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furry arts discussion => traditional and digital artwork => Topic started by: cause the rat on March 23, 2019, 04:41:24 pm
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This is more like an open blog. A way to share my triumphs and failures learning a new craft. Everything along the way.
A bit of my art history. I tried watercolor. Tried. And tried. If you don't have enough aggravation in life try watercolor. Any little mistake is there. You can't cover it up. And hardest of all you can't add light. The white of your paper is all the light you have. And when it's painted over it's gone. Yes you can 'scrub' it out. Scrub meaning ripping the surface of the paper away. Enough of that and your finished painting looks like zits on the Mona Lisa. And if you use white paint? THE HOROR!!! Your cheating. You have to suffer as much as everyone else or your work is not good enough to be called art. Well, I don't do art to suffer. All my paints most of the brushes will find new homes.
The reason I chose watercolor painting was the lack of chemicals. I would love to play with oil. But even the water based oil paints can lead to chemicals. Because my house is closed up ( allergies ) what i bring in stays in. Unfortunately oil paint is out of the question. But water? I get that out of the tap. Acrylics? The only acrylic paints I ever used were those cheapo craft paints you get at Walmarts. Used enough of those and it smells like you just freshly painted a room. So you may be asking why I chose to try acrylics anyway? Because quality acrylic paint doesn't have that painted wall smell. Because the cheaper the paint the more additives they use. And no matter how good the acrylic paint you can still clean it up with soap and water.
What I'm doing now.
Unlike watercolor painting it's better to have the surface your working on straight up. We're talking wall flat. So the first thing I'm working on is brush control. Holding the brush with no support between me and the canvas. Practicing my A, B, C,s. And I thought my handwriting was bad. A bit wonky. I'm also doing color saturation and hue studies. With a little under by belt I'll do my first painting. I want my first painting to be the absolute best I can do. Then I'll put that painting away and continue with excursuses. Then do the very same painting a second time. Just like learning to write with a pencil. You learn the moves your hand has to make to create the shapes. Then it's off to the races.
My first AH HA moment. What I've learned so far,
The farther back I hold the paint brush the more control I have. It sounds counterintuitive but it works.
When I do start posting works feel free to comment and critique.
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Still learning to control the tip of the brush. I've done four 12x18 (12.5x45.8) sheets with the alphabet. What i'm using to paint on is old watercolor paper I've gessoed. Figure already have the paper. Might as well not let it go to waste. And unlike watercolor I can use both sides of the paper for this. I have my first painting paper primed and ready to go.
Going through the watercolor brushes here I've learned that a few of them are also used for acrylics. Acrylic paint is actually hard on brushes. It can build up over time and damage the tip or edge of the brush. It also gets into to ferrule and spread the bristles. So there is a difference in brushes. My favorite watercolor brushes would die within days of use with acrylics. So I tried the ones recommended for acrylic paint. One brand that stands out. I can get thinner lines with a size 6 of this brush then I can get with the size four of the other brand. Way better control of small curves and backstrokes. Now looking for an alternative to this brush. Escoda Versatile brushes are a bit pricy. Not sure if I want to go hog wild. Like I did when buying watercolor supplies. I'll wait till I get to the point where I need them.
Things i've learned so far.
Made my own 'wet pallet' for acrylic paint. Been three days now and the paint is still good to go. Used a 14x9x3 (35.5x23x7.6) Rubbermade food container. Put a layer of paper towels down first. Then a sheet of parchment paper. You can get parchment paper in the same place you'd find plastic wrap and aluminum foil. Put some water in to wet the paper towels under the parchment. Paint goes on top of the parchment paper. Lid goes back on when your done painting. Works! I'm not using craft paints. The brands are 'M Graham' and 'Winsor & Newton'. Not sure if this would work with craft paints. After three days there is still no cheapo acrylic paint smell! Gesso stinks. But you don't paint with gesso.
Painting the alphabet over and over again is boring. :D
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Pictures or it didn't happen ;)
Is there a solvent you can use to clean the brushes? Soak-em outside in mineral spirits or something?
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Pictures? Picture a six year old with crayons. :) that's kinda where I am right now. Not much to look at if it's just the alphabet over and over again. I will post my first attempt. Got my composition planned. And a bit of a value study. Going to work on that a bit more before I commit. Trying to keep from getting a dark blob. May have to introduce another light source. I'm starting with the same idea I had for my first watercolor painting. A bar with outdoor umbrella tables under a large tree. Changing the composition up and going for more of a dusk or night time scene. Trying to make it as hard as I can.
I've read you can use denatured alcohol to clean out some of the mess. But once paint gets deep into the ferrule there's not much you can do. The synthetic fiber my favorite watercolor brushes ('Silver Brush Black Velvets' ) are made of are to thin to handle acrylics.
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Pictures or it didn't happen ;)
Not sure how to post pics here. I click on "Attachments and other things" and all I get is other things. Nothing to add an attached pic. Insert Image looks like it wants a hyperlink. None of this is on the web.
Getting a lot of help from Wet Canvas's acrylic painting forum. Same place I got loads of help when I was trying watercolor. Lots of great people. Every month they have a 'Different Strokes Challenge". Joining in this months painting idea. 'The (Secret) Garden'. The idea is to go crazy with a garden. Anything goes. So I asked if nudes are allowed if I 'landscaped'. :) No, not what I'm paining. This will be my official first acrylic work. Pushing myself and trying things I've never done before. Not even sure if most of what I want to do will work. Doesn't matter. Going to have fun with it. Best part is it's not watercolor. If I make a mistake I can paint over it. If the entire piece is a mistake I can re gesso and repaint the whole thing. No one will even know. :)
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Sounds like u are making some good progress! :) Art is always a work in progress (personal experience here), so keep at it!
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Thanks FarFar. Art is like playing an instrument. The more you put into it the more you get out. The only way to get better is to push yourself.
Bad news is I messed this up. Good news is I don't have to throw anything away. Unlike watercolor I can gesso over it all and start again. This quarter inch thick piece of plywood I'm playing with might be three quarters of an inch think by the time I'm done. :)
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:D
Yeah, I know what you mean. Sometimes, the stuff I draw/paint/sketch is not the greatest but I keep doing it so I get better.
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Practicing my peeps. Background people that is. Just an expression of a figure. Allowing the paint brush, with just a bit of guidance to say what that particular person is doing. Really starting to like angled brushes. I can paint small with the tip. Then push a bit to get a wider stroke. All wile still allowing for expression. Finding the more I try to control the brush the stiffer the figure. Did a lot of this when trying ( more like a constant struggle ) watercolor painting. Acrylics are a lot more forgiving. If I make a mistake I can paint over it. :) Strangely enough the bigger the brush the easier it is to paint a small figure. Each figure between an inch and a half to two inches tall. Brush is a one half inch wide filbert. That's a rounded top brush with a flat edge. And before you even ask. Yes some of these peeps are anthro. Honestly I don't see myself making badges and things like that. There's plenty of people making them. May do furry art. Anthro characters in land/city/town scapes and the like. But here my mouth is a few miles ahead of my skill. Have to see where this goes.
