is the item for my portrait group. I've emailed around a few folks and gathered a great group of people to do some portraits with this year. We'll work once a month from the same reference and then offer critiques for each other. The blog is private because we think that will help with the critiquing. We are keeping the group small. (drawing, painting)
    

Autumn - the VSD

"Autumn"
6in x 6in
acrylic on gessoed masonite

This is my entry for November's virtual sketch date.

I had two goes with this one. First, I began a detailed graphite piece - all those lovely cast shadows...those had immediately attracted my eye when I first saw the photo. It wasn't going that well though...

So, I began again with this acrylic piece. It was all magic the second time around. As the sky went in, I remembered I wanted more blue towards the top. I did the trees and kept stopping and leaning back and just asking my eye what was wrong (how could I make it look more 3D?) I took a risk and added in more branches in the back and leaves...

I don't always slow down enough to let my mind and eye tell my hand what to do...it's so nice when it happens!

Firecracker Flowers
6in x 6in
acrylic on gessoed hardboard panel

I decided to have a go with acrylics for a few pieces instead of the oils. Two reasons for this...one, I've been struggling with some headaches and I want to eliminate the oils (they are likely due to allergies, but one never knows)...two, I've been frustrated with the paint smudging, smearing, and dragging up when I paint over a place. Of course the second reason has alot to do with my inept handling of paint and impatience with waiting for it to dry.

Anyway, here was my first go with the acrylics in a long time. These aren't really called "firecracker flowers", I just thought that I painted them rather like firecrackers, especially with the green stems I put in.