Idaho Winter

 

Oil on Canvas , 36 x 24
 

Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle

 

Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle by Beatrix Potter

My rendition of Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle

 

I love Beatrix Potter's work, so today I wanted to draw one of her characters. This is using colored pencils and pastel pencils. I forgot to add a background to her, so I'll do that right now.

Learning to use watercolor

 

 

So I'm learning how to use watercolor. The mouse was copied from someone else's blog. It helped me understand how he layered the color. I created the owl from a picture I found, after I understood the idea that watercolor doesn't have to "fill in the blanks". It's a little like sketching. Fill in only what you need to.

 

My natural instinct is to keep going and be as detailed as possible, so in a way, I'm retraining how I think about painting.

Dahlia and the Bear

 

So I have a lot of downtime on my hands at the moment, so I've thrown myself into painting. This is an Impressionistic Dahlia. The orange really pops because of the background. Blue is the opposite of Orange on the color wheel, so it's going to really stand out.

I saw a sketch of his bear on the internet, so I free handed him onto a painted background. He's really cute.

Two New Paintings

I was inspired by a local Coeur d'Alene painter I met named Tom Hanson who does abstract acrylic paintings. I've been trying to branch out and add a lot of texture to my paintings through mixed media or by pressing objects into the paint.

Here are my two latest paintings. (Again the color isn't as vibrant as it is in person)

This is an abstract of the view of the mountains out my back door.



This one is really washed out for some reason. The painting in person has a lot more depth to it and looks like a light at the end of the tunnel.

White Tail Buck

This is a drawing of a White Tail Buck. I drew the picture from a normal photograph, but I tried to draw only the shawdows.

Watercolor, Not As Easy As You Think

Brent gave me a watercolor set for Christmas, so I've been watching Youtube videos to learn some techniques. Watercolor gives an ethereal yet natural quality to a picture. I was really excited to start using it. Plus the clean up is so easy!

I thought this medium would be easy to use because you paint with it as a kid. I mean you just add some water and start painting right?!
Come to find out, watercolor it's one of the most difficult mediums. Manipulating water and thinking about a picture in terms of layers is not something I'm used to.

I'm hoping to take a Beginner's art class at the local college in April. Learning some basic techniques is really going to be helpful.

Sketch of Max Yawning

Here is a sketch of Max yawning. I always think of this picture when I think of him. I miss him.

Old Rabbit vs New Rabbit

So Rabbit #1 is painted by Arthur Frost (who also illustrated "Alice in Wonderland"). I love his rabbit and how casual he is. I thought I'd give him an updated wardrobe. His head might be a little bit big, but rabbits do have big heads. I think it's really that his eye is too big. He looks a little chipmunk like.

2011 Christmas Card, "The Snowmouse"

Inspired by Beatrix Potter, I drew "The Snowmouse".

Colored Pencil

Mouse in a Sock

Drew my little mouse friend this afternoon. I'm planning on drawing my Christmas card, so I'm sketching to see what will work.

Bubbly, Bubbles

Acrylic/Oil on canvas

Flowers - Abstract

The background on this painting is watered down acrylic spounged on in layers. Then I painted the flowers with oil, so that the colors would pop.

I really enjoyed creating this painting and mixing the types of mediums. The picture doesn't quite show the texture of the acrylic spounging. It looks very cool next to the painted flowers.

Mouse and the Berry series

The Dragonfly bringing the mouse a berry.




















Down goes the berry and off goes the dragonfly.




















Mouse eats his fill and takes a nap.

The Knight Family Tree

This is a family tree of the Knight Family. (The picture is a little blurry)

I love these little birds.

4x4, Oil on wood block

Storytime

I painted this picture for my friend Shelly who is having a baby girl in another month. I found how to make little birds and fell in love with painting them. I've done another bird picture which I'll post soon.

I really enjoyed painting a more "cartoon" like picture. It was fun to paint things that were cute.

8x10, Oil on canvas

The Heart of God

I was inspired after hearing the testimony of Brian Welch who was the lead guitarist for Korn ( a heavy metal band). He was mentioning that he got to a point where he reached the end of himself and asked Jesus for help quiting his drug addiction. At that point he felt the love of God wash over him. I really wanted to just paint that; the greatness of God's love and the richness of it.

"The love of Christ is rich and free, fixed on his own eternally" William Gatsby

Dandylion in the Wind

Here is the Dandylion painting. Still have a little bit of work on the background, but for the most part it's done. I learned a couple things while painting this one. I could use Burnt Sienna as a dark shadow for Yellow ochre. I was trying to use the dark brown I have to darken the yellow ochre, but it kept turning grey. I pulled out the Burnt Sienna and it was perfect.

I also learned to smudge and make something look like it's there even though it's not. The white part of the dandylion and the bulb of the stem have this. I had to smudge a lot of little circles and blend them in to create a textured round object.

Cropped Lemon Branch Painting

The painting of this is much bigger and there are two other lemons. My camara made them look like I didn't blend the colors together so I cropped this one.

I really like how my White Rose painting turned out so I thought I'd try something similar with lemons. Black and white with a hint of yellow.

Small Flower Drawings