I've got so many flowers I ought to be a florist

Some more quick loose flowers.  Still trying to get coneflowers right (don't ask me why).  And working on roses.  I like the way my roses turn out.  From a distance they look really good, and as I keep at this method, they should continue to get better.   The coneflower is interesting.  I keep adding layers, and it keeps looking better.  I start with the outside petals, and then the inside and finally the ones in the back.  seems like it works, but I still have a little way to to to get it right (whatever that is).

At any rate, I'm having fun painting the flowers.  Hope yo enjoy looking at them.

A rose by any other name

Having gone through a poppy phase over the last two weeks, I might be going into a rose phase.  Here are a few I sketched out.  Some good, some bad.  Hope you like them.

simple coneflowers

So I was doing some doodling again last night.  Thought it would be fun to paint some coneflowers.  Before you begin, let me say that I didn't really look at any pictures of coneflowers to know if I've done it right.  And I know they have many more petals than these have.  And I know that the stems here are just green lines.  Blah Blah Blah.

Yes I should have done at least a tiny bit of research to know what I was painting, but these were kind of a throw in at the end of my painting session.  For what they are, I think they are pretty good.  I'll have to check to make sure these are actually colors that cone flowers come in, and probably change my color palette for my next attempt.  Also, I'll have to find what the stems and leaves look like.  Oh, and the heads too.  Whew, that seems like a lot of work all of a sudden.  Oh, well, for a quick painting at the end of the night, I think they turned out pretty good.   Thanks for taking the time to look.

Sketchadoodling

Just a few quick sketches I did.  I'm trying to recycle and reuse pieces of paper that I have laying around that have a bit of whitespace on them.  I've got more paper on the way, but in the meantime, I've got these bits to use and since they paintings aren't  great and were just sitting around anyway.....   So you might be forced to view through a few more before I've exhausted all my scraps.  Enjoy.

Got My Scanner Back

Today, I got a scanner back and hooked up to my computer.  If you haven't noticed, this year my paintings look like they have had a bit of grey tint to them.  My camera just doesn't take the greatest pictures.  I'd been trying my best with the equipment I had.  Now, however, I've got my scanner back and things are looking better.  

Here are a couple of thank you cards that I have painted.  They are, of course, small.  In fact you could say they are the size of a thank you card.   Enjoy.

Roses Redux

Ok, so here is my first finished work of roses.  I kinda like the way it came out.  I've pasted it on my office wall and already gotten several compliments.  

So I obviously  have a little work to do on my petals.  I think on some they should be closer together, and then outer layer should be pretty wide.  Since I'm still trying to figure it out, I'm not gonna be very hard on myself for an mistakes.

And I suppose you are wondering why a drip is going horizontally.  I'll explain that:  I just thought it would be fun.  That's all, no good reason.

I'm still considering not leaving the highlights on the inside of the flower, and moving some to the outside petals.  Actually, I'm not sure how much it matters.  Your eye ends up seeing the way it wants anyway, but I'll probably  try it just to see.

I definitely think that after a few more attempts I'll get roses down.  Errr, well, thats the hope anyway.


Hope you all enjoyed these.  Thanks for the view and for taking the time to read this blog.

Roses are Red

Having mastered (LOL) poppies, I am moving along to roses.  I'm still working hard to keep my style loose.  I don't want to feel like I have to paint between some lines, and I don't wanna be constrained by any.  I'm totally happy to let the paint go and do its thing and try to keep my mitts off.  

These are just some preliminary sketches.  Trying to get the handle on the feel of roses.  I think I'm off to a good start.  More to follow.

Hydrangea and Cherry Blossom at lunch

Spring has definitely sprung in my little part of California.  Everything is green, everything is growing, most things are in bloom.  It hit 80 here today!

Continuing on with my new fun painting style, I decided to revisit my cherry blossoms, and add a hydrangea.  I chose a simple cherry blossom.  Simple rounded petals, 5 to each bloom.  As for the Hydrangea:  4 petals, each diamond shaped.  Simple, right?  What could go wrong.  As it turns out, quite a lot.  But since I am trying to loosen up, I made an attempt to let mistakes go by the wayside and incorporate them into the final painting.  I don't know if you will even be able to pick them out.  I think probably I can pick them out because I painted them.  And if I hadn't mentioned it you wouldn't even know there were any mistakes.

