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Fall Acrylic Project: Fall Proposal Week 7
This week was all about finishing up the painting: Adding more color to leaves or deepening shadows or making the little fixes to your painting to your own satisfaction. If you are happy with the way your painting looks then stop and call it done, at least for now. I always put things I have been working on on an easel I can look at when I go into the computer room so I can glance at it to see if anything jumps out at me, if it doesn't, then I'm done. You need to learn to do the same because at some point in time you have to stop working on a painting. There are always the little things here or just a dab of paint their but if you aren't careful you can easily overwork your painting and ruin it. If your brush is circling over your canvas looking for a place to land, you are probably done. Live with it for a few days, if nothing jumps out at you sign it and stick it in a frame.
That is what I did in the last class: Look for the things I needed to finish then call it done. I added some more brightness around the ring box with the napthol and orange using a bristle brush and the dry brush technique to scrub in a bit more color to the box and to the fabric in front of it. I also added a bit more color to the tips of leaves and shadows around the bottle, just the little things I felt needed a bit of help.
I also finished the ring and added shadows on the box from the ring. I did notice when I looked at the photo I need to work a bit on the diamond and maybe tone down the ring part but that is a quick fix.
The last thing I did was take my liner brush and add the little squiggly things they always seem to stick in arrangements for some vertical elements to the arrangement, for us, it breaks up the dark area behind the bouquet making that large empty space a bit more interesting otherwise it is just a big,dark negative space that looks a bit odd.
I also used my liner to add some stems to the leaves and also to the roses .
As far as I am concerned, this painting is done. I think we learned a lot with this project because it is a challenge to deal with one color - in this case red - and make it different enough to separate elements out from each other by changing colors just a bit or by adding shadows behind, good practice and I am very happy with everyone's attempts at this challenging project.
Have a wonderful holiday season, don't forget to sign up for classes if you plan on coming back for the winter session, keep painting and I will see you in class.
Acrylic Class Project: A Fall Proposal Week 6
We are coming to the end of this project, so what I was doing in our last class was to fie tune my painting. One of the things I did was to put a wash of blue over the bouquet because I felt that all of the elements were too bright, particularly the white roses, and I wanted to knock them down a bit so in the end, they won't compete with the ring.
To do this I took my #10 flat bristle brush and made up a very watery color with my ultramarine blue, a touch of gesso and lots of water, this is called a "glaze" and it is a very effective technique for acrylic painters in situations where you want to add just a little color over an area just to change it just a little bit. You need to be able to see through this wash, and you use the dry brush technique: dry your brush, then load it the squeeze the bristles near the metal ferrule then use a circular motion and light pressure on the brush to go over the area you want the glaze on. It take practice and better to be too light than too dark.
Notice the light blue case to the roses and how the yellow sunflowers seem duller, this is just enough to push them back when I add the diamond to the ring.
The ring is a light blue/grey made with gesso, ultramarine blue and a very tiny amount of sienna, the darker values are the same 3 colors just less of the gesso.
The light is coming from the upper right hand side so on the outside of the ring, the lightest part will be the right side, on the inside of the ring it will be on the left side because of the way the light travels. Also not that the shadows are also opposite on the outside to the inside. I did this with a small flat sable brush.
I came back in and added some red to the ends of my flower keeping in mind I didn't want it to "grow" again and I also took a dark color (blue, sienna and alizarin) to make the separations between the petals. Please not those separations are not straight nor are they the same width start to end. I was using a flat sable brush to do the detail. I also took this dark color and lightly scrubbed it with my #4 bristle brush on the hydrangea to mute it and make the bottom and back end disappear into the shadows.
With my sable brush I added a touch of white and Hooker's green to that shadow color to make a grey blue/green for the leaves. The silver dollar leaves that they use are not green but more this grey blue/green, besides you do not want anything too light or bright in this area.
The label on the bottle really isn't as tough as you might think. Most of the writing on the label is just squiggly lines, even the large printing on the bottle doesn't need to be exact, it is better to suggest the writing than create a precise writing because the eye will want to read the label if there is too much exact detail, if it is just there, the eye accepts it and moves on. See next image.
This is the demo I did to show that all you need are vague lines that look like printing to fool the eye into thinking there is something there and the rough lines of the larger letters make them less distinct on the actual bottle, therefore less important. I was using small, round sable brushes.
I will probably finish up the project in our next class, we have 2 classes left if you need the time to finish up.
Keep painting and I will see you in class.
Acrylic Class Project: A Fall Proposal Week 5
This week was more of a fine tuning week before we get into doing the details and finishing up our project. Never be afraid to make changes or improvements to your painting, if you see something that bothers you go in and fix it. We are working with paint not stone, fixes are a lot easier. this week I did several fixes and adjustments.
The first adjustment I did was on the paper around the bouquet. When I looked at it at home it looked too pink and I needed more shadows on the paper behind the bottle.
