Mallow flowers - map

Whew!  Well I FINALLY finished the map process of the mallow flower painting I'm doing.  I have got to find a quicker way of accomplishing this - it took WAAYYY too long considering that it was only the MAP!

Now while I admit that this is a decent drawing (and it should be), there are some tweaks I may still want to do before I start painting.  That being said though, I could definitely get this on some watercolour paper next and start picking my colours.

As far as picking up the pace on this step goes...I'm wondering if I should switch to markers for this step?  I know you can get dark, medium and light black markers (or grey) and that may pick it up for me.  Half of my time was spent trying to fill in the gaps to make more transitional gradients.  And as much as I like this project, I went through a bunch of my photos today and I found a good dozen more paintings I'd like to do.  Since I'd like to see these done in my lifetime, I am soooo going to change my process before I get bored of the projects!

Another site with free Art Lessons

In my never-ending quest to find awesome (and free) lessons to learn how to improve your own art, I was recently directed to this site:

http://www.livepaintinglessons.com/FREEPaintingColorLessons.php

These lessons are offered by New Zealand artist, Richard Robinson.  Now, he does offer sales of dvd videos as well, but there is free content to peruse :) (my favourite kind).  He mostly works in oils, but for most of the "theoretical" lessons like colour theory and design, composition and contrast, this isn't very important.

Take a moment to look through the site and see if there's anything of interest to you (no, I don't get any commission for directing you there, I just really like spreading the word where free education is concerned).

Have a great weekend!

Lessons with Curly-queues

I've been working on a grapevine thumbprint piece for the last few weeks and it's been a lot of fun!  I started with a design that was completely made up of continuous curving lines with some curling tips.  I had a LOT of trouble working in watercolour and creating a continuous line.  I ended up changing the design (which worked out really well as it had more of my style to it) by making the grapevines much stronger and more stable-looking, while at the same time not having to worry about continuous lines.

And then, because it's me, I went and got myself a grape leaf as an example so that the leaves on the vine could look less design-y and more realistic.  Last, but not least, were the curly-queues on the vines.  You know, the little "grippers" that help the grapevine cling to surfaces and trees.

I'd never painted a spiral before and like many things that look pretty, but are small and elegant, I thought "How hard can it be".... I'll just pause for a moment so you can get the laughter out of your system...the short answer is - it takes practice.  A spiral is a very easy thing to draw, be it in pencil, or marker, or even crayon, because the drawing part doesn't move.  A paintbrush, on the other hand, moves quite a bit (as it should) and takes some practice to get used to the different "feel".

An important lesson that I learned from painting this way is that you don't want to focus too much on where your brush is at the moment, but where you want the brush to go.  This makes for a more smooth transition of line, less mistakes, and it's just plain prettier to look at!  Of course, since my life seems to be full of "life lessons" lately, I couldn't help but also notice how this applies to life as well.

It's just as important in life to know where you're going and how you will get there, as it is to know where you are and what you're doing.  Too much focus on where you are will likely keep you quagmired in the muck (if you're in a bad place) and unable to see beyond the "now" to where you could be with a bit of effort.  And, as in art, it's important to look up from time to time, take a step back and make sure that you're still heading in the right direction.  Or even determine whether what you are doing is working for you (or your art piece)!

That's my spiel for today :)

Some thoughts on organizing and success

I have to apologize.  I was going to write this amazing entry today about all this stuff I learned from the internet and now I am at a complete loss as to what exactly I was going to write.  A lesson, I suppose, about making notes during the day when you are thinking about it and NOT at the end of a long day, with a headache, and a husband that keeps interrupting you every 2 minutes.  I'm sorry.

