The Best Subject Matter

Well, I have finally found the perfect subject to paint, and if you cannot tell, it's me!   LOL.  Ok, I was busily pouring through the internetweb looking for a picture to paint, when I thought to myself, "Self, I think I ought to paint myself just to see if I come out with something recognizable.  

I think what I came out with it something that is a little closer to a police sketch than a photograph.  Actually, now that I am looking closer at this, I look more like Data from Star Trek than a real person.   I'm not totally disappointed with it since I can still recognize myself, but I think i need a little more work before I go into the portrait business.

I tried hard to get a lot of subtle color into my face.  I don't know if you can see them all but there are reds, greens, blues, purples, and yellows in my face.  All of these together help to give a lot of texture to my skin.  I wasn't going to put on any background, but I had some leftover paint on my palette and thought I would just use them rather just cleaning them off.





Some of you are going to look at this and tell me I don't quite have the eyes right, or the eyebrows or the mouth or ......  It doesn't matter.  Please don't tell me I didn't make an exact copy of this picture.  I know that.  This is a practice exercise and thats all.

You all might have to get used to seeing some more pictures of me.  Ha ha ha ha ha.

Morro Bay at Sunset

This painting for sale.  Watercolor.  9x12. $30

Ok, I think that every now and again, I will alway do a really loose paintint like this one.  They are fun to do, and have an interesting look to them.  Trying not to keep the paint in the lines, just in the general area is quite often maddening, but the results can be outstanding.  Also, I trying not to worry about my drawing quite so much too.  It was a little un-nerving to draw with ink like I did.  I think I will call this style coffee drawing, since it looks like I've had a cup or two too many to make the lines straight.  I actually didn't want to make the lines perfectly straight.  I've seen some videos lately of people talking about ow the irregular lines add more life to the painting that straight lines.  I wasn't sure I believed it before I did the painting, but I'm nearly convinced afterwards.

This is a painting of the Inn at Morro Bay, one of my favorite buildings in Morro Bay.  It's right on the water.  Of course, any good picture of Morro Bay is gonna have the Rock in somewhere.  And since the whole town is a bird sanctuary, I thought I would throw in some birds for good measure.

The west facing side of the Inn is almost all glass, and when the sun goes down, the windows really do look orange, red, purple and blue from the outside.  It's quite a site.  Of course most people look west rather than east, and never see the windows.

I like this painting and will hang it proudly in my office until its sold.  Hope you all enjoy it.

Tango For Two

This painting for sale.  Watercolor, 5x8, $10

Alright, I feel like I am actually beginning to get the hang of this painting thing.  I wanted to paint this picture for a challenge I had last month, but painted something else instead.  I had already drawn the picture on paper, and so I thought I would just paint it anyway.  The original picture had so much going on around these two.  There were people all around and columns behind them.  I decided to simplify the picture a bit.  I don't know if I did the picture justice or not.  I just thought if I simplified, and made these two the only thing to focus on, then they would be that much better.

Again, I am using my own, paint and blend technique.  As I do it more and more, I think that I am getting better at it , and it seems as though I can do it a bit more quickly.  I could have done more with this picture, but I didn't want to overdo it.

I hope you all like this picture as much as I do.

I'm Just Playing in the Band

So, I have finally finished another commission.  This one another band of instruments.  A bit more aggressive, you might say, than the last.  But in my mind, soooooooo much better.    I should take a moment to point out that this is actually the third one of these I did for this commission.  The first two...... well, let's not mention the first two.

Yes, this picture gets a little grey at the bottom.  I blame my iPhone for that.  It never has taken great pictures.  And this is with the flash on, from about 2 feet away.


Ok, here is the first picture.  This is my initial drawing, you can see how I arranged the instruments.

 This is all I got done before I had to stop and take a quick break.  You can see the instruments getting a little bit of color.

Here, I was able to put finish a first coat of color on all the instruments.  I've also gone back to do some shading on the classical guitar and the stand up bass.

A bit more color on the instruments and i'll have them all but done, then it will be on to the fun part.  







And finally the fun part.   It really gives the painting a lot of motion.  I think it looks great.  My son took a quick peak at it and gave me a review, "Too much splatter dad, you need to take some off. "  I probably ought to listen to him.  Though he has only been painting a short time, because he is only 6, he's much better at adding splatter to paintings than I am.  Many a Saturday morning we will paint and then he will "add some splat" to his painting, and voila, what was an ordinary painting, turns into something looking pretty good.

Well, I like the splatter, I think it adds a lot to the painting.  My intent was to make "splats" of different sizes to represent music being played by the instruments.  I don't know if i quite got that, but I still do like the painting.  Let me know what you think.

Quick Sketch

This painting for sale.  Watercolor 5 1/2 x 8 1/2. $8

Here is a quick sketch I did of an old car.  I know I have mostly moved on to other things, but I can't quite get away from cars and trucks.  I did this over the weekend.  It was fun, and quick.

I painted this completely with my waterbrushes.  I love how they provide a little extra water to your painting.  When you are outside, in the sun, they compensate for the extra drying of the paper quite nicely. I painted this one at home on my dining room table.  I really like how the colors ran together, but I think i needed to do more with it.