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The world of difference. In watercolor I could experiment and make a really nice effect. Then, using the same colors. Using the same brush and technique. Never have the very same effect. Or worst, never even come close. With acrylics I can get the very same effect. No matter what combo of colors I use. I'm learning and moving forward. With watercolor I would get something to work. Then fight to make it work again. I think this will be the last reference to watercolor. There are things I did learn. Color mixing. The difference and effect cool and warm colors have on each other. And how to mix grays without using white. There is quite a bit more I learned. So my dive into watercolor helped me. I don't think I would have this level of understanding about color theory had I started with acrylics or oils.
I might have to continue this thread in the 'Artwork Techniques and Tutorials' section of the forum. Watched a few digital painting tuts on youtube. Quite a bit of what I'd have to share work in both digital and traditional art. And because I can't find a way to imbed pics most of the posts would be about techniques anyway.
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Sounds like you are progressing!
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Thanks FarFar. Having a blast with it. Today I painted 7 skies. All on the same substrate. Get done. Slopped a different shade of blue over it and start over. I'd of gone through seven sheets of watercolor paper to do the same.
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So on a site called 'Wet Canvas' they have a monthly painting challenge. Decided to join in the fun. I've gone through a few ideas and finally decided on a painting. Drew this idea out. Really took a look at it. it could not have looked more like the bottom half of a female body if I would have drawn that instead. So, I did a few redrawing and finally have something that will work. Even at my age my libido is still larger than life. :)
This month's challenge is 'Secret Garden'. Make a garden out of anything. So I decided to paint a garden with concert lighting. It'll be my Rock Garden. Having no experience with acrylic everything I do is helping me learn. Hopefully what I come up with will look good enough to at least convey the idea. I'm using a glazing medium to layer the colors coming from each light on a somewhat black background. Then I'll use this to create a color fog around the shrubs. That's the idea anyway. I can't find anything online on how to do this. Guess it's painting by the seat of my pants. :)
When it's finally uploaded to that site I'll put a link here.
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Well, It's my first. So LET ME HAVE IT! Tell me like it is. I have the skin of an oak tree and all the warmth of an opossum. Not going to hurt my feelings.
Here's the link. Hopefully it goes right to the page.
http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?p=21587869#post21587869 (http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?p=21587869#post21587869)
If it doesn't go right to the picture look for 'wet rat'.
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Like the colors! Better then anything I can do!
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I see how you put specular highlights on the bushes that show the colors of the spot lights. Good attention to detail.
Fun idea, Rock Garden!
Although we can't hear the music in the painting, what song is rocking the joint?
Anything I would know?
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Thanks guys. It was fun and a learning process as well.
FarFar, ? I think you'd give me a run for the money when it comes to painting.
Jade, Van Halen's first album. Every song on it. That album was already two years old when I was a senior in high school. The art class had a turntable. We listened to that album every day.
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Love it!
Thanks for the auditory accompaniment!
I had a math class (algebra 1) where my teacher let us listen to Mike Olfield's Tubular Bells electronic music!
It got me SOOO interested in electronic ambient.
That teacher has a lot to answer for! It also let me focus in on the concept of algebra.
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Thanks guys. It was fun and a learning process as well.
FarFar, ? I think you'd give me a run for the money when it comes to painting.
Yup, you got my name right!
I'm better with digital which is a completely different concept. I'm thinking about taking some classes this summer. Want to improve on what I do.
Keep up with the good work.
Jade, Van Halen's first album. Every song on it. That album was already two years old when I was a senior in high school. The art class had a turntable. We listened to that album every day.
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FarFar, The only difference between digital and traditional art is the material and tools used. Color theory, value, perspective and even PHI ( the golden ratio 1 to 1.618 ) is all the same. It's art. One of the best digital channels I've watched,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQfF-P70V2Q&frags=pl%2Cwn (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQfF-P70V2Q&frags=pl%2Cwn)
Even though I'm using acrylics I still learned from this guy. The best advice anyone can give is to learn something and run with it. Make mistakes! Looking forward to seeing your stuff!
Breaking my learning down into sections. Fist was brush control. The second is what I'm doing now. Atmosphere. The sky. In art a blue sky is a blank space no one wants to see. I've already got color theory and values under me belt through learning ( struggling ) watercolor.
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Thanks! Good thoughts.
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Whoda thought skies would be a problem. I've seen skies for well over 50 years now. Look up. Look out the window. There it is. Just paint it right? So why does it look like I threw food on a blue wall??? :) I've painted eight skies now. Parts. Parts of the latter ones look better. Just parts. Need to get the entire painting to look like those small parts. :) Using plywood panels. Sizes range from 8x11 to 10x13. So all I have to do is re gesso over my mess and start over again. In all honesty having way to much fun. Throwing paint at a board. Let's see what happens next! I am taking it seriously. Learning from my mistakes. Knowing all along it's going to take time to get good at this.
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I remember when someone asked me to draw a cube. I did the "zero-point perspective" where I drew a square, with all other edges leaving the cube face, all parallel to eachother. This does not exist at all in real life, only as a concept.
What we see in everyday life is not what is there. I am still learning that. Our minds apparently filter all we see and reduces it to concepts.
Skies, yeah, I bet its harder than people think.
I still have trouble with geometric shapes.
Keep going, you will keep improving and amaze yourself.
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Thanks Jade. Haven't even started on shapes and perspective. Other than what I did in watercolor. Color theory and how we perceive color is mind boggling. There's a famous landscape painting that's mostly shades of orange. When you look at it you see an area that's green. In reality it's a grayed out blue. Color theory that doesn't make sense until you see it in a painting. If the subject is in warm colors then shadow and depth are done in cool. If the subject is in cool colors then the shadow and depth are done in warm. Art has nothing to do with reality and everything to do with perception.
My biggest problem right now is my color value. Everything should be muted and pastel. My painting looks like a bowl of fruit loops in blue milk. Painted a few more skies. Gessoed over a few more skies. What's not seen never happened. :) It looks like I'm still playing with crayons. Going to fix that next.
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http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=865506&stc=1&d=1556417208 (http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=865506&stc=1&d=1556417208)
Getting the idea of sky down. Top one is a keeper. A bit over worked but I like it. Kinda looks like a light glair off the left side. It's not. That's how I painted it. Bottom one is way to overworked. Should have stopped half way through. Painted a few more after these two. Not where I want to be. Know that will take a wile. But I'm getting results that I can live with. Learning a new lesson. When to stop adding paint. Stop covering up really good looking areas. If it looks good it is good. I wont make it look better. :)
Got the drawing down for my first full painting. Going to push myself hard. Once I get the WIP thread started I'll post a link to it here.
