Remembering Love at Christmas

I love Christmas. It's a time when I get to actually see my family, remember what's actually important and get to help make the chaos of Christmas come together as something beautiful. It's all about keeping what's important in perspective. Sometimes it's pretty easy to put it in perspective.  I have finally finished a project for a friend of mine that's been battling breast cancer. It's supposed to capture the verse that she requested to remind her on good days and bad that God has her in his hand and that's the best place she can be. Merry Christmas to her and her family. Lots of Love.

A New Adventure

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There are days as a human being where you need to get away from it all. Avoid traffic, cars, humans in general, but not specifically. There has been acouple of those trips I've had recently and this was one of them. I'm totally going to paint this site one day  (one day meaning when I actually have a French easle that all my friends seem to have but I don't). I love painting rushing water. Or any water for that matter. It's just so fun to get the water to cascade down over rocks and trickle into the lazy stream. The noise off this falls was perfect and the day wasn't too hot. I was actually perfect and great for exploring. I didn't take my camera with me exploring so I can't show you the rocks that were down the way, but they were great huge rocks. I learned to beware of crevices, because they have poisonous snakes in them, but I feel more sorry for the snake than I do myself. The one that we met its end before we met ours. The rocks further down the stream were more like boulders. A friend of mine dubbed the big one that was slanted "Pride Rock." It kind of looked very reminiscent of Lion King I would have to say. We just needed one of the guys to take a cat up there and raise it in the air. Would have been a great picture.  All that to say, go on a hike and rejuvenate. Enjoy the wonders of God's creation. Escape the man-made city dwellings. It's good for the soul.

Craig Mullins: The Digital Sargent

This man is really the first digital artist I was ever aware of (or cared to be aware of anyway). I found him my junior year of college and was floored that he could make digital do what he did. How did he manage the texture and the haphazardness that seemed to carelessly cascade down his canvases? I didn't know then, and I really can't say that I fully understand now.

Craig Mullins

He had the compositional control of a Classical master, mixed with the brushwork of Sargent and an amazing understanding of light. By understanding light, I mean that evenings feel like evenings. A day in Spain looks different than a day in Colorado. I know where I am based on the color and the harshness of the light. I loved looking at his work and I still do.

Craig Mullins

 Goodbrush.com is the most perfect website name for him, because he really does know a thing or two about good brush work. He follows after Sargent, which was immediately evident to me when I saw him.  It's loose but purposeful. Minimalistic, but I never feel like I've been ripped off- as if him not putting down those 'finishing' strokes took away something. It always adds.

Craig Mullins

His action and flair for drama remind me of N.C. Wyeth sometimes, but maybe it's just the subject matter. Both of them have bold broad strokes and can finish a huge painting sickeningly quick.

Craig Mullins   Concept work for Harry Potter

Mullins was my first introduction to the concept art world, followed very quickly by Ryan Church. I love getting paintings down onto 'paper' simply for the idea of them, so the realization that- hey, I can get paid for just doing my favorite part? was an incredible discovery.

Craig Mullins

I love just looking at his stuff. Acouple years after discovering him, the digital art crowd was talking about him, idolizing and hating him at the same time, the usual for all the greats. One of the oil painters (who happens to be amazing) wants to know who we are all freaking out over and why he's never heard of him. All of us on the digital 'dark' side just kind of looked at him like, Who's Craig Mullins? THE Craig Mullins? Feeling a little sheepish, my friend joked "Whoa. I feel like I just asked you guys who Sargent was-" Hit that right on the head, friend, right on the head.

Craig Mullins

Maybe one day I'll track Mullins down and see if I can absorb his talent through osmosis- or maybe I'll just steal his wacom pen. That must be his secret. ;) Sigh. One day, Craig Mullins. One day.

The Blessing and the Curse

I've been busy this weekend, having the privilege to go with friends to Disney World for a friend's birthday, so I didn't have much time for painting, but I do have a ton of pictures for inspiration thanks to my wonderful friend who let me come. It was awesome, and to those of you who know what I mean, Do you match? ;) Traveling on a road trip with art friends is awesome. Have any of you ever heard of Disneybound? We all participated )all eight of us) and I chose to dress as Megara. Very fun and we all enjoyed the little details Disney loves to throw into their architecture and lines to just complete the experience.

