Wanton and Wild Creativity

With Hallowe'en approaching and the fall leaves in the air, my brain has been working overtime with creative ideas!  This has been both a positive and a negative.  I believe that any creative idea is a good one as it helps to exercise a very important part of the brain.  The trouble comes (for me anyway) when I have so many ideas that it seems like I am surrounded by a thousand butterflies and I just want to catch one, without breaking it!

Usually when this happens to me I do one of two things: I either frantically grab at whatever's closest and easiest and then ruin it, or I do nothing and am disappointed.  Well, actually either way I'm disappointed.  Whenever I grab at something I tend towards the project that's been bugging me the most.  Something that I should take my time over and think about.  But instead I do a half-bummed job of it and end up frustrated and disappointed.

I guess the trick needs to be to find a way to channel all that creative energy into a really great project.  Instead of trying to catch one butterfly in a swarm of one thousand that all look alike, to see where the most unique butterfly is.  It may not even be in that swarm you are focusing on.  I don't catch butterflies, as a rule.  I prefer to watch them from a distance.  But I do know that any time you want to catch something precious, it's best to find one that's a bit more isolated from the crowd.  Unless you're eating it of course, then it shouldn't matter, but I digress...

So, you can guess from all this rambling that I haven't started a new project yet.  I have been very productive doing sorting and organizing, collecting, cleaning and storing.  But no real project just yet.  I wonder how others deal with this type of thing.  Has it ever happened to you?  Please tell me I'm not alone in this!!

Fall Leaves Inspiration

I went out today, in the cold and rain, with my camera, in search of amazing leaf images.  I did not come away disappointed!!  The area I live in is awash in all the colours of fall.  We are fortunate enough to live near a forest trail, and every day when I walk my daughter to school, we walk through a small section.  To be surrounded by so many reds, oranges, yellows and golds, with just a hint of green here and there - fall sets fire to the trees and the imagination!

I will be the first to admit that I'm not much of a photographer, but I can make do with the pictures I take to try and create paintings from them.  I've also been watching lots of videos teaching colour theory.  What I want to create from the pictures I took today is a simple painting, hopefully taking full advantage of all the warm colours of fall.  Maybe it will help me feel warmer in the coming cold months of winter :) 

Lessons in Charcoal

In my last post I included a link to a youtube video showing how to use charcoal to map out a landscape watercolour painting.  I found it very inspirational and immediately set to work on a piece that had been in my pocket for some time:

This is modified from a picture I took of my daughter playing on the rocks at the stream near our house.  I felt it was a very busy composition so I used a matte that I had in my studio (for just such a purpose) to see if I could simplify it at all:

I really like the way the simplified version looks so far.  And the cool thing was it only took me a couple of hours to sketch this out!  It was incredible!!  I was so jazzed about how it turned out that I thought I'd try it out on a portrait I've been wanting to do.  

If you are looking for the image of how that idea turned out, you will look in vain.  Suffice to say that it turned out very poorly.  There's a thing in computer graphics termed "the uncanny valley".  It's when you get a picture of a face that is just so disturbing to look at because it's just "not right".  You've seen some of the talking humanoid robots that are supposed to look human, but there's something just not right about them?  That's it.  Well, my portrait looked like that.  I couldn't even look at it to fix it, that's how bad it was.

I won't lie - I was very disappointed.  So much so that I doubted my abilities and drawing sucks anyway, blah, blah, blah.  After a while, when my brain calmed down a little, I came to realize 2 things: 1) the demonstration was for a LANDSCAPE not a portrait - likely for good reason, and 2) that I need a better method of quickly sketching out portraits.  

The problem with portraits is that they need to be accurate.  There are numerous ways of getting that accuracy, and I've tried out a bunch of them.  One method I liked to date is using a grid to transfer/draw the portrait.  The only flaw with this method (other than having to draw all the lines and then erase them afterward) is that you really need a LOT of grids to have an accurate drawing - the more squares the better.  Then I watched a video by Carrie Stuart Parks on drawing animals and I found a new way - using a proportional divider.  It allows you to take measurements of say a specific spot on a small image and enlarge it proportionally to a larger drawing (with out needing to do math! Yay).  

I had no choice, I had to find and order one right away.  And now I can't do any portrait drawing until it's delivered in a few weeks :(  Whatever will I do?  Everything I can think of drawing right now seems like it would come out sooo much better with the divider!  Well...I guess I do have a map of a painting that I could do, don't I?  Hmmm.  We'll just have to see :)

Video tutorial and Serendipity

So this really cool thing happened to me last week.  Do you remember in my post about mapping out the mallow flowers, I complained that it took WAAAYYY too long to do and that I needed to come up with a faster method (if not, click here to read that post http://artbyamandaw.blogspot.com/2013/09/mallow-flowers-map.html)?  Well, last week I got an email from Philip Davies of Arttutor.com with a video on how to do pen and charcoal sketches.