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So here it is. A work in progress. You'll be able to see all the steps I took to make it happen. Or fail. :) I'm going to try things I've never done before. I have a concept for this one. The house, people and yard will be in dappled shade. The bird feeder, garden under it and the cat will be in bright sunlight. Hopefully making them the center of attention.
http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1465260 (http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1465260)
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I think it would be best form this point on to start a thread in the Artwork, Techniques and Tutorials section of the forum. Save the rest of this space for finished work only.
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Got a second painting up at WetCanvas. My very first land scape in acrylics. I can point out six major mistakes. :)
(http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=865823&stc=1&d=1557641325)
I learned a new trick today! On a mac you have to jump through hoops to do this. The actual painting is a bit darker than what's displayed.
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Not bad at all! :)
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Thanks FarFar. Despite all my mistakes I'm doing the happy dance. It doesn't have that artificial candy color look to it. Like you would see in most acrylic works. Still need to learn to mix my colors duller. That takes some practice. Because we all tend to like brighter colors. To much of them and a painting can loose a lot of depth.
Painting this one over again. Trying to fix all eleven mistakes I've found.
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Thanks FarFar. Despite all my mistakes I'm doing the happy dance. It doesn't have that artificial candy color look to it. Like you would see in most acrylic works. Still need to learn to mix my colors duller. That takes some practice. Because we all tend to like brighter colors. To much of them and a painting can loose a lot of depth.
Painting this one over again. Trying to fix all eleven mistakes I've found.
That's the nice thing about most artwork....you can do it all over again if needed!
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I play guitar. Had a great teacher. He taught me to practice the stuff I was having trouble with first. Keep playing it till I could play it with the same ease as the rest of the piece. Then practice the entire piece. That's the approach I'm taking. I'll paint the entire picture. Pick out what I need to practice on. Practice those things. Then repaint the entire picture. It's useless to continue to paint an entire picture over and over again. End up getting better at what I may already be good at. And reach mediocracy with what really needs work. That's what I did with skies. And what I'm still doing with people. Because getting good at figure painting means getting good at anthro shapes as well.
The best part of being able to paint things over. I can re gesso this piece. And paint right over it. As many times as I want. With watercolor it was one attempt and toss the paper.
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Love the 'not been posted for at least 180 days" warning. Let's me know it's been a wile. :). I stopped trying to paint with watercolor because it was frustrating. One mistake and you have to start over. Chose acrylics because oil is out of the question. Toxic fumes from all the chems you need to play with oils. There are two reasons I put acrylics down. The first is they try quickly. I'm talking bone dry in five minutes or less. And with extenders and retarders meant to keep the paint usable I got a total of seven minutes of work time. A 'wet pallet' kept my mixes good for a wile. A longer time if the pallet was closed and I wasn't painting. I was going through tubes of expensive paint because 80%+ was drying on me faster than I could use them. I like mixing colors. Rarely ever use paint straight out of a tube. So any hope of getting the look I want and painting in the different styles I like can only be accomplished if I learn to paint an entire piece of work in seven minutes or less. I found a product that will let me paint like an artist. More on that in a bit.
The second reason I put painting on hold is something I just recently learned about. And I learned I'm not the only one who suffers with this. The good news is, if you can call it that, one it will never go away and two most professional artists have this. So if pros have it and I have it then I'm that much closer to becoming a pro!!!? I can dream! It's call "The Artist's Curse." When you look at a painting I've done you see the sky, buildings, people and things. What I see is a mess of ugly brush strokes. This blob of color next to that one. An endless mindless mess of formless ugly splotches. I will never actually see what others see when they look at one of my works. Never. You have no idea how liberating this information is. How deeply it has effected me. What it means to me. Guess you'd have to go through it to understand.
On to the paints I'm going to play with now. The company is called Golden and the acrylic paints are called Open. Bought some. Put some out onto an open pallet and left it there. Uncovered. This acrylic paint was usable for more than three hours. Have yet to see how long my color mixes will last in a covered pallet. Some folks on line report up to seven days. This means I'll be able to walk away from a painting. Come back in a few days and all my covered mixes will still be usable. My color mixes will last longer than most of my paintings! I can paint. Let it dry. Sand it down. Re apply a good layer of gesso. Let that dry. Then start a new painting with the same color mixes. I'll be able to use the paints I have now. Because Golden Open acrylics will mix with all of them. Knowing the mixes drying time will shorten depending on the amount I mix in.
Happily getting back into my mindless mass of ugly brush strokes!
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So why hasn't there been any paintings pictured? When your that disgusted with your work you'd understand. As stated before I might as well been painting with crayons. These paints I'm using now has opened up a new world of possibilities. And I'm taking it as far as I can go. Right now I'm learning to color match. This involves both the color and how bright or dark that color is. ( hue ) Blue is my problem color. Been able to match other colors within two minutes. Up to five minutes for some. But blue. Here's where the problem starts. Natural color pigments are never true colors. So there is no true red, yellow or blue in artist quality paints. So blue shifts to either green or purple. The guy I'm learning from at drawmixpaint.com uses a limited pallet. For blue his choice is ultramarine blue. It shifts toward the purple side. If you know color theory you already know yellow is the opposite of purple. And yellow and blue make green. Oh, if it was that easy. In a perfect world you'd add yellow to cancel out the purple. Then add a bit more to bring out the green. In the real world you end up with blue/gray. A bit more yellow and you get a blue/gray/green. Honestly believe this is why the old masters never painted a full blue sky. Well that and a blank blue sky is boring to look at in a painting. I'll be spending the rest of this weekend learning to make this work.
One thing in color matching I've seen that really stands out. When you put the color you've mixed next to the subject it's perfect. When you finally get a group of colors mixed and look at your pallet? There is no way those colors are right. It's an illusion. The colors will only look right when they're with in the context of the over all scene. By themselves on a different color background they look horrible. So those great looking oranges, purples and reds you see in a sunset are actually fleshy muddy grayish blobs. Put all those ugly colors together and you get a great looking sunset. You might be able to see this on your own. Been a long time sense I've played with Microsoft Paint. Hopefully this is still possible. Paste a picture in paint. Make it small enough to give yourself some room to have three squares. One black, one white and one gray. Now put a row of smaller squares in each. Using the eye dropper tool pick up a color from the picture. Use it to fill one of the squares in each of the larger colored squares. Color is completely different when taken out of context.