First, I took my #6 flat bristle brush and a mix of napthol with a little orange (you can use cad red light and orange as well) and water to thin it so it is very washy looking, then with a very dry brush (little water and little paint, remember to squeeze the back end of the brush with your paper towel) using small circles and very light pressure on my brush, I did a dry brush glaze over the whole paper area to give it a redder look but not lose some of the pinkish look. I also did a similar thing with a mix of ultramarine blue and alizarin to shade the back part of the paper that goes off the canvas to fade it out.
Another place I used this dry brush technique is putting a lavender reflected light on the bottle with my #4 bristle brush.
Practice this technique because it is very useful in acrylic. It should look almost transparent when you put it on, just hitting some of the tops of the canvas threads, if it is too solid looking you are pressing too hard, if it looks blotchy or runny, you have too much water on your brush, make sure after you rinse your brush you dry it and after you pick up the paint squeeze the back end of the brush to get out excess water you picked up when loading your brush.
The next fix I did was to change the shape of the lower rose petal. I thought it was too long and the wrong shape so I took my #6 flat SABLE brush and a mix of blue, alizarin and a touch of green to make a dark green shadow color and used that color to reshape the petal and add another leaf in the process. To make the outside edge of the leaf, I added a bit of white to the mix, just enough to make it lighter but not bright light.
You do not need to go through the whole process of painting out something that needs fixing, just fix it but remember to make the fix look like it is part of the painting, not just some random stripe or blotch.
I also fixed the bulge in the ring box using a dark mix of blue, alizarin with the bristle brush this time so I could scrub in the color to reshape the the box. Again, I didn't just make a stripe of color, I used the dry brush technique, scrubbed in the color around the box and also out away from the box. Once I have the shape the way I liked it I added some napthol and touches of orange to get the light back into the fabric working those colors in by scrubbing the color in and blending it with what is already there. It is important you learn to fix things so they look like they were always like that, you will be happier with your paintings.
Still more fixing and adjusting. I had made the petals on the red flower too long and too bright so this was a 2 part fix. First I took the #4 bristle brush and dark colors - blue, alizarin, sometimes I added green if I was on a leaf - and I reshaped the petals by painting in the dark around them. All of these fixes are what is called "negative painting" meaning you are painting the space AROUND something not the thing itself. With this fix I am changing the shape of the petals by changing and adding shadows. Remember to blend the fixes out into the surrounding area so they look like they were always there. The second part of the flower fix I did with my sable brush and a mix of napthol and alizarin trying not to make the petals longer again but to clean up the edges and darken the bright red color I had at the tips.
Another thing I did here was to add shapes to the hydrangea to make it look like it had flowers. Funny thing about this is there are very few actual flower shapes in this cluster but because of the few that look like flowers the rest of the shapes suggest more flowers.
I did a separate demo to show how just adding a few shapes that look like flowers and the rest are just marks, tricks the viewer into thinking that there are a bunch of flowers, even the center dots add to the illusion. I was using the sable brush, with blue for the base then adding white for lighter colors or alizarin for those "flowers" that were in shadow. Blue and burnt sienna or umber for the very dark centers.
This is where I left off on Monday and I am thinking I could possible finish this in our next class, don't worry if you are not as far along we still have 3 more weeks so take you time just keep painting and I will see you in class.
Acrylic Class Project: A Fall Proposal Weeks 3 and 4
Week 3 I started adding the flowers and this time I was using my flat sable brushes. You can get similar effects with round brushes but practice first.
Think about what you are painting and the shape you are trying to make. flower petals at both ends are rounded and narrow but fatter in the middle, by using the end of the brush, twisting, pushing and lifting you can make the shape of the petals so you don't get straight pointed skinny petals. The petals are also a bit curved as the go into the centers of the flowers.
Change the colors of red like you did with the background and box by adding orange or blue to brighten or darken the color. the centers are burnt sienna and blue and don't make them just round and smooth the edges are ragged.
This is the under painting for the sunflowers, I will do more later. The technique is the same as for the rend flower, notice the different angles the flowers face, you don't want them looking in the same direction.
Withe brighter colors I started to define the leaf shapes though most of those are only parts of leaves. I also added some dark between leaves to separate and also help define the leaf shapes.
I didn't work on the roses yet, but I did work around the roses to get dark areas around the roses. Remember if you want to show light you need to have dark around it for the contrast. I used the dark colors to define the petals of the rose as well as separate leaves from each other.
This is where I left off on week 3, I have most of my under painting in for everything in my painting, the next week I will start refining these elements by adding intermediate highlights along with shadows and some detail.
Week 4. this is what happens when you are trying to explain what you are doing and trying to paint at the same time. I am not happy with the highlighting I did on my red flower because I got it too light and I got some of the petals too long, I will fix this in class so you can see what I do. It is always helpful to know how to get yourself out of a problem or to change something without completely painting it out.
