Apple Blossom

Found a nice little picture of an apple blossom on pmp-art.com.  Couldn't help myself, I had to paint it.  I think it came out ok.  I'm working on putting light next to dark and smooth transitions of colors.  Also If I can get multiple colors into each space, so much the better.  The leaves are mostly HBC green #1 and #2 but I've snuck in some Perm. Yellow Lemon and some Viridian too.  The petals are Rose Madder and Vermilion. 

In the original picture the whole branch must have been set on a white sheet, because it had a very soft grey shadow.  I tried to replicate that here. 

I hope you like this one.  I think I'm gonna do a video for htis one, keep a check out for it.

Poppies

This is a fun painting I did for the coming of spring.  It's Poppies!!   The state flower of California.  I've got these growing wild everywhere around my house.  They add a beautiful splash of color.  

Many poppies have a dark center.  This variety instead has a bright vibrant yellow center.  I thought they would make the perfect subject to paint.

Oh and as for the background.... Well, I wanted to play a little and let these have some fun.  So a half wash and some splatter were just what the doctor ordered.

I painted this picture with a very limited color palette, and was delighted to see that even with that you can paint a beautiful paintings.  I really hope you enjoy it.

Oh, and if you are curios about a video of this painting, I've got just the thing for you.  I did make one and posted not long ago.  (yes, I've been delinquent about posting to this blog).  Anyway, you can find the video below.

Coneflower

I painted a few flowers on my lunch hour today.  They are just quick coneflower, not the most detailed, but for me, thats ok.  I want to give the essence of the flower, not an exact copy of it.  I think they look great and were a lot of fun to paint.  (yes, I realize I forgot the splatter on the first one.)

Hope you enjoy.  (oh, and you might see a video of a coneflower soon.)

Purple Potted Flowers

So while a had a little time off yesterday, I was able to paint this.  I've a friend who paints these unbelievable painting in this loose style that I like so much.  I asked if I could use her paintings as a guide while I'm learning and she agreed.  Mine are no where as good as hers, but I like mine none the less.

So this one is a potted purple plant.  I don't really know what plant it is, and I don't think it really matters.   Looking at it you can just see that the sun must come in from the other side  The plant is growing more away from us than toward us, but looking at it from this direction, we can see the pot.

well, thats all for now. Hope yo u like this little painting.  I had fun painting it.

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.

House Plant

I promised that I was going to get back into panting,  Maybe I won't paint every day, but I'll put out more work than once a month like I did over the summer.  This past weekend, after I was doing domestic stuff (shampoo'ed the carpets in the entire house, cleaned two bathrooms, cleaned the kitchen, scooped the cat box and made myself a sandwich), I took a few minutes to draw and paint a house plant that I have.

The kids were at a birthday party, and I figured I had about 4 to 5 hours to get everything done.  After the previously mentioned housework, I figured I had at most 30 minutes left.  A quick drawing, a splash of paint, a quick second splash and I figured I was gonna be out of time very soon.  A quick clean up, and I was done.  Shortly after the kiddo's returned.  All in all a very successful day.

I bought a book of 90 lb paper last year, always intending to use it to do some sketching on, but never getting around to it.  Well, I pulled it out and used it for this painting.  I'll admit it's not quite as nice as my 140 lb paper, but its not bad for something quick.  As you can see, the paper didn't really buckle or bubble or anything.  There is some very slight warping, but given that the page was wet for 15 minutes I think it held up really well.  There are 40 sheets of paper in this book,   I'm looking forward to filling up the remaining 39.

Hope you enjoy.

Some More Sketching

Today's paintings are the rest of the the random sketching I was able to do over the past several weeks.

Starting at the top:  The play structure at Monty Young Park in Morro Bay.  To its right is a plant that sits on the credenza next to my television.

Starting the second row is a car that my son got for Christmas, and then a small Christmas tree in a planter.

The picture to the left of this writing is another plant in the house and the last painting is the clock we have in our living room.

Of all these, my favorite is the living room clock.  It is chrome, and the wall color behind it yellow (of course).  I think it turned out great and just the right amount of shadow on the wall.

Other than that i really like the little christmas tree for some reason.

Well, just wanted to let you all in on some of the other small things I had been working on

How Now Brown....Door?