Have you ever had a V8 moment?  Am I aging myself by using that statement?  If you don't know what it is, I'm afraid you will have to look it up.  Anyway, after watching the video I smacked my head so hard I almost concussed myself!  Talk about "Durrr"!!  Why didn't I think of that?!  So, I plan to try out a whole bunch of these style sketches today on several paintings I have planned :)  I'm very excited to see how this will turn out!

Oh, and if you'd like to watch the tutorial, follow the link:
http://www.arttutor.com/blog/201310/how-draw-landscape-charcoal

Happy Drawing!!

Don't forget that I'm on Facebook now!  Follow the link to "like" my Facebook page.

Mallow flowers - Complete

What a crazy week!  It was Canadian Thanksgiving this past Monday and we had a bit of a family "to do" at our house this year.  We did the turkey and stuffing, and pumpkin pie and salad, so there was a lot of cooking and organizing and arranging to do.  On top of that, my youngest had a stomach bug that same day.  It actually wasn't as bad as it sounds, but it was interesting!

As well, I had a spur-of-the-moment job interview (which I think went really well), and a job skills test this past week.  And through all of this I was working through a flu/cold bug as well - is there such thing as an easy flu/cold?  If so, I didn't get that one :P.  So, with life being what it was this week, I didn't get much opportunity/energy to play in my studio.  However, I did finish the Mallow flowers!

I'm not 100% sure it's done, but again I can't think of what else I'd like to do to it, so I'm calling it done. The biggest flaw I have with it is that it's kind of boring to look at.  Do you know what I mean?  When you get right down to it, would you have this framed and displayed in your living room?  I'm not so sure that I would.  I think it lacks interest.  I considered adding a background, but all the ones I could think of (that weren't just a dark background), would've had to be incorporated in the drawing stage.

I'm going to post this on my Facebook page as well, where I will be asking for opinions on this piece.  I would really appreciate your thoughts on this, so please click here to offer yours!

 

Mallow flowers - Second wash

Managed to get a little painting in today (yay).  I worked on the mid-tone values of the flowers.  This added some much needed shape to the individual petals and helped define the flower placement.

Mallow flowers - first wash

Oh my goodness I have been such a busy bee the last few days!!! Whew!

If you are reading this from my blog page (if not, you should TOTALLY check it out!), I have made some changes.  Because I now have an official website for my portfolio, I decided to remove all the drawings and paintings from this site.  In place of these, I have created 3 new pages.  One is for my Impossible List.  This is my list of things/accomplishments I'd like to do at some point in my art/personal life.

Second, I moved my recommended tutorial books/dvds and websites to their own pages, cleverly entitled "Books/DVDs I Like" and "Recommended Sites".  This cleans up my blog page and allows me to add any relevant (hopefully) commentary for each book/dvd and website.  I hope you get a chance to look through these, and come back to them in the future for updates.

I have also set up a Facebook page, so you can also follow me on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/artbyamandaw

I hope to not only send out updates on my store (including sales), but also start giveaways.  So whenever you get the chance, check it out, like it, and stay tuned for more :)

Now, not only has my techy aspect improved over the last few days, but I have also managed to get some painting in!  This is the first wash of the mallow flowers.  I mixed the colours on the paper in a wet-in-wet technique.  I really like the way the leaves are turning out so far!

I would also like to take this opportunity to mention how easy it is to subscribe to my emails and to become a member.  Becoming a member allows me to feel a little less sad when I look at the members list, while subscribing to my emails gives you my blog posts directly to your email (no web surfing required).  Adding your name to either (or both) only takes a minute and both links can be found on my blog page and are super easy to find now that I've tidied everything up :)

Sale - This weekend only 70% off

In further news regarding my new online store, you can get 70% off your purchase this weekend only when you enter coupon code OCT70 at the checkout.  Here's the link again in case you missed it:

http://www.cafepress.com/amandawiklund

Happy shopping and have a great weekend!

Oh, and please don't forget to sign up as a follower if you like my blog :)


Sorry, folks, turns out I was a bit hasty in promoting this sale.  The cafepress coupon will not apply to my store products - that being said though, I am still going to offer a reduction in cost of 70% on the product price!  No coupon needed!  Product price reduction will start tonight and continue until I feel like changing it on Monday.

Happy shopping!

An Exciting Update!

I've spent a lot of time today making changes to my blog, my website and my NEW ONLINE STORE!  Yes, you heard correctly, I now have an online store where you can purchase my art on various items like shirts, bags, posters, jewellery and more.

You can visit my store by going to this link:

http://www.cafepress.com/amandawiklund

But if you can't remember the address, you can always get there from my official website:

www.amandawiklund.com

If you can't remember this address, visit the blog webpage and you will find a link among the tabs at the top.

The store is definitely worth a look - there's a lot of stuff in there, and I plan to update it regularly with more images as time allows.  Oh, and let me know if you feel something's missing from the store that you were expecting to find - chances are I can make it happen!

Happy Shopping!