Meet Peter Steele ~ commission

I've just completed a portrait of Peter Steele and it turned out rather well. I'm always a little surprised when I have success with people portraits, mostly because I so rarely do them. I will admit my first attempt failed. I couldn't find a suitable photo reference at first and a good reference is crucial. I also tried a non-conventional palette the first go around and it did not work. I had to try though.

The palette I did settle on was fairly typical for caucasian skin tones...Alizarin Crimson and yellow ochre. I do prefer DS Moonglow in place of cobalt blue because it will give me a full range of values. I added DS Quin. Burnt Scarlet and used it as the color on the lip area. This is the first male I've painted and I was able to create a more 'manly' lip color with this shade. The Quin. Scarlet also combined well with Moonglow to give me a nice neutral. For his hair, I did an under glaze of Indathrone blue, a staining color. I then mixed a black with the same blue and burnt sienna and went over the entire hair area, lifting out the blue highlights afterward with a stiff brush. 

Color Theory ~ pt. 2

In my second color study Yellow Ochre was used as the dominant, Ultramarine Violet and Prussian Blue as intermediates and Ultramarine Blue as the subordinate.

In this color study I used Prussian Blue and UB as the dominant colors, Yellow Ochre as the intermediate and Ultramarine Violet as the subordinate.

Here are a couple of split comp paintings recently completed. This time I used a semi neutral, in this case Yellow Ochre. Then I selected Ultramarine Blue, a teriary color and the compliment of Yellow Ochre. Within the range opposite of Yellow Ochre on the color wheel, I chose Ultramarine Violet(a secondary color) and another semi neutral, Prussian Blue. In hindsight I should've chosen Indigo blue because Prussian Blue lies just outside the correct range of hues.

Before I go on I'd like to make a correction. I mistakenly called DS Undersea Green a teriary color in my previous post. It probably should be considered a semi neutral, maybe even a neutral. Whatever it is, it's a combination of Ultramarine Blue and Quin. Gold Deep. It's neutral qualities worked well with my previous palette plus I like the color!

   

House on Thistle Downs ~ WIP color trial

Last night I did a quick sketch on a scrap of Yupo with Micron pen and Sharpie, then sprayed with a generous coating of Krylon workable fixative. Today I chose a palette of Ranger's Willow and Terracotta alcohol ink and did a pour, letting the colors mingle. Sharpie ink will bleed slightly when alcohol is applied and it creates a grey/blue color which I think works well with this palette. The workable fixative keeps the alcohol ink from spreading out and taking over. In short, it makes it slightly more manageable. I did drop in some rubbing alcohol with my oiler boiler to get the ink moving in the right direction. I noticed a few interesting textures appeared as the ink dried which I really liked. I'm not sure how that happened but suspect the workable fixative may have had something to do with it. I plan to try a few other color options but I really like this one at the moment.

A Cool Site

The site is called { Design Seeds } (link).  Anyone visiting can open the Palette Search page and create their own color combinations based on a single color. Many times I'm inspired by a certain color rather than a subject and I sometimes struggle with a complimentary palette for that color. 

I'm posting a screen cap of the palette page and have added colored arrows for reference. This nifty little site allows one to recreate their chosen color by adjusting the RGB levels indicated by the black arrows. You may even choose a theme such as Floral,  Edible, etc. (indicated by the green arrow). Fun! Hit 'go get it' which I pointed out with the blue arrow and various complimentary color combinations will appear below. Scroll down to see them all. Maybe you'll find some combinations you never imagined.

Daisytown Peeper Quartet ~ sketch

I kinda like this palette so far. It's a smidgeon of Pyrrol red(poured) with Quin. red, Quin. gold and streaks of a green I mixed up applied with a brush. I glazed over the green with Quin. red to tone it down. I drew a little daisy with soft pastel on my trial sample to see how well the palette worked with my subject.

This is my current working title until something better comes to mind. I finally completed the sketch after adjusting the tall daisy on the right three times. At first it looked too imposing so I reduced the size of the flower. Too small.:( Then I enlarged it slightly and still too small. Wrong, wrong, wrong.}:( Spent all afternoon tweaking this flower until I felt it meshed with the rest of the composition only to find I had returned it to the original size! Apparently it just needed some refining. Oh well...I don't ordinarily work this large (full sheet) plus this is a compilation of five+ photos so I'm discovering all kinds of challenges I've never faced before.

At the moment the plan is to use Arches HP w/c paper for this project. I'll be saving the white daisies and frogs with frisket film and will probably be doing some pouring of paint unless I can find a really big brush. Hotpress can be so tricky to work with but frisket film works best on this surface. Even though the setting is in a garden I want to avoid using a lot of green this time so I've been experimenting with various reds. With the green frogs I want to be careful not to let it become Christmas-y looking, though.

Sunflowers~Working Out A Palette

This was my experiment using colored pencils. I made notes, jotting down which color combos I liked and seemed to work well together. I have to write everything down these days because my memory has become a tea strainer.

Here I've done my best to match the CP colors with watercolor. I think I've finally got a plan now. I found a gold metallic colored pencil I forgot I had so I added that over the w/c in a few places as a possible accent.

Did you think I got lost? I did...for awhile. After several attempts (and as many failures) to settle on a palette I hit a brick wall. I couldn't seem to work out a palette for the sunflowers that excited me. My new favorite color is DS Quin. violet and I wanted to work this color into the painting somehow. Nick Simmons suggested I take a look at the work of Jimmy Wright . Wright paints amazing sunflowers in pastel and uses unusual color combinations. I also took out photos I'd taken in my gardens and browsed through those for inspiration. Last night I finally got out my 120 ct. set of Prismacolor colored pencils, printed out a copy of my line drawing and just played. I came up with a palette I really like so the next challenge was to match the CP colors to watercolor. I think I've succeeded.

I plan to do a smaller version of the painting first. I have a 12" x 18" block of Fabriano HP w/c paper I can use. I was disappointed to learn a nearby store no longer carries certain art supplies so I will have to order my full sheets online. I can't understand why, with all the artists in the area, that we don't have a decent art supply outlet. }:( The nearest is a day trip away, especially in summer when traffic is ridiculous. Griping over..........

My Sunflowers~color study continued

I fiddled around some more with the color study I posted the 13th of this month. I'm still undecided as to a palette for this painting. The background concerns me more than anything else. In the photo the sky is what I would call Cobalt Blue Deep. Looks nice but it's predictable and boring, IMO. Even though the sketch looks complicated the shapes are pretty simple. Can I get away with doing something really fun with the background without over complicating the painting? Do I really have to resort to using masking fluid? Can I get powerful colors like turquoise and Indian yellow to work together? How will adding gouache affect the painting? How can I produce convincing clouds? I tried to answer all these questions today and am posting my results. I learned a few things...some things I liked, some not so much. I will continue to try new colors and techniques until I have my "ah Ha!" moment.