Bridge over the American River

Today was such a beautiful day in Sacramento, I just had to get outside.  I've been cooped up inside because of rain or just being to cold to go out. (Ha, ha! I know I'm talking low 50's here. I'm just spoiled with California weather)  I have just been trying to get over this creative block that prevents me from even getting started.  But the good part of this is that I'm actually caught up on my blogging and I actually did this TODAY! (Not last month or a couple of weeks ago like I normally start) 

 It has been a while since I was out painting along the American River, but I am drawn to this peaceful strip of land amidst the hustle and bustle of Sacramento.  The Watt Avenue Bridge is one of those spots that the two converge.  I particularly liked the pattern of light and dark created by the support beams, and especially the triangles of afternoon light formed by the sun peeking under the bridge.

I've been working on different techniques such as mixing the color directly on the paper and using a dry brush. I like the way the dry brush strokes on the bottom left created the appearance of the sun shimmering off the rapids in the water.  I'm still working on being patient enough to let areas of the painting dry before laying down the next layer. Sometimes the resulting "bleed" creates a nice effect, like the trunk of the tree on the left. Other times its not so good (under the middle of the bridge).  I also feel there are some perspective issues on the bridge...next time I will need to bring a ruler or straight edge to keep my lines and perspective straight!

Model painting January

Back to Patris Art Studio for more figure drawing opportunities!  I'm not much of a plein aire fan when its cold  or the weather is unpredictable so I've been working indoors. There was quite a crowd there, so I know I'm not the only one that feels that way! Plus I can't pass up  the chance to have a free model every second Saturday.  I find the challenge more in the clothing than the figure.  This particular time, the model is wearing a fur jacket and hat (faux fur, I hope). The sheen on the jacket is difficult to capture as well as the texture of the collar. I like the way I was able to capture the "letter" and the bench she was on through negative painting.

dry erase pen  vs. vis-a-vis pen

 
The second drawing was a detail of the face of the same pose (since it was a long pose). I tried the Expo pen again to continue experimenting with it.  I did a little test in the bottom right corner to check how much it would bleed when wet: first with the Expo dry erase pen and then with a Vis-a-vis pen (also by Expo by the way). The dry erase held up much better to the water. The picture turned out a little "cartoony" but I like it.  It is definitely a different style for me. I also felt more confident with my washes without worrying about losing detail.
 I noticed the I've been stuck on profiles so I'll have to get there early next month so I'm in front and not on the side of the model again! Can you tell it's the same model from my December sketches?

That's me on the FAR left! Photo by Patris

Leilani's Competition

It's always fun to try something new. This competition that Leilani Joy put together fell right into that category: use one of Leilani's templates to create a character (full details on her website).  

Definitely not my typical landscape drawings! I thought it would be a good opportunity to get my 15 year old daughter involved in some art, too. I want her to have a chance to explore her creativity now and not wait as long as I did!

 She decided to use colored pencil for her character.

I stuck with watercolor (we all have our comfort zones!) The first one looks like it needed some defining lines so on the second one, I started by outlining the figure with Expo pen just to try it out.  This was an idea I had gotten from David Peterson. He likes using it because the ink doesn't bleed with the water... I like the effect, but I thinkI needed a finer point. 

There was definitely a difference from my regular painting plein air or from a photo. This required me to create it from my imagination, not something I've excersiced recently. I'll have to practice that one...

I also need to learn how to apply make-up to make the eyes pop! Ha,ha! Just kidding

I ended up printing the templates onto plain copy paper and not onto watercolor paper. This was a challenge because the paper's absorbancy was SO poor.  The color ran, the paper warped and wrinkled...I'm sticking with my watercolor paper!

Check out Leilani's website http://www.leilanijoy.com/

Model sketching December

I haven't done a drawing from a model for over 20 years, back when I was in college. So in the spirit of trying new things, I went to Patris Studio and Gallery (formerly Studio S12 but renamed due to moving to a new location on 26th St). The great thing is that every second Saturday of the month, they have a free model sitting from 3-6:00 pm. The host of the event is Patris, a very sweet and artistic lady, that makes you feel right at home.  She has a lot of her artwork displayed in her gallery as well as work from several other artists - quite impressive works!

The model was doing one long pose, but I decided to just do some pencil drawings to start. When I went to look for my watercolors, I had forgotten them, but I had some pastels instead. So I thought they worked well as just a background color. Since the model wasn't moving, I decided I needed to move to get some different perspective.  There were so many other artists at the studio taking advantage of this opportunity that the choices were limited, so I ended up all the way on the side where the model's profile had direct lighting.

I definitely had a good time at this studio. I'm going to put this on my calender for next month!  Patris offers classes, other model sessions, and more...check out her blog  at http://patrisstudiogallery.blogspot.com/

Wet on wet (on wet!)

On a cold winter Saturday morning, I went down to the American River to practice some wet-on-wet techniques. The sky was more of a dark grey, and the trees were probably not as green as the color I picked, but I was just laying some background color in to represent the far bank of the river. The near bank was just mud and grass so I started with laying down brown and some green highlights.

At this point, I've been wetting just the area of paper that I'm going to color and then laying in the color, moving it around to cover the space, tilting my pad slightly to allow gravity to help. I tried to keep a thin area of dry paper between each section to keep it all from bleeding together (had some trouble with that on the far left). 

And then it started to rain! So my very wet paper started to get even more wet, but each raindrop was creating a nice effect on my painting. (I wonder if I could recreate the effect in a controled environment?)  At some point though, I had to cover it for fear of complete destruction of the peice, but in the process of trying to protect it from the rain I touched the wet paper causing blemishes on the left side.