Ironically, I believe that one of the things I was going to talk about was improving the productivity of my day by scheduling/planning it out better.  I was on pinterest the other day and came across this really nice daily schedule (it even includes how much water to drink!) that I thought would help me to make the best use of my time.  I printed myself out a few copies today and started using it.  I'm disappointed in that what I have written and accomplished for the day seem woefully small, and doesn't reflect a 16 hour day to me.  Maybe I need to work out a few more kinks.  Anyway, here's the link to the site in case you'd like to try it out:

http://diyhshp.blogspot.ca/2013/01/home-management-binder-daily-calendar.html

There are similar ones out there, but they seem to cost money and this one's free :)

Another thing I found on pinterest was a 10 year goal setting worksheet from lululemon.  The reason this caught my eye is that I've been looking for ways to be more successful in life, personally, financially, and in my career.  And I've been paying attention to successful people and what they do.  A LOT of successful people seem to have come up out of nowhere.  I mean they weren't given the business by their Dad (no offence meant to any out there that have), they grew from nothing into a success.  How did they do that?!  Turns out one of the biggest factors to determine success is not letting ANYTHING stop you from your dream.  Whatever the dream, no matter how incredible and outrageous it seemed to be, these people determined a way, a path even, to make that dream a reality.  How did they do that?  Well this goal setting worksheet is a good first step, in my opinion:

http://www.lululemon.com/education/goalsetting?mnid=mn;education;goal-setting

What I like about it is that you start at the 10 year goal and work your way backwards in time to what you need to do now, and in 1 year, and in 5 years to be able to reach your goal.  Of course filling out the form isn't the end - you also have to DO THE WORK (insert ominous thunder and lightning).  I fully intend to fill my copy out and pursue the path to success.  Hmm, that almost sounds like it has an echo to it.  Like it should be in italics with quotation marks..."the Path to SUCCESS"...okay, it's hokey, but worth a try at any rate.

Do you have any tools that help you succeed, keep organized, and productive?  I'd love to hear your thoughts :)

Mallow flowers - planning

If you're looking at the blog site, I hope you'll notice that I've fixed the header (yay)!  Took a fair amount of work and a bit of CSS code (which I've never done before), but I think it's here to stay.  Which is good, because I have other things to spend my time on!

As I said in my last post, I started working on the mallow flowers again.  This time, I decided that for once I would follow all the appropriate steps for a finished painting - no shortcuts.  Although this will definitely tax my patience (it's a long process and I don't work very quickly), I think ultimately it will be worth it!  So...back to basics.  The first step in planning a painting (after choosing and arranging your subject) is the drawing.

I figured that since the drawing was going to have to be accurate and there will be a lot of work shading, etc that I would not simply use sketch paper.  I pulled out a sheet of one of my nicer drawing papers and mounted it to a board.  I began by laying down the rough circle and elliptical outlines of the flowers and where I'd like them to be on the paper.  From there I started adding some of the detail like the centres, stems, and leaves.

As you can see (even with the blurry image), it's a very rough drawing but you can see where things are headed.  I neatened up the lines, erased the placement circles, and prepared to start the detail!

Because this is a map and not a final drawing, I thought it might be safe enough to make this part of the project more portable.  I am pretty slow at this, and a lot of my time is spent in the family room with the girls.  I'd like to be able to pick up the picture during slow moments (i.e. when the girls are watching tv) and still be in the room with them.  I tried it today after the girls went to bed.  It wasn't too bad working on the couch, though I will have to sharpen my pencils before I come down - they get dull pretty quick.

Here's my progress so far.  I'm trying to establish where the light, medium, and dark tones are, as well as where the hard and soft edges need to be.  It's interesting in that I'm having to make some changes on the fly as I'm working from a photo reference and of course the light in the photo can blur edges that I will need to harden in the painting.  I'm only working with 3 pencils: HB, 4B, 6B to establish my tones.  I also want to pay attention to the contrast of the piece.  I have some good flow in the design having given an "s" shape to the object placement.

I'm more comfortable in my drawing skills than my painting skills, so I like that this "map" is allowing me to learn the details of the piece before I set a brush to it.  My last real flower painting used short cuts - I used photo imaging software to see the grey tones and did a rough sketch directly onto the watercolour paper, and I had to make quick judgements and decisions while my paper was drying and other crises were creeping up.  While it made for an exciting project, I can't say that I do well under that kind of pressure continuously.  I'm hoping that if I can get my ego around doing things in order, that I will have a better time painting.