To the yellow sunflowers I added a bit of orange with red to cut down on the bright yellow but leaving some of the yellow as highlights. I was using the flat sable again with a similar stroke, just not as long.
While the roses are looking more white, they are still not pure white and they never will be. I mixed gesso with a little tint of yellow. It take surprisingly little yellow to tint the gesso so be careful when you pick up the yellow.
With the sable brush and looking carefully at the photo, starting at the outside edge of a petal, I added this lighter color where I see in the photo the light areas on the rose, then smudging the edge that goes into the center of the rose with my finger to blend it into the under painting (the blush of pink was because I had red paint on my fingers when I did this, happy accident).
Don't cover up all of the under painting because this now becomes the shadows on the rose. use the corners of the brush to do the centers and smaller petals and work your way around the rose. You might want to practice.
I continued on the paper wrapping adding highlights and shadows. some of the medium shadows are pure reds while the paper that gets light has a touch or white in it just don't let it get too pink. Again, look at the photo or get some tissue paper and wrap it around something to see how the wrinkles form before you try to paint them.
The bottle was done by using blue, alizarin, Hooker's green and touches of white. Use a bristle brush for the bottle. The darker part was the blue and alizarin (before the label was added), dry brush blending the colors together, then adding the green around the outside edges with touches of white (teeny, tiny touches of white), blending these colors on the bottle itself using the dry brush technique and follow the shape of the bottle as you blend.
The cap was Hooker's, a touch of white and blue to darken, again dry brush blending on the canvas.
The highlights are a little blue, green and a touch of gesso, very dry brush, then start in the center and with very little pressure on the brush, make tiny circles and move out from the center, losing pressure on the brush as you go. You may need to do this a couple of times and also practice. If you press too hard it will look too solid.
The label was a mic of yellow, sienna, gesso and blue. It is darker near the red paper and lighter as it come into the light.
I keep brightening the little box using the napthol and orange in the brighter areas, alizarin and blue in the shadow areas, a bristle brush and the dry brush technique, scrubbing in the color to create soft blended edges which gives it the velvet look.
I also brightened the fabric around the front of the box with napthol and touches of orange to bring focus to the box.
This is where we left off in our last class and should get you caught up with what we have been doing in class.
We (I) are getting close to wrapping this up in the next couple of weeks so I hope that you can get caught up to this point. We should have a week or two to finish before the end of the semester if you get behind.
Keep painting and I will see you in class.
A Fall Proposal Week 2
Once the background was dry I sketched on my design with chalk. I used the chalk because the background is dark, charcoal would be hard to see.
What I did next was to under paint the elements of my design: The flowers, leaves, wine bottle, ring box and the paper around the bouquet.
For those new to acrylics or still struggling with how it works, the under painting is like the foundation of your painting, it is what we build on. We start out a bit on the dark side then work to the lightest lights and to the darkest darks, what you see here will change as the painting progresses but some of these colors become shadows or texture or variations of value, don't try to skip over this step or you paintings will look flat.
The under painting for the leaves of the bouquet are just a mishmash of color. I used every color on my palette and used my #6 bristle brush with the scumbling stroke (strokes going every which way) to create the background for my leaves. I was more interested in interesting shapes at this point and not completely mixing the colors so when I was done the brush strokes made it look like there is a lot going on in the bouquet.
The red paper against the red background needs to be handled cautiously. The red needs to be different from the background red (Alizarin, napthol and ultramarine blue) so it will stand out so I used the napthol with a touch of orange for the brighter red and the alizarin and blue to darken or to create shadows.
One of the things you need to be careful of when going to lighten red, it is better to lighten with either orange or yellow because white will turn it pink. That said, I did use a tiny amount of gesso (white) to slightly lighten the paper color because if you look at the photo you will see in front of the bottle the paper is slightly pink. Just be careful you do not add too much white or you will have to try again.
The bottle was a mix of my ultramarine blue, alizarin and Hooker's green with tiny touches of gesso on the right side. I worked wet into wet to blend.
The ring box had the same problem as the paper so I did a similar thing using orange to lighten the napthol red but no white this time. I used alizarin and UM blue for the shadows, gently blending wet into wet to give a soft rounded look to the edges of the box.
Always keep min mind the shape of the thing you are painting and follow the curves and remember that pressure is a big part of your brush stroke, very little pressure on the brush to blend.
Yes, I know that they are suppose to be white roses not lavender ones but this is how you start out painting things that are white with a blue or lavender under painting.
I used gesso (white) with touches of UM blue and purple or alizarin. to make it lighter you add more white to make it darker more blue and alizarin. I was still using my bristle brush pulling it from the outside edge of a petal in towards the center of the rose. The center of the rose was made with the end of the bristles turning it to create curves and the corners of the brush for the very center.
