Another Portrait?!

Underpainting

With this self portrait, I wanted to have a bit more refinement and work on my color. I've learned a lot in this second one. Big stuff I learned: 

• Simplicity over detail. Too much detail everywhere means too many focal points. A simple brush stroke is better than 5 smaller ones. 
• I learned about edges. Soft edges  are just as important as hard ones.
• I learned I need to work on a likeness which means I need to have a better underdrawing... so don't rush it. 

Up close and personal.

The Critique.... It can be tough to take a hard look at one's one work, but necessary for improvement. I love getting helpful critiques from friends (most of the time), but my friends aren't always available. I guess, what I'm trying to say is cultivate the ability to critique yourself. It  is a skill that will really pay off in the long run. 

This is mostly for me. I like seeing the improvement from my first portrait to my second.... it makes me feel good. hahaha!

My twin is Awesome!

I think you can get this on Amazon.com

My twin sister is annoyingly good at giving gifts. This year for our birthday she gave me the coolest book, but it wasn't just the book. She drew diagrams, cartoons are wrote commentaries on each page! How could I compete with this? Sheesh!

Aren't these drawing so fun!!!???

Still, she's pretty dang awesome. Whenever we get together all my creative juices just flowing! Maybe its a twin synergy thingy.

The White Stag

At least... that's the working title. This has been an interesting journey. I'm working on a comic that is 50 pages long....actually its currently at a standstill because I freaked out. I've got it all thumb-nailed out but egads! character design??? Me???  So I started my "How to make a Perfect Pie" Comic only 25 pages long, still struggling with consistant characters... Then came this: "The White Stag" Only 12 Panels. Now that I've gotten this far, I'm feeling more confident about the other, bigger projects. 

Thumbnails, character design, layout,  and even some facial expressions!(though... they are covered up....)

Close up of one of the panels. This is done on a 3 1/2 by 3 1/2 inch paper. This allowed me to work out some of the kinks, and see how to do it better before I went big. 

Layout Question: Should I have the layout 1,2,3,4 across the top, or should I have it more like a book as you can see in the Critique's layout below. It goes 1,2 then down to the next row 3,4 as if it were on two separate pages... Similar to the traditional comic book layout. Thoughts?

These are things I know I already need to fix, which is why I did it small in the first place. Having to redo this much work and detail at a 7in size would have been a pain. Even so, this took me a couple of days of concentrated work. 

Ps. Thank you Ray for the idea, and thank you Hollie for be excited for me and cheering me on!

Use what'cha got

I don't have a light table. I wish I did. I know I could technically get my husband to make me one, but....meh. So During the day, I use my living room window and last night I did this:

Drawing is part of a super secret project! Muahahaha!

The glass is usually my acrylic's palette and the lamp is one we got at Home Depot for a couple of bucks. I use the lamp for lighting my recent self portraits and general use in the room. Makeshift and temporary, but it works. In other random art conversions, I use a laptop stand for a small drawing table, or easel for my smaller paintings. 

What are some things you've converted for your art uses? 

When Plans go Awry

So.... I was feeling a little down last week. I felt rather purposeless and stuck. You see, I had planned on having babies with my wonderful husband as soon as I graduated college and well.... that hasn't worked out. I've still got the wonderful husband, but no kiddos. I never planned on having a career in the arts because I was going to be a full-time 100% mom. Since graduating I've been kinda floundering around with dead end jobs.

Last week, I filled out a free questionnaire online to help me figure out a direction for myself, but it didn't really help. I'm all over the place! I have too many interests and hobbies and skills. I'm struggling to pick just one to focus on. So I called my husband's grandma (all mine are dead) because she is very wise and very spunky. I told her my dilema and she told me that she had experienced the same predicament just recently at the ripe age of 72. She had a chat with God, who told her to continue to cultivate her talents. She has many talents, but not all are practical right now. She felt inspired to take up the organ. When Grandma started she felt like she knew nothing after years of playing the piano. Her husband asked if she'd quit and she said resolutely, "I NEVER QUIT!" So now she is taking classes from the Mormon Tabernacle Choir Organist and rocking it.

When I was at the Temple a few months ago, I suddenly had the thought that I should start oil painting. I thought it was weird, but I decided to go ahead and do it. I told Grandma this, but that I didn't know why I was painting. She said it didn't matter why, and that I should keep doing it. I would find out the "why" eventually.  I'm still oil painting, but as I paint I'm continuing to work on my comics, my quilts and my new recipes. I guess I'm taking that step in the dark until I get further direction from God.

How have you guys found your way with your art? How did you decide on what field, medium and style?

77¢ a Pound

There is nothing like rotting vegetables to spurn me on. This was a quick painting. Rushed would actually be an accurate description of how I painted this thing. The pepper were really starting to go. They were getting wrinkly and black spots were starting to appear. There was a slightly weird smell starting to waft from my art cave. Luckily, I bought the Peppers on the cheap.

I painted this thing in maybe 3  or 4 hours total. The bulk of the time was last night and I added "finishing touches" this morning. Mostly, I'm excited to have another canvas covered because when I use all the ones I have here at home I can go buy more of the square gallery ones. Until I use up all my canvas I can't really justify the purchase. 

I started to do a bowl of onions
(red, white, shallot) and garlic heads,
 but  I had to use some of them for dinner
....so that's what those red lines are. 

The set up.

Ugly underpainting. Just can't get around
that stage...

I noticed the composition was sucking with
 the yellow  pepper almost directly aligned with
the orange one, so I had to move it. to the right
 a little. 

I like to see other people's processes because it reminds me that the art didn't just burst forth like Athena from Zeus's head. I like seeing how other artist work through design problems and stuff like that, so I hope you do too.

Finished!! 

A close up shot, so you can see my hurried and
 rushed brush strokes. 

FIRST. PORTRAIT. EVER!!!!!!

So having never finished a real portrait before, I'm pretty excited!! Since I was feeling stuck on my black and white portrait of my sister, I thought I'd test stuff out with a small, rough, self portrait. I know it's not great, but I'm learning a ton about color and direction of brush strokes.

8 x 10 inches

The nice thing about self portraits is that I don't cost anything to model and if I wiggle, its my fault! I can see why Rembrandt and Van Gogh did a lot of self portraits. It was cheap and easy. All you need is a mirror and decent lighting.

Ugly Underpainting

I stumbled across this video in my online perusings and I've watched it about 3 times now and it helped a lot when I was doing this painting. Also, Prof. Bodily was in my head a lot with "drawing the envelope" and "angles, angles, angles." Hahaha! Crazy how professors get in your head!!