Monday, February 22, 2016

Blue Shutters #2

I took a second pass at the painting "blue shutters," by John Lovett. He has great tutorials and this is one of them. 


Ready for Scandal


Enough said. 

Happy with the wine glass on this one.

Remake of the Dream House


In an attempt to lighten both the sky and the greenery, I started over with a second drawing of the "dream house." I think I need to mix different colts and use more water for the sky and clouds. Though I have cerulean, cerulean chromium, and manganese blue sitting in my home palette, I am trying to develop skills with the limited palette. I have found the sky to be most challenging. 

I lightened up the greens by using a completely different style. With those, I think I just need to use white space better. 

Another issue may simply be the paper... The Stillman & Bitn journal is great for some things, but it doesn't do damp washed like the Arches cold press. That makes it tough to keep soft clouds. Maybe I'll try one more.

Wednesday, February 17, 2016

Working in the limited palette again.



Expanded the palette a bit for this one: Phthalo blue GS, Quin rose, Quin gold, cobalt blue, monte Amiata natural sienna, DR burnt sienna and a touch of indigo.

Clouds came out nice and puffy. Layering the Phthalo blue over the cobalt helped deepen the contrast and pull the piece together. 

Don't like the shrubbery. Too dull. Ni!


Monday, February 15, 2016

Painting from my photos

Recently I have been stuck, wanting to paint, but having difficulty finding a subject that interests me. After spending some time in iPhoto I printed several scenes to use. I painted the first, a bunch of grapes from a vineyard in Chile, about a week ago. Below are two versions of a second. 



I've been trying to stick with the limited palette. This one has Phthalo blue GS, Quin gold, Quin rose, hansa yellow medium, and a bit of burnt sienna. One was very quick with what people seem to call "juicy" paint, and I used Noodler's black in my Lamy Safari pen to finish it off. The other took much longer. The second also added cerulean blue for the sky. On this one, I tried to use negative painting around the edges. I think it helped. I have to remember to use enough water when filling in the background. Even in small spaces, to be sure there's enough texture in the background. Otherwise it ends up looking flat.

Sunday, February 7, 2016

Finishing what I started

Yesterday I finished a sketch begin a few weeks ago. Today I completed one from even longer ago- a month or so. This was a rental building across from the hotel where we stayed in Delray Beach FL. Lots of pretty buildings there. I did the  original pencil sketch in the airport before our flight home.


I expanded the color palette a bit on this one, since I needed some brighter, tropical colors. I stuck with Phthalo blue GS to make the greens, and used my own bistro gray (ultramarine + cobalt blue deep). Then I used cerulean blue (not chromium) for the sky and man's hat, cobalt real blue for all of the turquoise, and combined Quin rose with pyrrol  scarlet for the salmony-pink. Should have gone a bit more coral, but it works. For the Indian red shades I mixed a little cobalt teal into the coral. 

Overall I am pleased with both the sketch and the painting/mixing. The only thing I'd change is lightening up the ink lines behind the palm tree. It does bring back that Florida feel!




Saturday, February 6, 2016

Painting again

Since heading back to work I have had a tough time painting. Over this week I got two pieces completed. 

The first was a quick morning sketch.


The second was a watercolor of a sketch I began a few weeks ago. It's from a photo I took while we were in Chile in 2014. Stuck with three colors: Monte Amiata Natural Sienna, Helio Cerulean (Phthalo blue GS, and carmine, with just a touch of Burnt Sienna for the branches. Then I glazed with Aureolin at the finish. I'm pretty pleased with it.