28 November 2012

Botanical gardens

Hello again! Here's a painting that took me out of my comfort zone. A friend wanted a birthday painting, one with a doorway she said...

Hmm, thought I. Not keen on landscape-type paintings, not my thing, but I'll give it a go. So this is what I came up with in the end:

Watercolour, 11 by 14"

This painting had me doing a few things I've not done for a good while. First off I masked off the white areas of the glasshouse frame. I haven't used masking fluid in years. Had to go buy some...

Next, I did a pour, with viridian, lemon yellow and winsor blue (green shade) as a basis for the whole picture. Haven't done one of those since Theatreland. And in a first, I think, for me, I put a proper figure in there. I had the idea for the painting in my head, and used this as an excuse for a very nice afternoon out at the Cambridge University Botanical Gardens, where I took some ref photos.

So, it ended up being quite a project, and I'm glad (relieved!) to say that the recipient likes it!

23 November 2012

Acrylic portrait update

I decided to be brave and bump up the colours a bit on the elderly gentleman portrait from my previous post, so here he is:

I like the blue/orange colour combo but I think I'd better stop fiddling...

20 November 2012

Quick portrait in acrylic

Hmm, the blog's been kind of quiet for a few weeks, but I promise I have been busy, just with stuff that will be gifts so is still under wraps until after Christmas!

However, I did find a couple of hours to spend on a portrait challenge on the Painting Friends forum. The reference photo is by the very generous Steve Evans.

8 by 10", Acrylic on canvas board

I started this off by doing a contour drawing in marker pen on a pre-toned canvas board, then went in with the paints. Tried to keep things fairly loose. I may yet do some more on this, but I don't want to risk overdoing it!

02 November 2012

Cat sketches

Hello again! Was looking through a bundle of really old photos, and found some of our old cat - I took the photos when I was ten or eleven, with my very first camera (decades ago, ha!). I tried a couple of quick ink and watercolour sketches, just for the fun of it.


The bottom one of the two I have painted before in watercolour, painstakingly drawing it out as I recall. These were very much sketched loosely in ink, and watercolour wash/more ink then applied. A much freer (slapdash?) way of doing things, fine for the mood I was in at the time :-)

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