Ive painted other doors before, and will paint plenty in the future, I am sure,  but this may be the one where I look back and say that I have kind of changed techniques.  I started by drawing a very (well, at least fairly) good representation of a wooden door in a stone wall.  I didn't draw any of the stones in the wall, but drew everything else.  I had plans to do what I always do, which is to paint this little bit, then move the paper, paint another little bit, then repeat, repeat, repeat until I have what I think is a finished painting.  Well, after I started the door that way, I took a little different turn.  Everything after the wood was done free form and in rapid succession.  While the coloring is a little less than imaginative, I think it made for some really nice bits to the painting.

Painting with the strict way I would have painted in the past, this painting would have taken me an hour or more,  but since I painted the brown of the door, this took me no more than 10 minutes.

For me, the stone really stands out,   I could have used a bit more color, but they really seem to stand out, and the door does look like it is set back just a bit in the jam.

Hope you like it.

Bayside Cafe

I have been thinking of painting all the landmarks in Morro Bay.  To see if I could do it I did a few quick paintings yesterday.  They turned out OK.  The problem for me is that same problem I've had all along.  DRAWING.  Having not had a drawing class since Mrs. Mudrack's class in high school.  Drawing is tough.  I have been working on it.

Yesterdays quick sketches gave me a little hope so today I decided to give a go on the Bayside Cafe.  It is located in the State Park, right on the water.

So, armed with a little confidence, resolve and dogged determination, I set out to draw, and paint.  Let me pat myself on the back for a second (pat, pat).  This was drawn in PEN.  Did you get that?  PEN, no pencil.  Once I started, I was all in, for good or bad.  It did take just a while to draw it, but the painting went great. OK, there are a few problems.  The perspective is off in a few places.  I know, I know.  But without an eraser, i was forced to forge ahead.  From a drawing perspective, this is like 5 times as difficult as most of my others.

In talking to my painting partner, Ed, (who is learning to watercolor at the same time) he suggested that it may not be quite enough to mix colors in the tray and then put a homogenous color on the paper.  These are watercolors after all, let the paint mix on the paper.  I am trying to take that advice to heart.  If you look in the painting, you can see that most of the colors change ever so slightly as they lay across the paper.  I do think it adds to the interest of the painting.  I am trying to do it even more.  Please click on the picture to enlarge it, it will look much better.

Some More Sketches

Some of the sketching that I have been doing.  In order to paint better, I have to be able to draw better. I'm trying very hard to learn to draw what I see in the proper proportions.  Im kind of learning that you have to do a little drawing all over the paper and let them all come together rather than start in one area and move across the paper.    Some day i'll get it.  Until then you all have to suffer through my paintings and drawings.







This is gracie.

I like the couch in this picture.   I don't really care for the credenza.  The proportions on it don't quite seem right.  the blinds are down in the windows, which is why you can't see through them.

I sat on the front patio and did this.  You can see the step leading up to the patio.  A couple of little bushes and some sage.

A Little Urban Sketching

Yesteday and today I decided to do a little urban sketching.  I suppose that is the new term for painting plein air.  Urban sketching sounds a bit less hoity toity.  I have been walking around campus trying to find places to sit in the shade and paint.  The shade part was crucial for me, and as I found out, was also the limiting factor in what I paint.  It turns out that nearly all the benches on campus are in direct sunlight at noon.  Who would have figured.  Anyway, in my hikes around campus, I found 3 places to paint.  They all seemed to fit onto one sheet, but the sheet is bigger than my scanner.  The first picture, Bench on Dexter Lawn, is actually on the bottom of the sheet.  You can see part of the Building 52 Plaza in the top right.

This is the picture that is above it.  This is Building 52 Plaza.  Or at least part of it.  I don't think I got this quite right, but you get the idea that it is a bench with mulch around it, and (absent detail) brick walkway in front of it.  I assume you all can tell it has a tree behind the bench?

This third picture is actually the first one I did.  I wanted to get the little taco stand next to this, on the left side of the tan building, but i didn't have a clear view from the bench I was on, so this got chosen by default.  Some different types of bushes and shrubs with a few rocks, and a wooden wall behind, just in front of the building.  I'm extremely happy with the way this turned out, I often have trouble working in different colors of greens.  The fact that you can see 4 distinct colors of green and a little shading in each is, for me, a triumph.