Does anyone else see the happy monkey with a butterfly on his nose? Maybe that one's just me. There are days that I feel some of my non-art friends miss out on life. The beauty is everywhere around them-  in the rain, in the shadow, reflections, refractions, lightings- subtle things. Disney takes advantage of all that- it's just meant to be appreciated by artists. Really, normal seeing must be boring. I would have to say though, that 'great power' of seeing comes with the 'responsibility' of desiring to fix ugly things- or at least relieve the pain of seeing those ugly things by plucking my eyes out. There is a spot to eat pizza in the Animal Kingdom. If you desire to keep your eyes in their sockets, don't go to the room all the way in the back. It has a horrific mural painted on it. It wouldn't be so horrific, except we are at Disney and everything else is so pretty.

Ok. This is the little part in the back. It's a fall scene on the right and a winter scene on the left wall. Above is the corner of that room where the winter and fall scene meet. To whomever painted this mural: what in the world made you think that  the blue snow scene and the the gaudily red fall scene could be harmonized by sticking in a viridian green glowing leafy tree in between them. Anyone??

Secondly. I hate this bear. It is stylized. That's cool. Cubs are cute. However, just to the right of this is the cutest realistically rendered baby seal that I wish I could hug and squeeze. That seal makes these bears look like awkward stick figures.

Disney. If you are reading this: PLEASE LET ME REPAINT THIS ROOM. I will make it amazing and worthy to be in the Animal Kingdom. Til then, please white wash it for me.
  Gaghhh!!! Alright, I'm done with my tirade now.

Gregory Manchess: A Titan of Illustration

Above the Timberline Gregory Manchess

I love looking at the best of the best, but when it comes to viewing inspiring illustrations, I love looking at Manchess. His illustrations are so brilliantly active and- well having seen him painting in action via video- I know that his skills are just as dynamic. Bold solid brushwork, simple, impressive, and swift, it kind of makes me a little jealous. He just put up a post on Muddy Colors and I loved reading his thoughts on composition. Well, I almost love everything he writes about painting. He continually makes me question what the difference is between fine art and illustration. He's made several paintings for National Geographic creating a series on the pirates of the Wydah. Very impressive work. Definitely recommend his latest post.

Landscape Basics

Mobile, Alabama Trip

So today, I get to talk aerial perspective. This won't be rocket science by any means, but here is what I think through. First and foremost when making a landscape, I check to see how much depth is going to be given to the piece and probably because I've been using photoshop for so long, I think of it in layers. This own has three 'layers.' Foreground, Midground, and Background.  Value and Color are the two considerations I constantly keep in mind as I laydown the paint.

Value is the lightness or darkness of a pigment. The darkest and lightest values are in the foreground, so when I putting down paint, I locate where those darkest darks and lightest lights are. In this cause, the sky and the reflection of it in the water is the brightest and the darkest darks in the shadow of the nearest tree.

The midground has darker highlights in the lights and brighter darks in the shadows.

Finally, the background even more diminishes in contrast with more subdued light and shadow.

Color. The foreground has the truest colors in it. True yellows and reds and oranges are most intense in this 'layer.' The more distant an object is, the less brilliant those colors will be, usually. I will say usually because all 'rules when dealing with color can always be broken. That's part of the beauty of painting.

The midground as I've said, loses the brilliance of it's yellows and reds the greater distance (usually). The more air between you and the object you're looking at, the more you can see the effect of it. The sun during the day, makes the atmosphere of our sky blue and it is this blue that tints the air, more and more perceptively the greater the distance.

The background has the most 'blue,' or cooling effect. The saturation of the colors diminishes and more and more white is added as a way to cool the colors and lighten the values.

Finally, there is a crispness to the foreground and loss of clarity to the edges in the background.

As I said before, all those 'rules' can be broken.

Desert Saguaro Sunset, Kevin McCain

At sunset,  the atmosphere and the clouds shift into the red spectrum and affect color similar to the way that the blue sky changes color, that effect increasing with distance. Here the reds are strong in the distance and all those general rules I gave earlier are thrown out. No matter what rules you are given, the best thing to do is observe life and light and how it reacts in reality. If you can, paint it in reality. Photos lose a great deal of true color and value patterns because they are captured by a machine. Trust your eyes and not the machine's. You'll be surprised how much color and subtlety you'll find with them when you look for it. 

