I Have A Lot To Learn

I have a lot to learn. I don't say this as a bad thing. It's actually quite a good thing. I am trying to think more before I do, to pay more attention while I am doing, and to engage the editor rather than the critic. The critic in my head frequently tells me that this or that photo would be too hard for me to paint. That kept me from trying to paint a picture of Minnehaha Falls that I took last year. As a way to push back, I plan to have two paintings going at one time. One is more in my comfort zone and one is not. Minnehaha Falls is not in my comfort zone.

Another change is that I am starting each day out by painting. Most mornings that means five minutes, but that is enough time to dash downstairs, paint a few strokes, clean my brush, and start on the other morning routines. This is a much better use of time than scrolling on social media. This new habit started on Tuesday morning, my first day back from the cabin and the first day back at work. Between the happy feelings from the cabin and taking a few minutes to paint, it was a good morning and that carried through most of the day. This morning, I started to sketch out a new painting, so it's not always about picking up the paint brush.

This is the painting that I started on Tuesday morning. I finished it last night. One of my goals was patience. I tend to get overwhelmed and in a hurry with a more complicated scene.

The result after several mornings shows the pool of water unconnected to the falls above. I'm not good at seeing this type of thing on the fly, so having a break is good. Even with this problem, I was pleased with the different values in the water, especially the bright white. Up until this point, I'thought that I could get a bright white color by adding more and more white to a brush that was already loaded with another color (especially if that other color was light in value). Not so! I tried this many, many times and it never worked. Slowing down gave the editor in my head a chance to come forward and recognize a truth. If you want bright white or ever-so-slightly off white color, you have to clean your brush first. Mini-breakthrough.

This shows the painting further along and look! The falls and the pool of water are attached to each other.  

I finished this painting last night. When I look at it, I can see that I need to develop a better vocabulary of brush strokes. I'm not sure how to represent all of the undergrowth, trees, and shrubbery. The green parts near the falls could also use better texture or something. While I could go back and continue to fuss with it, I'm  done. I learned what I could and I'd rather try it again at a later date. 

#149 - Minnehaha Falls - 8 x 10 on paper - palette 1

While I'm not sure the completed painting is a success, the experience was. I tried some new things and learned a lot.

Wingnut - The Beginning

I decided to do "dotty" again.  Here is the start of this painting.

VW Bus - Work In Process 3

I am going slowly with this one.  Here is the original picture.  I took some creative liberties when I drew this out by removing some of the detail.

Here is the painting, so far.

It was a very good evening of finishing up the drawing and starting to paint.  I'm pleased that I stopped when I did.  It is challenging (and thrilling) to work on a picture that has so much going on.  The VW bus is turning out, although I might adjust the values a bit before I'm done.

Tonight phthalo blue (red shade) was doing great things in my painting colors!!

Chandler - Take 3

Yesterday, I drew this over lunch at work.

With watering the garden last night, There wasn't as much time to paint as I would like.  Although, I did harvest some tomatoes.  I still need to finish the eyes and whiskers.  

I like this one.  The values are much better and so is his face shape. 

Ella - Work In Progress

I worked on this painting yesterday.  It might have been the value drawing in pencil, reading a bit about painting, or just thinking about it.  Whatever the reason, I felt much better about addressing the color values in this painting.  It felt good.  I got into a grove and went with it.  As a result, the values seem closer to reality and not so extreme.

I still need to work on colors, paint strokes and all of that.  It's weird, but it's almost hard for me to "see" this painting, since that I felt so good about the process.

I rushed on the inside of the ears.  This morning, I decided to paint the part over with black gesso, so I can give it another try.  Yeah!  I was grumpy about the ears, but now I have a do-over.

Esther - Take 3

It helps me to paint the same thing more than once.  I wish that I could see and execute better the first time, but my guess is that it will come with more experience. Frequently, the third time is the charm.

Here is the picture.  It's a friend's cat and I grabbed the picture from Facebook. Hope they don't mind! I do intend to give them this painting or a future rendition.

Next up is the drawing.

Here is the painting in process.

Here is the final painting.  The eyes could have been a bit more orange.  

