Practice Fruit

I had a little time on my hands during lunch, so I decided to sketch a few fruits.  Yes, red was the theme.  I gave myself two minutes a piece to paint each one.  I like the apple and the single cherry.  I really want o like the double cherry but the shadow i put on it kind of ruins it for me.  The tomato..... well, i think it went a little south.  lol.

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.

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.

Speed Painting With My Daughter (Now with Sparkle)

I love painting with my daughter.  Like me, she makes up stories about the things she paints.  (She got that from me, and I in turn, got it from Bob Ross.)  Her stories are always outrageous and seldom have any place in reality.  Perhaps thats the imagination of a 5 year old.  I could just sit next to her and listen to her stories all day long, but I'm lucky enough to be able to paint with her while being regaled with these outlandish stories.

This past Saturday we were sitting at the craft table painting when we were just finishing out first paintings when she decided that fruit would be a good thing to paint.  I would quickly sketch out a couple of pictures (one for her and one for me) and we would set out to paint.  She got to the point where fruit was a solid color with a green leaf all lobbied onto the paper in one gleeful moment.  We both ended by laughing and painting furiously.

Then she remembered that she has glitter watercolors.  We had to revisit and add the glitter (she calls it shimmer or sparkle.)  The following was my contribution to our time together.

Apples and cherries were the first pictures we did.
 

I didn't have time to draw my own grapes, so I just freehanded them.

This peach has a generous amount of shimmer on it.  I guess it is substituted for fuzz


No, a chili isn't really a fruit, but she suggested and I obliged

Second attempted portrait.

First portrait attempted.

Strawberries definitely have shimmer.

A tree to end out fun for the day.