I'm Back!

Wow!  I go away for a week or two and everything goes to pot!  I have absolutely no idea what's going on with my header here, but I'm working on fixing it (please bare with me).

Okay, so where did I leave off last time...so much has been going on and I have a lot to talk about today.  Right, I was working on a botanical illustration of my mallow plant.  Hmm.  How do I put this...it didn't go well.  And it wasn't the drawing part that I had a problem with, strangely.  My brain just did NOT like the level of analytical pressure that I was applying to the project.  Which is really weird because I am a VERY analytical type person.  But when I walked away from my sketch (which I hated), I had an extremely hard time getting back to it.  I actually avoided my studio for a couple of days before I figured out what was going on!

So, I took matters into my own hands and completely erased the image.  Of course by then my flowers had turned towards the window and some had wilted and basically my setup was gone.  Now I'm sure you are thinking to yourself "Why didn't she just do another one from a different angle then?", and that is a very good point.  I'm not sure why, but there was added pressure there too.  I felt I would've had to rush to get the drawing and painting done before it all changed again and I didn't like that.  Fortunately I took a picture of the plant prior to drawing so I do have an image to work from (yay) and I've not completely given up on this project!

Now you may have been asking yourself "If she hasn't been drawing or painting, what's she been doing with her time lately?  Was she on a vacation or something?".  Well, I wasn't on a vacation.  For a long time now I have wanted to start my own website.  Not just a blog site, but a proper website with a real domain name and everything.  It would have all my drawings, paintings, and illustrations and merchandise for people to buy and enjoy my works.  My sister sent me a link to a blog/site called www.collegeinfogeek.com.  This guy is amazing.  He straight up shows how to easily and quickly set up your own personal website (without knowing HTML).  From hosting, to registering a domain, to working with wordpress and what add-ons you might want.  So basically I've been doing that.  My site's not completely done yet - I'm giving myself a few months to set it up properly, but if you'd like to have a look you can click the link below:

www.amandawiklund.com

When it's ready, I'll put a button on this blogsite to connect you to my website :)

As well as the How to Make your own Website page, he's also got a How to Make your own Blog page.  Another godsend, as I've been searching for a way to make my blog more interesting and useful, not just to others, but to myself as well.  His information and advice on this have given me a LOT to think about!  I want to start a blog that has information for other beginning/intermediate artists who are interested in learning more about what it's like to take the next steps, to level up their work, and decide if that's what they want to do or not.  I want to learn it too!  I think there should be a place where we can learn what those steps are, without spending a fortune going to college/university.  Especially for those of us that are narrowing down how they want to spend their time!  That's my goal anyway.

I haven't decided whether I will keep this blog going when I start the new one.  They will be so completely different from each other.  This one is more of a journal of my experiences and efforts, while the other will be more about research and learning the practical side of being an artist (I need a name for the blog too - you wouldn't think that would be hard, but it IS).  I won't likely start the second blog for a few months anyway as I have a few things I really need to finish first, but I have a LOT of thoughts about my first and second posts!!

I'm curious to know what you think about this?  Would that kind of blog appeal to you?  Any suggestions for a name?  Should I keep writing here as well?  What do you think of my new website so far?

A few days after I had done all this reading, and I had gotten so frustrated with my mallow painting, I was looking at pinterest and admiring all the artists with their loose, paint-runny, soft-edged, negative-style paintings (you know the ones) and had one of those "middle of the night thoughts".  You know, the ones that sound brilliant until you try it?  Ya, well...I thought to myself "I obviously was over-thinking the mallow painting.  Let's go the opposite direction and just, sort of, let the painting flow.  No real planning or design, just paint it.  How hard could it be?"  Famous last words...they say a picture is worth a thousand words, so let's let the picture tell you everything:

I don't do well with zero planning (as you can plainly see).  This is true in my life as well.  I'm taking this painting as a reminder that structure is necessary in all things.  It acts as bones to the body, giving it form and substance.  Allowing things to move in a more desirable manner and direction.  Too much structure builds a cage that you can't get out of, too little and you're spinning like a top with no real direction or focus.  So, I will begin again.  This time with a bit more planning, a touch more structure, and focus.  And I will show you some progress in my next post :)

Botanical Illustration - Part 1

Today I set forth into my garden and cut myself 2 branches of mallow with flowers and buds, and 1 branch of leaves (because they were really big and looked different than the others).  I put them all in a vase (did you know that mallow stems have teensy tiny thorns?  you don't even see them - until they STICK YOU!) with water and went into my studio.

I figured that the drawing was not a sketch and so I pulled out some decent quality drawing paper and taped it to a drawing board.  I pulled out my notes from Wednesday's reading of Chapter 4 in "The Art of Botanical Painting".  After some deliberation, I turned on my desk light and tried to orient my flower arrangement to an appealing style.

My notes said that I was to take copious measurements of the flower (vertical x horizontal), the stem, the leaves, and the flower centres.  They didn't say what grade of pencil to use, so I checked the book.  I was surprised to learn that it recommended using a mechanical pencil with 0.3mm leads.  I don't have a 0.3mm mech pencil, so I pulled out my lowest - a 0.5mm.  It was weird drawing with a mechanical pencil again.  I haven't drawn with a mech pencil in a very long time and it took some time to get used to it again.

The book said to divide the page in half horizontally and to place the flower(s) in the lower part of the top half.  Also, try not to draw with broken lines, but with long continuous strokes (unless you are hatching or cross-hatching of course).

After about an hour of measuring, re-measuring, drawing, erasing, and a lot of squinting, I gave up for the day.  My head was threatening to burst with all the extra effort and eye-strain.  I expected there to be a learning curve in regards to the technique, but I wasn't expecting so much demand on me physically.  Hopefully my efforts will improve next time!

Botanical Illustration

For my next trick, I'm planning a proper botanical illustration.  This isn't a new idea for me.  I've wanted to do a proper botanical illustration for ages!  I do have an ultimate goal in mind (aside from a finished illustration of course :).  To help in my efforts to become a professional artist, I have been told by many different sources, that you must join professional associations.  I want to join the BAC or Botanical Artists of Canada.

You don't necessarily need to be a professional illustrator to join the BAC.  It only costs $30/yr and you will then be entitled to enter their juried exhibitions.  It's also important to enter exhibitions and win awards!  The more awards, the more you prove how good you are and the more you can charge :)!

I'm using the book "The Art of Botanical Painting" done in association with the Society of Botanical Artists.  They are a very big deal in botanical illustration circles worldwide.  They offer a program to teach you how to do it distance ed.  It takes >2yrs, and you get an automatic admission to the SBA.  They are much harder to get into than the BAC.

My first task is a drawing of a flower, from Chapter 4.  I'm thinking of drawing a mallow plant that's currently in my garden.  With fall coming on, flowers are getting to be a bit scarce and beggar's can't be choosers!

I've included the websites for both the BAC and the SBA so you can see the level of skill I'm aiming for:

http://www.botanicalartistsofcanada.org/

http://www.soc-botanical-artists.org/

Poppies complete!

So today I worked some more on the final details and finishing touches of the poppies.  I darkened the background (which I think really makes the flowers "pop"), and I added some extra vermillion and cad orange wash to the flowers as they were looking more yellow than red.  I did a little more lifting in specific areas too. 

Again, the picture shows better than the actual painting.  Mostly, you can see how overworked some parts are in the original, but that's just because I'm still relatively new to the painting aspect.  With more practice, I expect to get better at getting the effect I want the first time :)

Anyway, I can't think of any more damage to do to this piece, so I'm calling it done!  Poppies are a much more difficult flower to paint I think than most others, specifically because of all the folds and creases in the petals.  It was a fun project to try though and I learned a lot.  My next poppy will be that much better!!