Hope that helps. If you want a really good reference for color and such, I definitely recommend James Gurney's Color and Light. It's the best most comprehensive book on color theory and I love Gurney's writing style. Very easy to understand and down to earth. No 'artsy highend' impossible to understand stuff and beautiful, beautiful art. Love it. :)

Muddy Colors

If you're interested in illustration and you want to know what the best of them are up to, I recommend MuddyColors. Sometimes they annoy me because I see more than I wish to see, but their advice and input is very valuable and sound. This week, they've posted what I've known for at least two years now. Artists who are good at what they do aren't actually motivated by money. They do what they do cause they love to do it so they continue doing it and get better because they love it. Putting monetary value or commissioning can make the artist nervous and the creativity dies and with it the quality of the work. Been there, done that. Here's the video from the UK that Eric Fortune posted by Dan Pink. No, I'm not making up the names.

Left brain versus right brain. Outer-motivation vs. Self-determination. Very nice.

Mobile Fine Art Park

Here's another quicky. This one is roughly two hours as well. I was going to tape it, but my recorder failed again, so you'll have to bear with the still of where I left it. I started out with the picture at 72 dpi so I could block in very quickly, and after I got the initial paint down, I brought it up and started detailing what I wanted in the trees and the water.

I would like to add the people to the painting as well, so we'll see what happens, but seriously, this was a beautiful day. The play of the light off these southern trees was awesome and there were far more birds here than I've put in, I just haven't decided which to add in. Creation is an incredibly wonderful thing for those who seek it's beauty.

Goose Sketch

Well, I think I might have been able to pick up a few things from the Sargent exercise. I was trying it out and think that I have and good way to get to the rough sketch very quickly, or at least quickly for me anyway. I was able to go to the Mobile Museum of Art, which has an amazing collection of work, which inspired me to work on this one. There is a park and a couple bridges to explore there which are awesome. Loved it. There were geese living there. I'm assuming they'll be traveling back to Canada now that it is getting warm, but I took some shots of them and this is what I came up with in 45 min. I loved working in the cool colors of the shadow and the light through the trees was hitting the grass just perfectly. My model was very willing to give me his best poses.

KISS

I have this tendency to overcomplicate things, so I've tried to follow my mother's advice and KISS, Keep It Simple Stupid. I've been learning how to do that through Sargent, master of simplicity. Simplicity, is overwhelmingly more complex than it seems. It is exact, calculated, but elegant. I love it, but it is SO hard. I mean, copying him is one thing; being able to make it myself from what I see- difficult- very difficult. This is the end for this one. I have too much going on to finish the grass properly, but it was really fun. I wish that I lived in a world where flower gardens had amazing lanterns that needed to be lit. Hope you like it.

Question though- any suggestion on who to study next? I'm probably going to look up some other digital artists and see who they studied on their journeys. I wouldn't mind ideas.

I Won't Choose Sides

There has always been this battle between pure art and illustration and then there is the battle between digital and traditional media. Let me establish right now, I LOVE both.  I love the texture and expression and variety just as much in one as the other. Most artists line up on one side or the other. meh. I get bored too easily to totally devote myself to one or the other. I understand the perks to each. Traditional has original works- it can't be copied- it's unique and no one can have another one.  Beautiful-  I love digital as well. It's flexible and dynamic. Ideas flow quickly. Nothing stops you from changing those ideas and there's no worry about waiting for paint to dry too slow or too quick. There are giants on either side of the line. Men and women I admire and read up on. Like Nick Harris here. He makes me smile.

Enjoy the art. Keep your preferences, but appreciate the work that goes into both. It's way too awesome not too.

Picking up the paint brush, again and again

I've come to the conclusion, that the hardest thing in life is repetition, the grind. Doing what you know you need to do- to be proactive- and to be productive- Every- day. When I feel like it, when I don't feel like it. When I feel like it- there is nothing in the world I would rather do, I mean really? Art=Dream Job. It just doesn't get better- I was built for this. Then there's those days common to us humans, where even the best things in life just don't seem that desirable and I don't want to paint and be creative. It's the last thing in the world I want to do. If I have to repaint that face for the fifth time, I'll just scream! Despite all that, you go to work anyway. I've found ways to help fight the don't feel like it blues. Music, heroes, and friends.

