The Young Equestrian~Completed

Transparent watercolor on a half sheet of 140# Arches bright white CP paper.

I've been puttering away at this one for a couple of weeks now. I decided to veer from the more posterized reference I posted and instead play with unexpected colors. I probably should re-title this, A Horse's Tale (Tail?) I may darken the background more. I'm still unsure about that. As usual, I think it needs a few tweaks here and there but I'm considering this pretty much done.

The Young Equestrian~experiment with Elements 6

After cropping, applying the cutout filter and greyscaling the image. Gotta love technology.:)

View to the east. The original photo.

The view to the west.

During the peak Fall color season I took my camera and tripod and drove to a lookout at the end of Maple Grove Road, not far from my home. From this particular vantage point one can see for many miles in all directions. On a clear day Beaver Island is visible out in Lake Michigan, a 2 hour boat trip from the mainland. I decided to create a panorama using Photostitch for the first time. As I was setting up my camera several young ladies drove up hauling horse trailers and proceeded to get their horses ready for a Sunday autumn ride. I asked if I could photograph them and the horses and they were happy to oblige.

One photo really appealed to me. The youngest rider was so proud of her palomino(which is obvious in the picture)and I love photographing animals of any kind at odd angles so this image has it all as far as I'm concerned. Tonight I was playing in Elements, working out an idea for a Christmas card and decided while I had the program open to pull up the image of the young equestrian and her horse and experiment. I have problems seeing shapes(my eye still searches for detail) so I used the cutout filter to break the image down into...well, shapes! I was impressed with the results and may give this a go with paint.

Lucy & Ethel~Update

I decided to change the title of this piece. These two hens remind me of Lucy Ricardo and her friend Ethel Mertz of 'I Love Lucy' fame. I'm not sure I'm entirely happy with the background so I'm not ready to call this one complete yet. Cloudy day today so colors are not entirely accurate in the image but they're pretty close.

I'm also mulling over ideas for a new Christmas card for 2010. I'll probably wind up waiting until zero hour before pulling that project together like I did last year. If I'm really good at nothing else I AM a master of procrastination.

A Couple of Hot Chicks~WIP

I was going through some photos I took this past summer of my friends' chickens and found a good candidate for a painting. Chickens can be incredibly funny sometimes. I was snapping shots of an Isa Brown hen when another hen decided she wanted to get into the picture, too. I still have the chicken wire to paint, the Isa Brown to finish and more work on the background in general. I didn't plan a background beforehand this time. Sometimes I let the main subject/subjects dictate that for me. I'd rather not make it too busy and draw attention away from these two 'hot chicks'.