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This is nice. Kind of like a blog. A place where i can share one failure after the next. Actually I think that's funny. I can laugh at my failures. Be nice to have other's see humor in them as well. Hoping at least this is informative. In case any other furry out there wants to do traditional art. I wasted some expensive paint today. There is good news. After having the paint sit out for seven hours it was still usable. That's like way longer than the usual seven minutes I was fighting with before. What I learned today. Turning ultramarine blue into a lighter more green shade blue is impossible. Mixing these to pigments will always give you a grayed color. And here's why. Already stated that artist pigments will never be a true yellow, red or blue. Ultramarine blue is on the purple side of blue. Blue and red make purple. The yellow that's suggested to use is Cadmium yellow. And guess what. It's on the orange side of yellow. You get the drill. Yellow and red make orange. So if you mix blue, red and yellow you get tacky greens. Dull greens like olive and army greens. So I'm trying to mix orange and purple to make blue. There is no magic formula that will ever get this to work. I know what your thinking. But rat, My printer only has three colors and black. Your right. It has cyan, magenta, yellow and black. Or in the artist world of paints, cobalt teal, quinacridone magenta and cadmium lemon. The black is a mixed color. Without knowing what colors are used we'll just call it black. Millions of colors out of those four choices and the white of your paper. I have those three paint colors as well. So I guess the next questing would be, "why don't you use those three colors for everything?" The answer sounds both counterintuitive and obstructive. To many color choices. Color harmony is what makes a piece of art look natural. Something rarely seen in digital art. The color you see outsider depends on how that color is being lit. The color of the sky effects everything. The same goes for indoors. The color of the room will effect the color of everything in it. Color harmony. Well before i get into a long winded and un necessary rant I'll leave it here.
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Back to paining. Leaning away from using most of my poisonous paints. It's makes it easier to wash up when I don't have to wear gloves. Still using Cadmium red light. That red seems to work with everything. Kinda hard to replace. Anyway. Spent a good time today trying to match colors for a challenge on the Wet Canvas forum for acrylics. 'Do a landscape in the style of an Impressionist'. I chose John Singer Sargent. He's mostly known for his portrait paintings. Very few landscapes. He did very little blending. Mostly a crazy mix of brush strokes in every direction. A good one to see this in is his "A Capriote, Rosina Ferrara". Even the colors he used were off. In some mostly toned down or even grayed out. In other paintings bright and almost over saturated. Like in his painting 'Landscape with goats". I can't say enough good about these new paints I'm using. Was able to spend 20 minutes trying to match one color. Without out the paint filming over. So much more like real painting. I'm having fun again. Will post when I have the pics up on Wet Canvas.
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Well it's past August and I'm still working on that painting. I started slapping paint on the canvas. The farther I got along the farther away I got from my target. So I walked away from it. Not quite starting over. Because the composition is good. I don't want to be a landscape painter. So I'm replacing the field and far away trees with buildings and a street scene. May even add more people.
Here's a link to the page on Wet canvas I posted pics on.
https://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/topic/whats-on-your-easelwoye-august/page/4/ (https://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/topic/whats-on-your-easelwoye-august/page/4/)
Scroll down to find the post by "wet rat".
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Created a thread on Wet Canvas on this painting. Be a lot easier to fallow than hunting through a community thread.
https://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/topic/my-sagent-attempt-the-ongoing-joy-of-throwing-paint/#post-1333511 (https://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/topic/my-sagent-attempt-the-ongoing-joy-of-throwing-paint/#post-1333511)
As stated in the thread. I don't want to be a landscape painter. Urban scenes. People at places is more of what I want to do.
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Don't fool yourself. Probably the hardest thing for someone to learn. Especially with artistic ventures. Like when I decided to base most of the music I sang on a technique I just learned. To fall flat on my face. In front of a crowed of people. Or when I'm painting. Decide to go way off base. Throw paint. Loose myself in left field. Then step back and look at it. Come to realize it's wrong. Or better put, lacking the discipline I already know. At least when I'm painting I'm not standing in front of a group of people. :D
Added another pic to my WetCanvas post. Along with a description of what I did wrong. Knowing and doing is something you have to learn to put together. Or in my case, I know where I want to go and I'm not doing anything to get there. :) Really hope by posting what I'm doing wrong and how to correct it will help someone. Achieving depth is a painting is something you have to learn to do. Relying on perspective alone doesn't work. Both color and detail play a big role. I've seen pros fall on this one. Watched a pro on line paint. Known for his photo realistic work. However on this painting he used the same color intensity and detailing for everything. Background and all. In the end it looks like a bunch of pictures clipped and glued together. Hours of work to achieve something with the depth of a piece white paper. The first painting I watched this guy do that turned out really bad. Not going to give a link. Rather this guy be known for the hundreds he's done right.
Back to painting! Done kicking myself over this. It's time for me to do something else I can kick myself for! :D
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Going back to basics before I continue. Been some time between trying to paint. When I started to learn watercolor I spent hours learning brush control. I'd paint out the alphabet. Then brought it down to the smallest I could paint. Lots all that control. Plus there's a big difference in the flow of water and acrylic. Acrylic paint doesn't flow, it clings. Totally different feel. And speaking of feel. With acrylics I can feel the brush on the surface as I paint. Couldn't do that with watercolor. The brushes I liked were supper soft synthetic squirrel hair.
Here's where i differ from 99% of other beginner painters. You learn technique first. Lean how to put the brush where you want it. Then how to get the results your looking for. Everyone preaches 'loose painting'. "Never learn to control your brush." Then they spend years. Painting after painting. Learning to control their brush. Sorry, I don't think that way. As a musician I learned technique first. Then how to play. Learned beat and timing. Then learned how to add feel. As a singer I learned scales first. Then how to forget about them and add feeling. Like everything else you have to learn the basics first. It's like trying to multiply in math before you know how to add. It doesn't work. I've watched the same painters for a few years now. Every painting is the same. They never get any better. I don't want to end up that way. Not promising to be a pro artist. Or a good one for that matter. Don't want to end up like most painters I see. Painting the same thing over and over again. With each painting looking the same. I realize most people paint for fun. I have a hard time doing anything just for fun. The learning process. Figuring out what does what and where it leads. How to do something is what's fun for me. If I end up liking to paint I'll continue with it. Right now it's fun to learn.
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After covering five 12x16 sheets of watercolor paper with a single brush technique I finally think have it! That's right. five sheets. To get ONE technique. Five sheets of single line paint brush strokes. I'm either persistent or crazy. I'm enjoying this to much. Go with crazy. :) Either way it was worth it. I'll do this again tonight to make sure it works. If I can repeat it three days in a row I know I have it down. Now to reprime these sheets with gesso so I can paint over them again.
haven't posted this yet on WetCanvas. Wanted to tell you all first. I'm that excited about it!
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Doing my crazy obsessed happy dance! I don't need to wait for a third day. At 90+% success rate I'm very happy with it. Not quit what Sargent was getting. May never be able to mimic the results of oil paint with acrylics. But very usable. I've tried it with both stiff and soft bristle brushes. Got the same results from each. So it's the technique, not the brush that matters. I'll be using this technique to finish out the painting.