Things worked so much better for this 3rd attempt, including the colors, the brush strokes and all of it.  I altered things a bit from the picture.  It was good to make the collar and background color different than the picture.  Also, I'm glad that I did not include the bell.  

Jennifur - Part 3

Yup, we are skipping to part 3 on purpose.  I finished a painting of Jennifur last night, really, really, really did not like it, covered it up, and started again.

Here is the current work in progress.  I am still having some troubles with paint strokes.  They's been tight and fussy.  A few minutes before I stopped, I loosened up and just went for it.

While the painting has been challenging, I wish that I would have taken a picture of the drawing before I started painting.  I was pleased with it.

Jennifur - Part 1

Wednesday night, I purchased the Art Byte, Painting Fast, Loose, and Bold, by Patti Mollica.  It talked a lot about nailing value in your painting and provided some good examples.  Kat talked about this in painting class a lot.  Since all of this is new, it's helpful to read and see what different people say about the same concept.  It helps it sink into my brain better.  As part of planning her painting, this artist does a simple charcoal sketch of what she is planning to paint.  She makes this sketch with essentially 3 "colors", dark, medium, and light.

I think this will help me slow down to see and document the values better, so I'm giving it a try.  Here is Jennifur.  She came to my friends, with this name.  Yesterday, I did the outline and started with the shading and erasing.  With limited time yesterday, I didn't get far.

Although, I took my time on drawing the outline.  At this point, her face looks more like a lioness or a panther and I'm not sure why.  This is the reason that I need to keep working on my drawing skills and how to "see" things better!

Essentially this exercise is the same as one from my painting class.  At an early class, Kat had us smudge up paper with charcoal, so that you had a background with a medium value.  After that, we drew an apple by layering on additional charcoal for the dark areas and using an eraser to create the light areas.  This was back when I was trying to get my apples to have an apple-like posture and it really helped with getting the shape down.  It also, of course, helped with the value.

If I keep doing this, and I think that I should, I may need to buy different paper.  The stuff I have does not seem to "grab" the charcoal at all.  The stuff that Kat had us use worked much better.

Finished!

I finished the painting of the tortoiseshell cat.  It was an experiment, since it's not clear how to capture the colors.  It turned out a little abstract.  Still, I'm generally pleased with the end result in that this painting was from a drawing.  This cat has sharper angles in her face versus the other cat below.  I also like the eyes in this one.

Here is a cat painting that I started on Friday and finished today.  The finished cat is okay.  The composition is off.  The cat is "wearing" a Christmas ribbon tied in a bow and there's not enough of the bow to really see that it's a bow.

Tee hee.  I started signing my paintings!

Painting in Process

It's hard to paint a tortoiseshell-colored cat.  Here are two work in process pictures.

When I showed the second one to DW, he said the colors verged on abstract.  Hey, new idea.  Maybe I'll paint a couple of cats with alternative colors.  There are no rules and I'm having fun learning!

Also, I'm pleased with how my drawing skills are coming along. Dividing up pictures and painting surfaces into 4 equal parts really, really helps.

Painting In Process

I'm experimenting with how to paint a grey cat with colors other than just grey.

First Blog Post

This is my first post on my first blog, making me not exactly at the forefront of the blogging world.  My hope is that blogging will help me capture the experience of learning how to make art and, hopefully, will track both improvement and growth.

This blog is mostly for me, but I did make it public.

One of the many things to capture and document is the journey from an idea to a finished painting. Since I have no past experience, my drawing skills are a hindrance to the process. Using tracing paper removes this barrier, but I really want to be able to draw what I paint. For paintings based upon a picture, my current work around is to divide up both the picture and my surface in a grid pattern and try to draw the picture onto the painting surface.

Today's picture:

The process is very, very slow, but it helps me truly see what is in front of me. I use a pencil to measure the different angles on the picture. Frequently, I am astounded. My eyes lie. My pencil helps me see.

Drawing in process:

I am happy with this drawing so far. The surface is a spiral notebook with heavy paper.  I taped the edges of the paper and painted the paper with black gesso.