Before I get to the topic for today… I have declared the Ovation painting complete and I’ve signed it. It’s not ready for the photographer yet because I want to varnish it. I’ll probably varnish it this week and then get it to the photographer the first week of the new year. Which will make it the first new piece on the store for 2024.
Now to today’s topic. I finally decided what I want to tackle next. And I decided to start three, not just choose one. I’ve finished the sketch for the black and white stippling already. It’s a turtle that a friend and I came across while at the park in September. I was going to make it a 16-inch by 20-inch piece but the paper I have that size is a little warped so it’s difficult to dot on. I did start out on that size. I started drawing or sketching in the turtle and got the whole turtle on the page and realized that not only did the turtle need to be bigger, and not the whole thing on the paper, the paper needed to be bigger. So. It’s now on the 18-inch by 24-inch paper. Same size as the Penguins. And by blowing it up and making it big enough to make the head and face a focal point it has made the composition better.
I am also going to do a color stippling piece. This one will be a guitar headstock. I’ve chosen a Telecaster from 1955 that I saw several years ago at a guitar show. It’s got some wear and should make for an interesting piece. I am going to do that on canvas board, like the Ovation. However, I have added a couple of layers of gesso to smooth out the canvas texture a fair bit so hopefully it won’t be as frustrating to work on as the Ovation painting. I started the sketch for it and have had to start the sketch over. I had the same problem with it as I did with the turtle. I made it too small and tried to put too much of it on the canvas. That made for a really weak composition. Not that there is a lot that I thought to do with the composition. Maybe the next one. Anyway. I also had some trouble getting the shape and angle just right. Telecaster headstocks are just a little odd and they have more of an angle than you think. It’s been challenging. I hope it turns out good.
I’m also going to do a watercolor of some flowers. This will be a little larger than the other flowers I’ve done. And it is a small cluster of flowers. This one will be interesting. I tried painting a flower of the same type as these on some handmade paper with watercolors and found it a little frustrating. Partly because of the paper and partly because of the flower. The color is a real challenge. But I’ve seen some demo videos that have given me an idea of how to approach them so hopefully this one will work out.
Of course, as soon as I decided what I was going to work on next, all sorts of things made it difficult to start working on them. It was a little frustrating so to keep at least a little art going I worked on the experiment a little. I made some adjustments and I’m starting to work on the cliff detail. It wasn’t really enough to keep me in drawing/arting shape though. I think that’s why I struggled with the turtle and even the telecaster. Hopefully the flowers will go a little smoother.
I came across an Instagram post one day of someone testing color mixing and eye mixing of paint. It was really interesting. Even with the discrepancy of the digital camera not allowing for true eye mixing, I could see where the eye mix gives a much more vibrant and true color versus the paint mixing. To demonstrate, they painted a swatch of the mix color they wanted in a circle. Then, around the outside they painted the colors they used to mix the inside color in alternating patches. Then they spun it like a roulette wheel and filmed it. You could just get the blur where the two colors mixed, and it was the same color as in the middle but a bit purer. It was cool. And it started me thinking about pointillism.
I think I’ve mentioned this before, but I’ll share it again. Pointillism is what Georges Seurat did. And it is a lot like what pixels do or the older tv’s where you put the red, green, and blue colors next to each other and the eye mixes those colors based on how much of which was present. Basically, pointillism is putting the pure, or close to pure, color next to a complementary or contrasting color, or even a black or white and letting the eye mix the colors. That’s a very simplistic description and probably not 100% accurate but it should convey the idea.
So, after watching that demo of the way the eye mixes, I started thinking about seeing how that would work. I tried to mess around with it and see what sort of results I would get. I just did a small sort of basic sketch with some colored multi-liner pens. And while it looks cool and should be very effective, I’m not sure if I like having to be as precise in my placement of my dots as it seems I would need to be to make this most effective. So that idea will probably simmer for a while longer.
As you can tell, I have a few things I’m working on. Fortunately, I have a few days off from the day job for the holidays so I might get to some of it. Actually, I have ambitious delusions that I’ll get all the sketches done, the varnishing done, and at least one of the three pieces started. I’ve also got a small music project to play with so while my ambition isn’t entirely unrealistic, it might not all happen. Check back to find out how it goes.
Peaceful holidays to you.
Cheers!