So the question that I have now: Where do I go from here? Add in details- trees, reeds -to cover the blemishes and finish the scene I started? Or, as I look at this scene now, I'm more reminded of a starry night on Lake Tahoe.  Or just paint the Golden Gate Bridge and make the foreground San Francisco and the background Marin County. What do you think?

Milk Farm

On a sunny fall day last fall, I went on a plein aire meet-up hosted by David Peterson.  The subject of the meet-up was the Milk Farm sign in Dixon, CA.  We always drive by it on the way to the Bay Area at 70 mph, and wonder why it’s there.  There used to be a restaurant built in the 1920’s where they would have milk chugging contests, all-the-milk-you-could-drink for 10 cents, and a record holder wall for those who drank the most!   It closed in 1986 due to damage from a wind storm and never reopened.  Residents of Dixon wanted to save it as a historical landmark, but all that remains today is the sign in a weed infested parking lot.  Even the sign is showing signs of dilapidation.

So after squeezing through a hole in the fence surrounding it, I set up my chair and pulled out my sketch pad.  I usually just start sketching right onto the watercolor paper, but since I had a sketch pad with me, I decided to use it.  The interesting thing is that I found I had more freedom knowing it was just on the sketch pad and if I messed up, no big deal.  After I finished my sketch, I thought I would add a little color with a quick wash of blue in the sky.  Well, the sketch pad didn’t take water very well, just pencil next time. Onto the watercolor paper…

I actually liked the outline sketch better on my sketch pad.  The one was a little stiffer. Is that because I was a little more worried about not erasing on the water color paper? Probably. I have noticed that too much heavy erasing affects the absorbency of the paper. 

The lettering on the sign had to be the trickiest part for me.  The first part was just to have a steady hand.  The other part was the spacing and centering. “Milk” and “Farm” was easy enough with only 4 letters but when I got to “Restaurant”, I actually started by putting the “au” in the middle and worked out from there.  Still there was still extra space on the right side.

David Peterson Painting the Milk Farm Sign

The great thing about this meet-up was that there were 3 or 4 other artists there that were very friendly and supportive. David Peterson, the host of this particular gathering, has always impressed me with his wet on wet style...very loose but somehow incorporates the details as well.  He says his secret is the Expo dry erase pens: they don't bleed with water.  I'll have to try that next time.

Another artist that was there was Linda Hao.  She doesn't usually work in watercolor but I thought her watercolor style looked similar to mine.  What do you think? 

Watercolor by Linda Hao

Fishing at William B Pond

I went to William B Pond for the regular “1^st Sunday” meet-up of plein aire painters at 3:00 in the afternoon. There are tons on places to find inspiration here so it turns out I didn’t see any other artists, but sometimes that just takes the pressure off.  I found a spot on the hill above the fishing dock where a man was fishing with his young son (about 3 or 4 years old).  Now fishing is all a relative term because he was spending more time chasing after his son: keeping him from running off, keeping him from climbing the rail, keeping him out of his tackle box.  I kept thinking how he could expect a child sit for hours watching him fish?

I figured this man deserved a spot in my painting. Other than my self portrait, this was my first attempt at putting people into a painting. OK, well I cheated a little bit by sticking him in a chair and you only see his head, but it’s a start, right?

I  found the most challenging part of this was the railing on the dock. Do I paint the rail first and paint the background over it, between it? Or do I paint the rail in last over everything else? After experimenting a little, I figured out that painting it last was probably the best solution in this case. But being outside, it just wasn't drying and it got a little muddy.

By this point the dad had packed up, and the boy, barely being missed by a bike as he ran across the bike trail, was being yelled at as they headed out to the parking lot.

Sunset at William B Pond

Back in October, my favorite time of year here in Sacramento, I went for a evening stroll with my wife down by William B Pond to catch a gorgeous sunset. An added benefit of this particular evening was there was also going to be a harvest moon, the full moon that occurs closest to the autumnal equinox. This was called a harvest moon because it never gets completely dark between sunset and moonrise allowing farmers to continue harvesting late into the night (as well as letting us hike back to our car!).

The great thing about this time of day is that you see all kinds of colors in the sky and they continually change until it is dark.  These colors are all reflected in the calm waters of the pond to enhance the scene even more.  The problem with painting sunsets is the same reason that they are so amazing: the colors constantly change, it doesn't last very long and soon its dark!  Its hard to really get a good sense of the color even in a photograph (at least not with my camera). So, I just put down  a quick horizon and  then focused on the sky and the clouds. I need to work on my gradient coloring, blending the blue at the top of the sky with the reds at the horizon.

Locke, again!

Locke is one of those towns that just lends its self to creativity.  The buildings are so unique and the walkways throughout the town create these unusual perspectives.  The last time I was here, Painting Locke, I found myself challenged by the rules of perspective, which seem even more extreme down the long narrow main street of the town.  So this time, I put the vanishing point in the middle of the painting.  The details of the buildings was where the challenge laid this time.  I found that interpreting them into geometric shapes was the best solution.  And the negative spaces between created the supporting beams (as well as a buffer to keep the colors from bleeding together). 

The left side of the street was obscured from my view, so it didn't get any attention other than the shadows that were cast. I need to work on foreshortening  cars, but this was my first attempt at painting cars (putting cars into a painting!) so I thought I did pretty well. I liked the big yellow street sign at the end of the street so it got more emphasis in the painting than can be seen in the photo.

I think my favorite part of the painting, though, is the motorcycle in the foreground.  I was just experimenting with different shades of black and trying to get the essence of  the bike and its shadow without too much detail.