Kayaks (for Linear Vision show)

I thought I'd try something different for the upcoming Linear Vision show by painting these colorful kayaks strong and bold. I used Photoshop to crop and posterize my original photo (taken in Tahoe), and I simplified the background, removing the large boulders and replacing them with just sand. I'm not sure if the posterizing look came through in the final painting or not. Time to move on to a new project!

Tom Lynch Watercolor Workshop

Three days of intense workshop with Tom Lynch. The first two days we did lightning fast exercises, one after another. Today, the third day, we watched Tom demo a complete painting (on watercolor canvas) and then tried our hand at it, hopefully incorporating some design tidbits that he had mentioned previously.

These are some of the exercises we did. The first one is just showing the sunset colors reflecting and intensified on the hills. For the next one he gave us a magazine picture and a paper towel with a 1-inch hole out of the center. We had to paint - no drawing first - what we saw in the little hole. Then we had to tear the hole a little bigger and continue the painting, and repeat a few more times. Mine was pretty simple since it was just some tree trunks and foliage and water. The third example was also from a magazine photo but we had to write a couple of words on the back of the paper and then try to paint that "description". Mine was POWER and COOL (for the waterfall). Not sure that I got that one right, but it was fun.

All these were done pretty darn fast and I think most of us were totally exhausted at the end of each day.

Depth of Field Exercise

This week we had to experiment with depth of field, both great and shallow. Here are the four images I submitted.

New Photography Assignment

Here are my photos for tonight's assignment, we had to shoot pictures depicting LINE, TONE, TEXTURE and SHAPE.

Reference Photo for Linear Visions Show

I've registered (for the first time!) to be in my watercolor society's annual show. The theme this year is Linear Visions. I decided to use a reference photo that I took a few years ago while we were vacationing in Tahoe. These fun, colorful kayaks just cried out to be painted. In trying to work within the theme idea I decided to play around with my image on photoshop. The idea was to paint these with a sort of "posterized" effect, playing up the flat, linear quality of the altered image. I'm not sure I'm quite there yet, but at least I'm broadening my horizons (thanks to Pattie who pushes me through my whining!). The first picture is the original photo, #2 is the cropped and posterized version, and #3 is a hard cropped version. I'm not sure if I'll hard crop the final painting or not, I'll see how the sand looks and then decide.

Reference Photos

I just started a photography class with the goal of finally learning how to use my digital camera and also to get me started in taking photos with the express purpose of creating reference pictures for new paintings. These are the pictures I took today around the yard. It was a lot of fun and got me looking at things differently --- close up!--- and gave me several ideas for paintings!

(As for my goals for last week, I didn't do very well, I did manage to stretch paper and work more on my drawing for my Linear Visions painting and work out a partial color scheme, but I haven't started painting it yet. I did, however, get my shower regrouted!!! LOL!)

New Goals for Upcoming Week

Home from my painting group and it is time to write out some new goals for the next week. This week I want to primarily focus on working on my Linear Visions piece so my goals are as follows:

1) Stretch some watercolor paper

2) Finish tracing design and transfer to paper

3) Begin painting (obviously after the paper has been stretched and dried - better get on that asap!)

4) Complete at least one of my online lessons (watercolor secrets).

Goals, Goals, Goals

Well, I was partially successful reaching my goals this week. A few extra outside activities came up that ate up a bit of my time - a whirlwind moving of my mother-in-law into an independent senior facility (and all that entails) and back to back meetings at our daughter's school - she joined the robotics team so we had to meet for that last night and tonight we had the Senior Parents night. We have meetings or events every night this week AND I started back at college - yikes!

Okay, okay, excuses aside, this is how I fared on my goals for the week:

GOAL #1) Finish applying fixall to the exterior wall, in preparation for my mural.
I did manage (barely) to finish applying the Fixall to the entire area for the mural; however, I think it will still need another coat, or even two, in places. Now I have to let it "cure" a bit before applying the next coat.

GOAL #2) Finalize full-size sketch for the Linear Visions show
I have a few ideas I like but I decided I better just pick one and go for it. I am in the process now of getting it ready to transfer to my watercolor paper (which I realize I forgot to stretch ahead of time! Good goal for next week!)

GOAL #3) Buy mat for item #2 above.
No luck here. I went to Michael's, coupon in hand, to buy my mat only to find they don't carry the size I need. Looks like I'll have to cut it myself.

GOAL #4) Spray fixative painting for Mom.
Done! Yeah, I know, this one was easy. I wasn't sure how many coats to give it so I opted for 5.