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Wish I had more time to do this. Even though the painting is taking forever to complete I'm still learning a lot. Especially when I do exactly what I tell myself over and over not to do. Paint with bright candy colors. End up doing the very thing I can't stand. It's what acrylic paint is best known for. Gaudy, overly bright candy paint. There is a reason for that. Artist grade acrylics and oils have the exact same pigments. The exact same intensity of color. The big difference is the drying time. Oils can take weeks to dry. Regular acrylic paint can be bone dry in five minutes. Doesn't give much time to work with. The acrylic paints I'm using stay wet for a good hour on the painting. And can be reworked and blended up to a few days. The mixes I make on my air tight pallet can stay workable for well over a week. So I have no excuses for ending up with candy colors.
One of the online painters I follow said it best. People like bright. New painters tend to make things brighter than they should be. Over saturated colors make for a bad paintings. A mistake I'm happy to admit I've made and know to fix. If I actually put to practice everything I've learned doing this painting my next one will take less time. Wont be a master piece. Looking forward to learning from my next painting too.
The more I struggled with watercolor the farther away from what i wanted I got. The more I struggle with acrylics the closer I get to where I want to be. Lesson learned.
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I know I've said this before, but fundamentals, fundamentals, fundamentals and more fundamentals. I think they deliberately stuck the word 'fun' in fundamentals. To try to make us think fundamentals are fun. Nope. Not fun. But important. I could be tossing up one painting after another. Trying to get it all at once. Putting out one bad painting after another. This would be fun. But it would take forever to get better at painting. The bottom line is if you can't put the brush where it needs to be. If you can't control your brush strokes. Your not going to be able to paint it the way your really want ti to look. Every time someone talks about learning to paint all you hear is "you have to learn to paint loosely." And even worst, "Paint goes where it wants to go." The truth is the only reason you have to learn to paint loosely is because you have to learn brush control first. Then ease up on control. Paint goes where it wants to go means you are paining sloppy. Big difference between sloppy and loose. Because I've started to get serious about painting I've paid more attention to other peoples work. The beauty of the web is you can view works done for years by the same artist. Which brings us to one of my favorite words. Catawompus. Means askew, out of proportion and bad perspectives. For the most part their art is just as catawompus today as it was five years ago. No fundamentals. No brush control. It's no different than having the same hand writing today as you did in kindergarten.
Brush control and arm strength are to the two things I'm working on now. Arm strength because holding your arm out from your body for an hour or longer at a time takes some getting used to. And a good strong shoulder to boot. The more tired my arm gets the shakier my brush work is. As for learning brush control I'm writing out sentences with the tip of a round brush. Everything from one inch down to collage rule. For two hours a day. I made rule lines in a word program and print them out as needed. I now have page after page of this stuff. Wrote on a collage rule size the 14nt of this month. I'll compare it to the same rule on the 14nt of next month. To see how much I've improved. For all the time and concentration I'm putting into this it's working. And I'm learning things along the way. Like when you spend all your concentration on your brush stroke spelling goes out the window. :D And I've learned the only difference between the point on a size 2 round and a size 6 is how much paint they hold. You can get the same fine line with both. So if I use a size 6 I'm dipping back into the paint less. But my arm gets tired quicker.
I know all I'm dong is rambling with nothing to show for it. Kinda off kilter for an art thread. However what I hope to accomplish is inspiration. And a bit of solid teaching to boot. I'm taking my experience as a musician and applying that to painting. And my experience of teaching others to play. With al that under my belt it's easy to spot both good and bad habits. And why some people get better quicker than others. The phrase 'Natural talent' is a joke. It's a favorite phrase repeated by people who make every effort not to put effort into what they are doing.
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Man, to think someone would have the nerve to have an art thread with no art....:) Ya, I know, nothing to show. But plenty to talk about. First I want to congratulate myself. Yay! I'm narcissistic! :D The exercises I'm doing. Touch the surface with the point of the round brush only. To get as thin of a line as possible wile writing with paint. The brush I'm using is a size 6 round. The fibers are 7.0 mm wide by 27 mm long and come to a sharp point at the tip. Any amount of pressure or slight movement widens the line you make. Proud to say I'm getting lines as thin as you would with an ink pen. Not all the time. But I can get this more often now than when I started. When I started these exercises I could not hold my arm out in front of me for more than a few minutes without my arm twitching. Even the slightest twitch sent the brush off in all directions. Now i can hold my arm out for a bit more than a half hour. Relieving it only to get more paint. What this means is now I have a longer time to do the exercise. Why am I doing this you ask? Well, hopefully you asked....:) The answer is brush control. The only way to get this is to practice this. Over and over again. Because you have to build up your muscles to hold your arm out. And you have to learn the finesse to control your shoulder, arm, wrist and hand. Yes, I could get this tossing paint on a substrate over and over again. But why take years do learn something that I can learn and THEN use it to paint. To tell the truth tossing out a lot of bad paintings would be a hole lot more fun. There is a personal reason why I'm doing this. Take a look at that unfinished painting of mine. All those marks I made for flowers. First those are not the marks I wanted to make. Secondly I wasn't able to put them where I wanted. They ended up where they are. Looking the way they do. My lack of brush control was frustrating. That's why the lady isn't finished. How could I possible make her look right without brush control. Will she look human when I'm done with her? Probably not. But I'll be a lot happier knowing that my end result is because I don't know how to paint. Not because I can't control my brush. There is still so much to learn!
So how can you apply this to digital art? You have to be good at drawing before your good at digital art. If you can't control your stylist your not going to be able to draw what you want. Make each mark count. Make each line count. Get into the habit of making each line and shape you do the best you can do. Even if you have to do it over and over again. Practice what your bad at. Take every mark, line and shape you make seriously. Why should you be one of those people who eventually get better. When you know how to do it now. You hear this all the time. "It takes 10.000 hours to get good at something." I'll share a personal story here. It took me less than 3000 hours after starting guitar lessons to knowing 500 different chord forms and learned how to solo. I was playing jazz . Because I put the effort into it. 'Natural talent' is a battle cry for people who don't want to put an effort into what they do. Yes you can spend 10.000 hours doodling. It's a lot more fun than taking the time to l earn what you need now.
A side note. I'm having a real problem making a long straight line with a paint brush. Tried everything I could and nothing worked. So I went to you tube. Watched a painter who sells his works in the thousands. He put the edge of a straight wood dowel rod on the edge of his canvas. Held this rod at an angle to keep it off the paint. Then rested the side of his hand on the rod. Held the brush like you would a pencil and made a straight line. This made me happy. I now know I am just as good at free handing a straight line as someone who sells their paintings for thousands of dollars each!
