Pepper Plus Spoon

This is a different pepper from yesterday.  I am very, very pleased with the shape, especially the top.

Pepper Plus Plate

I am away at an annual cabin weekend that has been taking place for over 20 years. I brought drawing and painting supplies and hope to get other people interested. It's fun looking for items to use for still lifes.  I've been doing some contour drawing of well used kitchen implements.

Here is today's painting composition.  The picture is not at the same angle as the drawing and painting.

Here is the drawing.

Lastly, here is the painting.

The side of the pepper nearest to the plate is off. Also, this is an 8" x 8" painting, rather than the usual 6" x 6". 

Three Rolls of Duct Tape

On a whim, I decided to paint 3 rolls of duct tape.  I gained confidence with each one.  It's pretty obvious that the painting order was blue, pink and purple.  I'm happy with the purple one, especially the highlights. The blue one is pretty wonky.  The drawing wasn't too bad, but it sure did not work when I painted it!!

Also, I'm not sure how to represent the writing on the inside of the roll. Hmmmmm.

White Gesso (Ick)

I've painted a few apple duds in the last several days.  The apples have not been duds.  My paintings have been.  The red apples I purchased are very, very dark and I'm not getting the colors right when I'm painting over black gesso.  I decided to experiment and paint over white gesso.  Ick!  The colors lack spark or gravitas.  I can't quite find the right word.  The white "adds" nothing.  I don't like it peeking through, so I covered up most of the surface.  Also, you can see my grid lines and drawing lines.  When some of the drawing lines peek through on a painting over black gesso, it looks kind of cool.  Over white gesso, ick.

It was a good experiment.  I'll probably try the white gesso again or a different color of gesso at some point in the future.

On the plus side, I am very happy with the shape of  this apple.

Pear Plus Friends

Meet pear and this friends, plate and spoon.  I set up and painted on the front porch yesterday afternoon.  The light was good, much better than the basement!

It was hard to draw, but I am pleased with the finished painting.  It's the first time I've painted a plate. Trying to fit in multiple items in the same painting is still very new.  The spoon still needs work, but it's getting better.  

I'm supposed to bring 6 still life paintings to my next painting class.  This one I will happily bring!

Apple Plus Spoon

I'm still painting in the basement.  The light is bugging me.  Although, I have an idea about how I want to change the lighting.  Today, I'm working on cleaning up the front porch, as well as many, many other house-related things.  My hope is to set up a space on the porch where I can paint with natural light when I want.

Here is the apple and spoon from yesterday.  The part of the spoon on the right side where the bowl of the spoon meets the handle does not work!  Also, I forgot the highlights!!

It's weird, but the picture looks better than the original.

I went to Cub Foods yesterday and bought some different apples and a pear.  I want to work on capturing the unique shape of each new apple.

Drawing A Still Life

I tried to paint a similar "scene" last night, but did not get past drawing the outline.  I has having trouble "seeing" the shape of the spoon.  When the outline was done, the distance between the cup and the spoon was way too close and the drawing just did not work.  With limited time last night, I just put it aside.

Today, I decided to just try and draw the scene and it went much better.  The spoon shape is looking good!

I may have to figure out something to hold the view finder.  At least some of my trouble involves keeping the view finder in the exact same place, as I draw.  It's hard to do, but I really, really need it.