Sleeping Kids Sketch

Here's a sketch I did of the kids from a photo. I was just using a little travel notebook and it has sky/cloud paper, so the background is a little strange. I didn't expect it to come out so nice or I would have done it on better paper.

Week 12 - Finals

Tonight I did this painting as an assignment for my last class. I bought a used easel from my teacher a few weeks ago and it was kind of neat getting to put my stretched paper and board on an easel and paint on really nice paper.


It gave me a little trouble though, because the paper was so big and such high quality it kept absorbing all of the water I was trying to use.

It's not as nice as the woman on the beach, but it has some good things about it. I really like the warm color of the sky against the cool color of the mountain, and I like the guy in the boat.

I've got one more class which I'm looking forward to and then I will be taking a bit of an enforced break from painting due to the upcoming holidays. I hope to still do a little here and there, particularly the watercolor sketches. I think they are a lot of fun and very meaningful in a journal.

Look, an Artist!

My mom and I went into San Francisco last weekend and took a stroll down Pier 39. We sat on a bench overlooking the Bay and just chatted for a while.


The view and the afternoon were just so nice, and I had some supplies in my purse, so I decided to do a little sketch. It didn't turn out amazing, but as I was finishing, some women sat on the other end of our bench and saw what I was doing. One told the others, "Look, an artist!"


It's not a fantastic piece of art, but it'll always be special because it will remind me of a perfect afternoon spent with my mom.

The Big Paper

I only have one class left, and my homework is to paint a picture on the half-sheet of stretched paper I have. Even though it's called a half-sheet it's actually quite big.

I decided for the rest of this week I would do some smaller paintings as a practice for the bigger one. My first thought was to do this windmill pic my brother took when he lived in Belgium.


It's hard to tell from this pic, but the sky in my first attempt looked more like big city haze and pollution than the Dutch countryside. Needless to say, that one got the boot.


The next one still turned out a little unfortunate, especially the foliage.


It does get marginally better with some cropping:


I'll keep adding to this post as I continue working my way up to the big paper. The fun news is I don't have a paintbrush big enough for such a big paper, so I will have to do some art supplies shopping. Poor me. :)

Update:
I went out today and got a new brush. It's got an interesting shape, kind of like a dagger, but I didn't really need it tonight so I haven't put it to the test yet.

Here's what I painted tonight. It was pretty fun, but definitely not something I want to try to do again on the big paper. In case you'd like to meet up with this lovely lady, you can find in her the uncanny valley. =) Yes, she is a little out of proportion. Or a lot.


I am rather fond of her flowers though.

Week 10 - Plants and Trees

I asked my teacher a few weeks ago if we could focus on foliage at some point, so that's what my most recent class was about.

I am sooo awful at trees and especially at bushes. I watched the teacher do his demo for a couple of trees. I asked in particular about the brush-work. He said I just had to "feeeel it," and that "it would come to me."

I think the rest of the class "felllt it" because they had really nice trees and bushes. Here is my little in-class failed attempt at trees:

Morning Walk

I just finished this tonight and I think it came out really nice. I have a book from the library called The Figure in Watercolor by Mel Stabin, and it has a step-by-step guide for painting this scene.

Week 9 - Value Paintings

This week we talked about value in paintings and did sketches and brief paintings. Mine were so bad I don't want to post them but for the sake of posterity I will.


This week's homework is to do a value painting from a photograph we have. I only did the Mel Stabin tutorial though. It does have some nice lights vs. medium lights, but not too much dark (low key).

I later did the windmill painting from a photo, but despite my efforts it is still mainly just medium values.