Music just helps set the mood. Is it going to be fighting music, melancholy music, get up and go? Epic? whatever is needed, music can help get there, but it doesn't do anything at all for me when I get stuck on a project that I just don't know how to fix.

That's when heroes come in- the best of the best. I sit here, and I look at them. I know they've had the same struggles as me and they got through it either by sticking it out or help from friends and mentors. I read about them, what they said, what others said about them, and what their hands crafted. They make me feel better and worse all at the same time. They inspire. I see how far I need to go and how far they have come. I study techniques and observe skills. I covet. I admire. I despise. I love. Then I go back to my project and I work again. If they can do it- may I can too.

Last of all friends. Not the least important mind you. Having a good set of friends with similar passions can be quite motivating when it comes to the painting department. Even better if you work with them. They know what  it's like to go through lulls in the creative juices and how to keep squeezing art out when it doesn't feel like there is anything left for the day or the week- or the rest of your life. They encourage, they tell you when it looks stupid and the most helpful ones tell you how to fix it. These are the indispensable ones on bad days and on good days, because they can make any day turn out great.

So here's a post for the creative lulls of life. They come, they go. The trick is to keep going anyway.

Carnation Lily Lily Rose

This is last weeks progress. I would have more documented, but the recorder just was not working with me. Frustration. Above is the progress captured successfully in the camera, and below is the true progress of the painting as of now. Haven't had much time for it, but when I do, it's wonderful

Learning to simplify

Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose- Sargent

 I tend to put in too many details. to over complicate simple beauty, so I'm studying Sargent this week. Next week I'll put up the finished project, but I'm doing a this mastercopy Sargent

  

 This is where I am so far with the study. Slowly getting the kids put in there and trying to get the right color harmony. I think the hardest part to replicate is going to be the grass ironically. I don't understand why he put so much detail into them. It's just grass, but there is more detail in the blades of grass than there is in the strands of hair. Don't understand that, but I am learning alot.

 

 I really like how he simplifies her hair, and the folds. There's detail, but there is a simplicity to it. Color, but just what's needed. Simple and few strokes. One day, I'll get it.

Mastering principles of form empowers artists to make ANYTHING, so if you want to make anything, you have to know how things are made, or at least the principles behind how they look. For anyone who wants to draw from their head, this exercise proved to be most helpful, although I found it quite stressful the first time. You're not getting graded, so I'm sure it will be much more relaxing. This also helps you get more control of whatever you like to draw/paint in and forces you to notice how light falls on objects.

Here's the list of the principles that makes the things around us look 3D

Highlight is where the light hits directly. The shinier the object the more distinct the highlight.
Light side is the side where the light hits.
Midtone is where the sphere is turns away from the light, but not completely.
Dark side is the shadowed area of the sphere facing opposite the light.
Reflected light bounces up onto the darkside of the sphere and makes it lighter, but not as light as the light side.
The shadow, well, you know that one, but it is the area on the ground that the light is blocked by the object
The last one that I don't actually mention in the video is the "Dark Accent" it's at the base of the ball, where no light can reach, or at least, very little light.

Take a perfectly round sphere, rubber ball, little beachball (or as close as you can get) and light it with some lightbulb. Make sure that you can see where the highlight hits. You will have seven different areas of "Form" that make that sphere look round.

I started out just lightly putting in a circle, sketched in the shadow, (as round as I could get it) and then split the circle into the the five main areas of form.

The video below shows how to capture all seven parts in a sphere. Getting all seven in the right spots makes it look real. It really doesn't quite come together until the end.

The next video has the same principles only for a cube. I never had realized, or I had forgotten, that cubes have highlights, dark accents, and reflected light, just the same as a sphere. I had only really thought of them as lightside, midtone, darkside and shadow.

If you try it in pencils, make sure you have a 6b around if you want to get those dark darks.
If you try it in charcoals, make sure you don't smudge your paper and build to your darks. It's much easier to add more charcoal if it needs to be darker than to erase it off. Charcoal just likes to smear.

Best of luck.