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When I started this exercise I really did not know what I was doing. Thought the alphabet and painting out sentences would give me a good visual reference. Easy to compare from one week to the next. Thought using a brush bigger than needed. Hard to control. Needing a touch so light you can't feel the brush against the substrate. As crazy of an idea as flipping fried eggs in a skillet with a long handled shovel. Thought "why not." had no idea if this would help my brushwork and control at all. When I started this i had real problems keeping my arm from being jittery. Once my brush was steadier I got serious with this.Did this exercise twice a day. An hour each time. for 17 days now. So today I wanted to see if I was getting any results. Set up a gesso covered piece of watercolor paper. Picked up a flat brush and painted. One brush, one color. Did this mind numbing exercise help? HUGE! Night and day huge. My brushwork was way more precise. And an unforeseen benefit. I could feel the brush react to the gesso covered surface. Perhaps all this barely touching made my hand more sensitive to the business end of the brush. I'll keep doing this til the 14th of this month. Giving myself a full month. To compare that sheet to the one I did when my shoulder was strong enough.
An I having fun doing this exercise? No. This is mind numbing, boring and frustrating. I'm taking each stroke, shape and line seriously. Concentrating on every move I make. Seeing the results today makes this exercise only slightly less miserable. But worth every moment spent. Seeing the results is vindication for my resolve. Inspiration to continue.
I'm a beginner. I have no idea what I'm doing. No idea where I'm going. Can't even say I'll be a great painter. The only thing I can do is take my experience as a musician and apply it to painting. Talent takes effort. Mind numbing frustrating effort. The more effort you put in the more you'll be able to do. The more you can ddo the more fun you will have. When put;ting everything you have into something becomes a habit people wil call you naturally talented. :D
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That is true. The more you work on something the better you get at it. Though it can take time. I bet Kada-Ru could give you some insights. She loves watercolors and paint. Also a suggestion why not apply for a Furtopia web hosting? It's free plus you don't even need to know how to make a web page (it has it's own gallery if you don't have your own web page) and you could then link your art directly here in the forums as well as other websites if you wished. :) Web hosting application page: https://services.furtopia.org/f_application.shtml
Some cheese for thought? ;) WhiteShepherd
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WhiteShepherd. Thanks for the invite. I've been following the progress as the hosting was moving along. I'm not a furry artist. OK, I'm a furry. But my works aren't. If I do paint something anthro I do plan on posting it here. Right now I have nothing to show. Other than page after page of me writing with the tip of a round brush. Lots of me convincing myself that this exercise is working. Be as mind numbing to read as it was to paint. :D In a few days I'll start working with flat and filbert brushes. To better understand what I can do with them. Once I do start painting I know I will find something else to accomplish before I go on.
I do have a way for folks here to follow what I'm doing. Links to threads I make on an art forum. Like the one below showing the painting I keep referring back to.
https://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/topic/my-sagent-attempt-the-ongoing-joy-of-throwing-paint/ (https://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/topic/my-sagent-attempt-the-ongoing-joy-of-throwing-paint/)
It's good to hear of another furry who uses traditional mediums for art. I'll have to check out Kada-Ru's works.
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I know. As far as internet time line goes it's been over a decade sense my last post. Between death, hospitalizations, family and now work I really haven't had time to do anything. The only real setback is I haven't been able to show just how much better this idea of learning is. Learning to do something takes effort and work. It's not fun. But way more productive than mindlessly doing the same mistakes for hundreds of hours. I know. As both a student of a really good teacher to becoming a teacher myself. I've both experienced and seen the results. I repeat the same thing over and over again. Because I keep hearing the same thing over and over again from on line instructors. Everyone of them say this in their own way. "Mindlessly go at it every day. You will eventually get better." That doesn't work. Spend some time doodling and having fun. Noting wrong with that. Spend more time practice what your having trouble with. Even your doodles will come out faster and better. And be more fun to do.
Before you ask, no, I'm not going to talk about what's all been going on. I like to keep my privet life away from my internet life. That way i don't have to deal with privet life on line as well. Thanks for being understanding.
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I know. As far as internet time line goes it's been over a decade sense my last post. Between death, hospitalizations, family and now work I really haven't had time to do anything. The only real setback is I haven't been able to show just how much better this idea of learning is. Learning to do something takes effort and work. It's not fun. But way more productive than mindlessly doing the same mistakes for hundreds of hours. I know. As both a student of a really good teacher to becoming a teacher myself. I've both experienced and seen the results. I repeat the same thing over and over again. Because I keep hearing the same thing over and over again from on line instructors. Everyone of them say this in their own way. "Mindlessly go at it every day. You will eventually get better." That doesn't work. Spend some time doodling and having fun. Noting wrong with that. Spend more time practice what your having trouble with. Even your doodles will come out faster and better. And be more fun to do.
Before you ask, no, I'm not going to talk about what's all been going on. I like to keep my privet life away from my internet life. That way i don't have to deal with privet life on line as well. Thanks for being understanding.
Cause, I send you my condolences. :( Grieving makes artwork difficult, I know this firsthand (er, paw?). Take care of yourself and doodle/paint when the muse is ready.
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I'M BACK! Well, sort of. Back to practicing brush work. Back to learning to draw what i see will holding a brush like a brush. Honestly the only advantage I see in learning to hold a brush this way is it keeps your arm off the painting. Back to listening to online instructors say things like "You need to learn to paint loosely. To much brush control and your paintings start to look stiff." Just to hear the same online instructor say. " Viewing your work upside down or in a mirror (backwards) will show you all the mistakes you made when drawing and blocking in your painting." The hypocrisy of art. Don't start off learning brush control. Spend years learning it by fixing all your mistakes. The very mistakes you wouldn't make if you learned how to draw with your brush. Learn to paint loosely? Yes! Even the most detailed painting you can view is a well done illusion. There are people who paint 'photo realistic'. But even then your brain is still filling in the blanks.
Why I'm sort of back. The painting style I like requires thick layering of paint on a canvas. Easily done with regular acrylics. But with regular acrylics you have to work fast. Color matching and mixing can be a real issue. You end up with wonky, somewhat cartoony colors. Slow drying acrylics give you a lot of time to properly mix colors. With a real drawback of not being able to paint thick. Anything thicker than a 1/16 ( 2.0 mm) and the paint wont dry properly.
My solution. Still going to learn to draw and control my brush. Still going to continue with color mixing and matching. Still going to paint thick wet on wet. My color mixing painting will be single brush strokes with no layering. The right color in the right shape in the right spot. My thick on thick paint will focus more on value studies and getting the textures within the colors you can only get when using thick paint. Dragging one color through another. Look at any John Singer Sargent painting. And when I run out of this small fortune of two types of acrylic paint I'm going to water mixable oils.
