Finished Oil Painting?

So I had my last oil class last week. I pretty much completed my painting although I think I would like to go in and touch a few things up...not sure yet. For my first oil I am satisfied. I know it will take practice to get use to the medium and dry time. I have been quite busy over the past few weeks that I haven't had much time to update this blog. So I am sorry for that. Enjoy!

Oil Painting Pt. 2

So I finally had another painting class tonight. After last week's blizzard my class was canceled. I was very good with not touching my painting throughout the past 2 weeks. I was so scared that if I did touch it, I would end up regretting it in the end. So tonight I did a little bit of a touch up on the sky. My oil paints were dry on the canvas. So I had the opportunity to do a wet on dry technique with the oils to get a bit of a more detailed look.

After forcing myself to stop fiddling with the sky I started my work on the water and the horizon line. I started out with just my blue and white mix to reflect a bit of the sky color. But I was finding my water needed a bit of a green tint to it. So I toyed with a few of my paints and created my basic color of the water.

I also determined that I am a full contact painter. Kinda like a full contact athlete. I go all in...I use my hands and fingers and anything that I can to paint. By the time I was at the end of my 2 hour painting class my hands looked like I dipped them in a bucket of blue dye.

I also put in the tree line along the horizon line. Still needs a lot of work, but my painting is coming a long. I have 2 more classes to go...the classes that I need to make up for they were canceled due to weather.

Too Much Snow!

Well after having a blizzard last week and some more snow this week my art class this past week was canceled. I was going to work on my oil paint this past week while being snowed in, but I have found myself playing with a new form or art. Digital Media. I have always been very hesitant on this whole digital thing. Using a mouse to draw on a computer isn't easy. I don't like the feel of it. I like the feel of a pen to paper. Where you can watch what your hand is doing and see your picture at the same time. My mom does have a tablet and stylus pen, but you still have the lack of the pen to paper feeling I desire. Since I am in need of a new computer I have been looking for a tablet laptop that will allow me to advance my capabilities in digital art. But being an artist I would want the best...and need the best...and the best has a lot of money invested into it.

The best out there that I have read about is the Wacom Cintiq. It is a tablet that allows you to have that pen to paper feeling. But it's not a computer, it's only a tablet so I would still have to buy a new computer. The cheaper Wacom Cintiq runs at $1000. So ya...not an easy purchase for me. Thankfully my mom is looking into purchasing it with me so that I can still afford a computer. So with the tablet that I do have...this is what I have been playing with:

lol a work in progress??

A little better??

Also this week I went through the lovely process of filing taxes...which I think is an art in it's self...And Also spent most of my weekend going to and from the hospital for my mom came down with Phenomena and add that with an unknown heart condition you will find your self admitted to the hospital in no time. But thankfully she is doing better and is home now :)

So hopefully tomorrow I will have my art class and will have an update on that for you all :) 

Happy Birthday To Me!!

Such a bad picture of me...*sigh* thanks mom....

If you haven't guessed by the title of this post...it's my birthday! :) I turn 23 today...and I don't feel older...So for my birthday I got to work 8 hours at a daycare where I got beat up by a bunch of toddlers...so I'm sore...I also got to go out for lunch at a local Mexican place....and my mom let it slip that it was my birthday...so the staff decided to come out with a sombrero and some free fried ice cream and sang to me in Spanish. So ya...it was very interesting afternoon.



I then stopped at my favorite store...Hobby Lobby where I stocked up on some fun things to play with while I get snowed in this week by 18 inches of that cold white stuff and a quarter inch of ice...oh and wind too...

Bought some nice art markers to work on my drawing. Also bought some more French Blue Oil Paint for my Oil Painting. Most likely my art class tomorrow night will be canceled so I must keep going on my own with out the teachers help.

So I am also looking at purchasing a HP Tablet Laptop. Or something similar. Because 1) I am in a huge need of a new computer since my current one is out of order 2) my brother is sick of me using his all the time 3) I really think I could benefit from having a touch tablet for my art work :) if anyone has or has used one of these any idea of which one I should get? I really would like a Wacom Critiq but sadly it is wayyyy out of my price range...plus I would be still out of a computer....*sigh* if only money grew on trees....

