Watercolor – The Finish

The nose knows...It is so hard in watercolor to get all the values right on the nose, and with the added shadows, a challenge to say the least! I am pleased with this one and have called it finished.

This painting was accomplished with a limited palette which included only five colors. Red Rose Deep, Azo Yellow and three blues, Cerulean, Cobalt and Ultramarine. Some of the color mixing was allowed to occur on the paper. This color fusion is one of the interesting characteristics of watercolor art.

The lips and the bottom of the face were the last elements to be painted. Some interesting design element to note is the predominant eye is the center of interest. It is located in the golden mean. For me, this was a fun painting that captured her personality.

Carolyn:

Watercolor – One Still in Progress

While many watercolor artists will not lift or scrub to adjust values. 300lb. Arches will take a lot if you know the techniques. While the hair is giving me a hard time, it is finally coming along. Now, I need to finish the face, and then start adjusting values.

While this is not a step-by-step work in progress, it is where I stopped.

Work Still in Progress:

Watercolor – Two New Portraits and One in Progress

After recovering from some medical problems, my muse has finally returned. It is funny how mood can affect your painting and your urge to paint. I am feeling well and back in the groove; much has been going on lately. More soon…

The first painting is my first attempt at a full sheet portrait (23” X 30”) on a new brand of paper I have not tried before. From now on, I plan to stay with Arches, the paper that works the best for me.

Smile II



















The second painting is another view of my friend Karen. This one is on ½ sheet, Arches CP 140# paper. I had more fun painting this one because I didn’t have to constantly think of how the paint would react with the paper!

Karen II



















Finally, this young lady was kind enough to pose for several reference photos and like most of my paintings at this stage, I’m not sure how it will turn out. It is on 300 lb. Arches rough paper, ¼ sheet size. Stay tuned in...

Work in Progress (un-named)

Watercolor Update - 02

Recently I conducted a workshop on painting watercolor portraits here in Central Florida. The goal of the workshop was to teach methods and techniques of painting the portrait in a loose, fresh and quick manner. This method requires unique brush control and moisture control.

Here is the demonstration painting I did for the workshop. It is a duo-tone (two color) painting of my son Andy:


















While painting a loose portrait has its unique advantages, I also like to paint portraits in a tighter more realistic manner using some loose elements. Here is a portrait of a good friend Karen:


















Here is a dog portrait I recently did for a lady. It was a gift to her husband, a soldier, who is returning from Iraq. The dog was retired from the Army after ten years of service. Typically know as an IED (road side bomb) sniffer, this dog, saved her handler's life on many occasions. It was painted as a tribute to her service. When the Army retired the dog, she was given to the handler's family. For me, a dog lover, it is a wonderful story with a very happy ending. Soon both the dog and soldier will be re-united after their service and return home. She is a Belgian Malinois...I painted her proud...of her service.

Watercolor – Update 01

Sorry it has been awhile since I have posted here. Life can get in the way of art sometimes. If you have been reading my blog, you know that transparent watercolor is the media I love. Lately, my watercolor journey has taken strange turns, and I had little time to paint over the last few months. I plan to change that as this year goes on…..and, most importantly, will be updating this blog regularly.

Here are a few of my recent painting and I hope they hold your interest.

First a new face since portraiture has to be high on my list of things I like to paint.

This is one of my dear friends. Both he and I do a lot of plein air painting in the Central Florida area. He is a character, and loves to flirt with the ladies. I had fun capturing him in this magical medium called transparent watercolor.


















A good artist friend, Roger in the UK, allowed me to use his reference photos of Venice. Thank you Roger, your digital images have inspired me.

Watercolor – Interesting Faces

Often I find myself looking at interesting faces. While the placement of eyes, nose and mouth follow some standard rules, it is the facial structure and texture of faces that I find a challenge to paint in transparent watercolor. Most often I paint from reference pictures which allow me to make some measurements during the drawing process to be sure the feature placement is correct. Changing the lips just a 1/16th of an inch will most often dramatically change the expression and perhaps loose the true portrait of the person. I use an engineering scale and dividers to check my drawings. While this can be time consuming, as Charles Reid has noted in his book, drawing is 80% of a good watercolor painting.

I believe in honing my drawing skills and go to various open life studios once a week. It is a bonus for me when the group chooses long poses as it allows me to draw and then paint in watercolor. As a musician practices scales to keep in practice, drawing from life is a necessity. Family and friends now duck out of sight when I have my sketch book or camera and approach them.

Here are a few recent painting. I hope you find them interesting too!

Watercolor – What is not to like about Boats?

Nautical scenes still hold my fascination. Although I have been concentrating on portraits lately, here are a few recent boat paintings that I like the final result.

I hope you find the scenes interesting too! The difficulty with painting a nautical scene, or for that matter a landscape, is to determine what to leave in and what to leave out! Many times you can just delete things from your reference and just focus on the central view. Other times the surroundings features support your central view, but you can paint those elements in a looser manner.

From Venice to Florida, nautical scenes are popular and not necessary a “guy” thing. So relax and enjoy the view.

Watercolor – Controlled Blooms - #2

Sorry I’m late getting back here but I have been involved in a wonderful art experiment. Since I am a traditionalist when it comes to transparent watercolor, and there are others world wide who enjoy traditional transparent watercolor.

While many watercolor artists despise blooms during the painting process as noted in my previous posting, I love them. By encouraging blooms through new techniques I have discovered, and then in painting many multiple layers of blooms, I have been getting interesting results. While I will let you decide if the results are interesting, I have added this techniques to my bag of methods and techniques in producing my art.

This new method has a lot to do with the timing of moisture control of the paper and the thinness or thickness of the paint applied in a “wet into wet” process for a given section of the paper. Then letting it dry and then repeating the process.

Watercolor - Controlled Blooms

My journey continues as I study the faces of interesting characters. My methods are evolving mainly due to my experimentation with what I call “controlled blooms.” Each new painting seems to be a discovery of methods and techniques that are moving me closer to my goal.

While many watercolor artists despise blooms during the painting process, I have been encouraging blooms through some of these newly discovered techniques, painting in many multiple layers of blooms. Much of this new method has to do with the timing of moisture control of the paper and the thinness or thickness of the paint applied in a “wet into wet” process.

I’ll leave the viewer to decide the merits of this new process. For me, I am as excited as I am obsessed with this finding. Above are some recent paintings that explore the process.

Sorry I am late in updating this blog, but I have been out of pocket lately. The next installment will show a Work-In-Progress (WIP) of one of the first paintings I used “blooms” for layering purposes. So stay tuned in…watch the magic!