Glad you could stop by to take a look at the pictures.  Hope you enjoyed the.  I thoroughly enjoyed painting them.

Oh, and sorry the pictures have a slight blue tint.  I don't have my scanner with me right now, and am sorely missing it.

Chicken Mania

In addition to last nights poppy painting session.  I also found a little time to paint a few chickens.  I really don't know why i keep painting chickens.  I do like birds, but if I were asked to list my favorite birds, chickens would be WAY down the list.

It must have to do with the fact that you can throw a few colors into a chicken shape and it always comes out looking good.

I started painting them to force myself to let the colors mix on the paper, and I guess I got a little addicted.  Well, at any rate, they are fun to paint.  I hope you like them.  

Poppypalooza

I went home last night with the intent on painting some hydrangeas, and guess what happened... Poppies.  This time it was a little different painting from little pans (All I have at home is a small travel set of paints).  I wasn't sure if I would be able to make up enough wash to really work this style of painting.  Luckily, I found out I could.

Also, I should say, I wanted to paint yellow/orange poppies, but somewhere between palette and paper, my mind forgot, and I got these red ones.

I can't express how fun it is to paint these.  Most of my whole artistic (if you can call it that) career (part time dabbling with paint) I've been painting tight pictures, and it always bothered me that they didn't look like the pictures I was painting from, and they were rather lifeless.  Additionally, if I were to paint outside a line, or paint something wrong (whatever that is) it would make me nuts.  I could never figure how to let the water and paint do their own dance on the paper.  

Now with this style, I feel much freer to let the paint be the paint, the water be the medium to make the paint dance, and the paper to record it.  All I have to do it keep refilling the brush and move it to the paper every now and again.  I know these pictures aren't accurate representations of poppies (or whatever I'm painting).  But what I think I get is the expression of the poppy (or whatever I'm painting), or the feeling of, and that is what is important.

Anyway, I'm gonna keep along these lines for a while.  Don't expect me to be painting inside the lines.  I had fun painting this, hope you had fun looking and reading. Thank you and see you next post.

An Attempt at Cherry Blossoms

OK, I wanted to continue on with this style of watercolor painting, but I didn't want to do the same thing I've already done.  So, I decided on cherry blossoms.This is my first attempt, so they might not be quite right, but I had fun painting them, and hey, that's the point anyway.

I did get a little heavy handed with the color in a few places.  Especially in the bottom paintings.  Also, as you can see, I put a background down on the bottom painting before doing any work with the flowers.  I don't think it worked, and I wont be doing it again (at least I have no current plans to do it).

This style for me is all about putting a dark next to a light.  The contrast between the two is what gives the form its shape.  On the top twig, I did a fairly good job of it, but kind of lost my way a bit on the second painting.  Also, I got some of the shading on the petals correct, and some horribly wrong.  What can I say?  Sometimes I forget to define top and bottom and from what direction the light is coming from before i begin painting.  I get all caught up in having fun in putting paint to paper, and really should step back a little to think a bit more.

Yes, I was trying to limit my palette.  You really only see two colors, or more truthfully you see variation on two colors.    In my next iteration, I may try to work a third color into the mix.  It might help it to be a bit more dynamic.

Well, I'm done havering.   Hope you enjoy the paintings, and thanks for taking a minute to look at, and read about them.

12 Poppies

I got a bit ambitious today and decided to do quite a few poppies. Why 12?  I have no idea.  I just kept getting paper out and painting.

The first two I drew so that I would know where the flowers would be.  Don't ask me which of the 4 paintings they are.  The next two I did freehand.  Again, I couldn't pick them out without looking closely at the paintings.

These are of course orange poppies.  I don't have orange in my palette, so I mixed Cad Yellow Medium with Scarlet Lake.  It really make a vibrant orange.

I don't know how far I'm gonna go with this technique, or with painting flowers, but for now, I'm having fun with it.

Hope you all enjoy.

More Lanterns

I had a lot of fun with the previous painting of Chinese Lanterns that I did.  I thought I would see if I could recreate what I did.

Again, like last time this was a quick painting, trying to let the paint do whatever it wanted to do on the paper, and as little as possible on the palette.

It had been a few days since I picked up the brush and I wanted to make sure I don't forget to do that.  So, today, like many days, I substituted lunch with painting.  This is what I came up with.  I like it, hope you do to. Thank you.