UNDER CONSTRUCTION

So since I have decided to up the ante on the whole blog thing...I have decided to upgrade the style or look of my blog. I am going to add some html...well attempt to do this. To make tabs and links to other pages and such. So if you view my blog and you see random or weird links...it's probably a test of what I am doing. I currently changed everything back so as for now it's not messed up any more for the night. Hopefully I will have this figured out by the end of next week. I am open to any tips or ideas on how to do this...so please...don't hold back...remember this is all a learning area for me and for you the readers. So help me out so that I can help you :) Hope to come with a new blog and a new update on my first oil painting...probably Tuesday night after my class. See you all then! 

Oil Painting Pt. 1

So for Christmas of the 2010 year. My mom bought me a 6 week Oil Paint Course through a new art center that has recently opened up. The Classes would take place for 2 hours every tuesday night for 6 weeks. For 6 week weeks I will attempt to come out of my own element and venture into a whole new Medium of art. For a few years now I have been wanting to try oil painting, but every time I would attempt it I would get discouraged and give up. Oil painting is very different than using acrylics of what I am accustomed to. I wasn't keen on the idea of my paints taking forever to dry. So I stuck to my acrylics.

Last week I had my first Oil Painting class. My teacher is a local artist that paint murals on the side of buildings and is well known for his charcoal and pencil sketches. My first class wasn't much of a painting class as it was a informational guide to materials and such...Which I think could have been handled better by a pan-flit or a paper packet. Once we had that all said and done he wanted us to find a subject to paint. This subject could be in a form of a picture or a still life.

*note* I do not own this picture found it on flicker I claim no rights to the picture.

Once we had our subject we were to sketch it out on our canvas as a guide. Now me I'm not big on sketching things on a canvas because the White Gesso on the canvas doesn't allow the pencil to erase well. It is also very hard to have different shading effects on a Canvas with Gesso on it.

So I decided to first sketch out my subject in a sketch book to see I if I like it from my own hand. Once I did that I sketched it out onto my canvas, but I only did the main outline of my picture to avoid having too much pencil on my canvas (I have read and been told that oil paints can mix with the lead from the pencils making the paint color darker than originally intended)

My Subject in a simple sketch

The Basic outline on my canvas

At my second class held this week we had to present our subject to our teacher and he would look at your sketch and offer some helpful advice. He had told me to draw my line on my dock out at an angle more to have a little more a deeper feel of depth perception. Once done I started to paint. While painting I got to chat with my fellow painters (some still sketching) and one of the girls next to me makes the comment that she shouldn't have sat next to me because she will never get anything done due to her watching me paint. I had a few other people say that they liked my work so far (to me though..still not convinced) So now I must try not to over work my painting.

I have tried not to touch my painting over the past few days and to not change what I have already done. But me being me...I failed at this. I ended up making things too dark and didn't like it at all...so thanks to the oils paints being wet I got the chance to scrape them off my canvas using a palette knife and start all over. So the picture you are about to see is the before I messed it up and started over. I added a pic of what I just did to it...no I promise I won't mess with it...I'm happy with it now...

Before I messed it up... The new and improved :)

Well so far what I have learned is to be light with a brush and with the paint. Also...change your bush direction to give off a different feel (clouds) My sky was done with vertical strokes so I make my clouds doing a horizontal motion with the brush. (you don't even have to use paint for this effect) !!

**When cleaning my brushed I tried to use this Pink Brush Soap...that says on the bottle you can use with oil painted brushes...ya well I think that's wrong because it didn't work. I ended up using a can of paint thinner or oil based paints my dad had. This pulled the paint from my brushes really quick. The down fall is that if has a bad fume so be careful. Also use a pair of rubber gloves if you are doing it by hand. I used a glass Prego Sauce Jar with about half a cup of paint thinner. If you have a lid keep it. Let the paint thinner sit for a while and all of the paint will settle to the bottom leaving the thinner on top...thus letting you able to use it again so that it doesn't go to waste!!!