Still standing furn on learning all the basics. This works with digital art as well. You all have a set of problems I, no matter what medium I use, wont have to deal with. But you will learn that when you learn color theory.
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I bet everyone thought I wasn't doing anything. Well as far as doing things to get better using a brush that's a no brainer. However the only way to get good at putting a painting together is actually painting. My frustration level with acrylics have hit a wall. Slow drying acrylics are like a horror movie. You know what's going to happen. But your not sure when. And the only way to keep it from happening is to never open the tubes of paint. I have an entire alchemy lab of chemicals meant to keep these paints workable. Or, putting it more realistically, turning them into Kool Aid. If I wanted to paint with Kool Aid I'd go back to water colors. I'll continue practicing value studies and composition with the acrylics I have. Because I can do that with one or two colors of paint. And not worry about the paint turning into plastic before I'm through using it. I have seven tubes of water mixable oils and two bottles of mediums on the way. One medium is for speeding up the paint's drying time. The other for the 'fat' in the fat over lean technique in oil painting. After a few months of reading other peoples research on line I've learned to never use water when painting with water mixable oils. Water is for cleaning only.
So from this post on there WILL be paintings to show. Master pieces? Hopefully not as bad as my water color 'Man who wet his pants', "Two headed thing on a flying table', and 'Exploding Tree'. No masterpieces. Just a rat learning to paint. And hopefully inspiring you all to know that art is more than just coloring between the lines.
My purpose for this tread was to inspire you all to take the time and learn the things needed to be a better artist. What this thread turned into is a frustrated old man screaming about his bad choices. Sorry folks. It will get better.
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I did something today to prove something to myself. Did a color and value study. Three small three by fives of distant hills with a cloudy sky. Without any reference picture. What did I end up with? Three levels of horror. Every really good artist on line will tell you the very same thing. You need to have visual references of what your painting. Doesn't matter if it's only one reference or ten. I've seen painters on line take an interior shot from one picture and put people from another into it. Art has nothing to do with reality. No matter how many years they have been painting they still needed the pictures to put it all together. That didn't stop me from trying. It was both fun and a good learning experience. I've wiped off two of them. Kept one. Already have a simple picture picked out. Hopefully be able to do this the right way tomorrow.
I like learning new things. I like to create. And i love making a mess. Art is making me a very happy old man.
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I"m posting this because it will help those doing digital furry art as well. If you paint someone's head the correct size to the body the head will look to large. If you reduce it's size slightly it will look right. If you follow the link to Wikipedia' page on Philippe de Champaigne you will see, in every painting, all the heads are not the right size for the bodies that support them.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippe_de_Champaigne (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippe_de_Champaigne)
From what I understand this is common practice.
Wasn't able to get to painting tonight.
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Posted my first WIP ( work in progress ) on the oil painting portion of Wet Canvas. And as promised it's horrible. Learning to color match and do a value study at the same time. I think I remembered all the beginner mistakes everyone talks about and non of the right things to do. :) This panting is so dark and drab it would make a sewage treatment plant in the rain look like a cheery day. I really do need to learn to lighten up. I'll post a link to the thread once I get the painting done.
There is one thing I can say I'm very happy with. Everywhere I wanted to put the tip of the brush is exactly where it ended up. I'm painting 'alla prima'. Wet on wet. With no mediums. Said to be the hardest to learn. But it's the look, style and way I want to paint. I'm having no trouble with the technique at all. I would not be able to do this had I not struggled for three months. Writing out the alphabet as small as I could get it. With a large brush. i have the technique down. Now I have the 500 more things I need to learn. Never tell yourself "It's just my style". Because there are 10.000 other artists out there with the very same 'style'. If there is something your struggling with take the time to work it out. Keep working on it until you get the result you need. Doing the same thing over and over isn't fun. It's tedious and boring and at times the last thing you want to do. Get it right. Then go back to making art. You will see the difference. And it's guaranteed you'll find the next thing you need to work on. Every time you isolate something and work on it the results will come quicker. Because your training yourself to learn. And you know more.
and for fun,
Why alla prima is hard to do.
Fat over lean in oil painting means your adding more fat ( oil ) to your paint as you add layers. This changes the thickness of the paint. A thinner, more oily layer will lay down easy over a dryer ( less oily) layer. There is way more to this. But we'll stick with the simple for now. Alla prima doesn't use that technique. Every layer of paint is the same as the layer underneath it. What happens is, if your not careful, the paint your applying over the paint that's already there will start to mix. As you pick the brush up and place it on the painting again you end up carrying paint from the first layer. Applying this mix of paint on your brush and you end up with a mix of the two. This is referred to as 'mud'. Now there is nothing saying you can't use fat over lean when doing alla prima painting. I may end up have to use this technique when applying the highlights. Will have to see how it works out for me.
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Found my next challenge. Color matching. And understanding that the value ( how light or dark the color is ) is more important than the color itself. Then there's the entire color theory spectrum to learn along with color matching. But for right now I'll stick to trying to get the color I see in the paint I'm using. And how all this end up in being totally unrealistic in color once it's in the painting. Painting isn't about color. It's about value relationships between colors. How these relationships interact to create the illusion of depth. A wrong color with the right value is more important than the right color. The link below is to a painting that demonstrates everything. If you were actually looking at a photo it would not look anything like this. So let's play "What's wrong with this painting that's hanging in a museum and worth millions." by asking a few questions.
How many trees have you seen with orange bark?
There is a view into the distance through the trees. Why is thee not a single realistic color in that view? Trees and all.
It's a painting of an overcast day. The majority of the light is coming from the right. So why is the left hand side of this hill also in sunlight?
Looking a the trunk of the tree. The distant trees to the left are all in shadow. So how did the distant trees to the right side become bright?
The answer to all the questions above is? Color theory! Color value is more important than the color itself. Art is the interpretation of reality. Photography is reality turned into art.
OK. Great. So that's painting with paints. How does this relate to digital art. Disney uses color theory to make their animations look 3D. That may not be digital art. But it is cartoon style art. Both Marvel and DC comics us color theory. 90% or better of furry art is done with no color theory what so ever. Taking the time to learn all the crazy and off the wall techniques of color theory will take your art above what most consider the best of the furry art out there.
https://www.questroyalfineart.com/wp-content/uploads/Bierstadt-A-Trail-through-the-Trees.jpg (https://www.questroyalfineart.com/wp-content/uploads/Bierstadt-A-Trail-through-the-Trees.jpg)
So after finding out that color theory is more important than color why are you going to take hours to learn to match colors you ask? I'm using white and seven colors. I have an eight on the way. To help knock down one of the colors I'm using. The painting in the link has a good chance of being painted with less color choices. Most of the time spent painting is mixing colors and adjusting their values to work within the painting. I need to wrap my head around mixing unrealistic colors. Instead of trying to mix the colors I see. Learning to mix the colors I see will teach me how the paints I'm using relate to one another.
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Does the "color" you see change as the paint dries?
I see this with interior house paint.
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Jade, with acrylics and watercolors yes. Acrylics become darker wile watercolors lighten as they dry. With oils what you see is what you get. Linseed oil ( flax oil ) does lightly yellow over time. But because color is relative to the colors around it if all the colors slightly yellow the colors will still appear right.
I think color shifting would be more of a problem with digital art. The artist may be using some ultra high resolution monitor to do the art. Where the buyer might have a cheepo windows box that lights up. Or worst, the other way around. This is where relying more on color value instead of the color itself would help. Even if there is a shift in color the art would still read the same because the values wouldn't change.
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Starting a color study. If you can't get it on a 3x5 your not going to get it done on a 12x14. :D Concentrating on areal perspective. Working on color more than shape and form.
https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=1156599338184145&set=gm.4370290496355173 (https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=1156599338184145&set=gm.4370290496355173)
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Yep, the same thing I've heard over and over again. When posing about doing small color studies I heard it. 'That's nice. But it's still going to take hundreds of paintings to get it right.'. The idea of braking things down. Getting better at what your worst at. Then do a painting is totally foreign to these folks. If it doesn't look good at 3x5 it's not going to look good at 12x14. Size doesn't matter. Did my first color study. Eight lines of paint. Eight lines of complete disaster! But i"m loving it. Because each color has to be mixed I'm learning what can be done with the paints I have. Learning to mix color for it's value in relation to the colors around it. And it's placement within the painting for areal perspective. That is what I'm bad it. Doing one bad painting after another and hoping I get it right is not the answer.
I did add a color to my pallet. Varidian green. Decided to add it because Phalo green is kryptonite. The pigment is so strong it stains plastic. Really hard to control when mixing small batches of paint. Phalo kryptonite isn't going anywhere. ( phalo green blue shade ) Because I can use it to change the properties of ultramarine blue. And it makes a strong turquoise color that's great for mixing other colors with.
Just a rambling. First I would like to say everything you have heard about oil painting is true. It is way easier than watercolor or acrylics. Now that i know about solvent free brush cleaners and oil mediums I'll be e switching over to regular oil paints. Once I've used up these water mixables. Because you can mix water soluble oils with regular oil paints I'll be replacing the colors with regular oils as needed. For brush cleaning I'm using a product called 'Bristle Magic'. According to the MSDS sheet it's non toxic and biodegradable. With the only safety warning of not inducing vomiting if swallowed. And the best part is it works. Way quicker and easier than using soap and water with water soluble oils. Because I'm no longer using soap and water I can use the non toxic Alkyd I have. M. Graham's 'Walnut Alkyd Medium'. Alkyd makes oil paint dry faster. I've read the MSDS sheet on this stuff. It's not got anything in it that will evaporate or harm you if you get it on you. I now have a non toxic oil painting studio. Now I need to hire someone who can actually paint. :) Also wanted to add, I LOVE the smell of oil paints.
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The good the bad and the ugly. Hope you like ugly because I'm not good at painting yet. :)
First three value studies. From left to right.
'Yay Stripes!' Thought I could simplify and represent color spectrum using only stripes. Nope.
'Ugly Stripes.' Honestly wanted to stop after the second stripe from the bottom. Had I stopped it would not have looked this bad. :) Actually learned a few things form this.
'Worm Monster.' From right to left. A mouth, eye and three dots. Don't know where this thing came from. Didn't notice it till the end of the painting. Still lots wrong. Mid and far are still to dark. Need to stop relying on white to make a bright sky.
After my 'ugly stripes' I went on line and looked at hundreds of old landscape paintings. Noticed something I hadn't before. The majority of these old paintings don't use color spectrum to create depth. Instead they relied on color value. Color spectrum is the farther an object is the more color drops out. The first color to drop is yellow. Then red. Till you end up with nothing but blue. For now I'll work with color spectrum. Then I plan on tackling light direction and shadow within color spectrum. This will really help me to understand how to create value relationships. It's one thing to be book smart. It's a whole new world when doing it. And a whole lot more fun. Right now i'm book smart and brush dumb!
https://scontent-ort2-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.6435-9/214541885_1157918811385531_5602317715829141030_n.jpg?_nc_cat=100&ccb=1-3&_nc_sid=825194&_nc_ohc=tpeyQNVfChQAX-AqudH&tn=ZMy4BhR4dhObnveV&_nc_ht=scontent-ort2-1.xx&oh=6813979d1b24d94e36e347c42c2a4943&oe=61221FF5 (https://scontent-ort2-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.6435-9/214541885_1157918811385531_5602317715829141030_n.jpg?_nc_cat=100&ccb=1-3&_nc_sid=825194&_nc_ohc=tpeyQNVfChQAX-AqudH&tn=ZMy4BhR4dhObnveV&_nc_ht=scontent-ort2-1.xx&oh=6813979d1b24d94e36e347c42c2a4943&oe=61221FF5)
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My adolescents is over. From this point in time on it's nothing but serious studies. I had fun throwing paint. Glad I used 3x5s to play with. Can imagine all the paint I of wasted if I did all those on 8x10 or 10x12 panels. I'll still be using the same 3x5 format. Turning them upright to give more room to work on the changes in value and color that creates the illusion of depth. Also known as. 'The Theory of Angles and Consequent Values'. That's a thing. It's part of color theory. Then there's the 'Theory of Halation' or how we visually perceive two objects of contrasting color and value when they are next to each other. These two theories are covered in depth in a book I was recommended. 'Carlson's Guide to Landscape Painting'. This book was originally published in 1929. However the English used is much older. Reads more like a manuscript from the mid 1800's.
Gone back to doing brush control exercises. There is one really big difference between doing these in oil instead of acrylics. When mixing the oil paint to the consistency I need it stays good for hours. Acrylics harden up quickly. Spent most of my time remixing. I can tell I let this go for a bit. My arm gets tired quickly again.
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Would like to change one statement from the above post. The oil point I've stet up for doing line study lasts for days. House makes it sound to close to acrylics. But I guess 96 hours is hours. However comparing that to a workable time of up to ten minutes is kinda understated.
This will be my last post in 'A rat's journey into art. Acrylic paint'. I'll start a new thread for oil painting. With paintings. And lots more to rant about. My journey so far. Watercolors: The paper and paint control you. One mistake and your threw. Acrylics: You have two choices. You have five minutes to paint the entire painting. Or Make mounds of paint so high you can cut through the already hardened plastic to the still workable paint below. Oils: You can control the drying time of the paint. You can sculpt by moving wet paint around. Had I known it was possible to paint with oils without all the toxic chemicals I would have started with them.
Thanks everyone for reading through all this. Looking forward to seeing everyone at the oil painting thread.
Cause the Rat.