While I had that light blue color on my brush, I just made some loose leaf shapes that will be the sliver dollar leaves near the background. Please note that these are just shapes, nothing more at this point.
Finally, to that same blue color I added a touch of green and a bit more of the blue for the under painting of the hydrangea. Add white to make it lighter more blue and green to make it darker. Again this is just scumbling and creating an interesting edge around where the flowers will be.
I hope that most of you have your paintings to this point when we meet in class, we still have the under painting of a few flowers before we begin the detailing which I hope to start once we finish the under painting.
So keep painting and I will see you in class.
Acrylic Class Project: An Autumn Proposal Week 1
This week we worked on getting the background fabric in our painting. In acrylic we can paint right over areas that have previously painted so it is best to work from background to foreground, we don't necessarily have to finish the background but we do need to get it in so we can paint the foreground in and it won't look cut and pasted when we are done.
I only used 3 colors for the background fabric: Alizarin crimson, napthol red (cad red light would also work, just remember it is on the orange side) and ultramarine blue. I wanted to work fast to get the background in using the wet into wet technique to blend my colors on the canvas instead of mixing on the palette, so I needed to use my #10 flat bristle brush. I am working on and 18 x 24" canvas that I painted black with black gesso and let it dry.
Because I am painting on a black canvas I need to use enough paint to show up against the black. If you are taking one little dab of paint and trying to spread it across the entire surface of your painting, you will not have much luck, so put out paint and replenish your brush often and you shouldn't have a problem.
Starting in the upper left corner that is black in the photo, I wanted to create the suggestion of fabric going into shadow so I was only using the alizarin and the ultramarine blue, working quickly, thinking about the flow of the fabric (always follow the direction of the thing you are painting). When I got to the first fold, that is when I started using the napthol for the lighter top of the folds that might be catching a bit more light.
Please look at fabric and pay attention to how fabric drapes and how folds don't just start and stop but fade in and out, flatten or get smaller. Use the blue when you want to create shadow, the alizarin for the middle tones and the napthol for the brighter parts and work quickly blending as you go.
The folds and creases will change direction when they go across the flat surface the bouquet is sitting on, so make your brush strokes do the same.
This is only the under painting for the background we may or may not do more to it later as we develop our painting but once you get your background complete, let it dry completely then with your chalk or charcoal, sketch in the design for next class.
We can always make adjustments to any part of our painting at any time so just do the best you can. We haven't done too much of the wet into wet and it does take a bit of trial and error, but once you get the hang of it, it is a really lovely way to paint and for those of you who want to work looser, this is the technique for you.
Try to get your painting to this point with the sketch on we will be doing the under painting for the bouquet and bottle next time.
Keep painting and I will see you in class.
Acrylic Class Project: Summer Fun Week 6
This was the last week I worked on my project. Remember this wasn't about having a photo-realistic painting at the end but to explore and experiment. Mine is more a fantasy or dream like painting and while I am not sure I will keep it as is, I am not unhappy with it. It is very different from the way I usually paint and it was fun to do which was the whole purpose: To have fun and cross personal boundaries if for no other reason than to give yourself permission to explore.
I started out finishing up the highlights and shadows on the tower as well as a bit of detail like the bolt heads, the sign on the back and the wires to the window shutters.
I also highlighted the edge of the roof and tops of rails using a mix of white (gesso) and a tiny touch of yellow to warm it up and tint the white.
I also made the tracks in the sand look less high by breaking up the ridges and flattening out the spaces in between. I alternated between a medium sand color and the highlight color to create more texture in the sand.
Finally I got to the drips. I had to add a bit more water to my paint so it was like a thick ink and I kept applying it until it ran, tilting my canvas to control the direction of the drips. I wanted to repeat colors I had in the sky but there is no rhyme or reason for why I put them where I did, it's all made up anyway.
This is the final stage of this painting and I hope that it gave you the courage to try something different. Until next time, keep painting and I will see you in class.
Acrylic Class Project: Summer Fun Week 5
As I have said before, if you see something you don't like fix it! When I looked at my sand from the previous week I realized I had a small mountain range rather than truck ruts in the sand. My strokes were too steep and the ridges too sharp so I went in with 2 versions of the sand color on just a bit darker that the other and broke up some of the ridges and made the height less by steep with shorter gentler strokes. I also added in the float.
Because the float is so small in the painting, I did a larger version to show what I was doing on the smaller one as a demo.
These floats are plastic so some light will pass through them and their shadows won't be as deep so for the shadow areas I used my alizarin crimson then blended in some of my napthol red as I moved into lighter areas, working wet into wet with a sable brush. From the napthol red I added orange and for the highlight I moved to yellow, all the time working quickly so I could work into the wet previous color.
One of the things about the warm colors, particularly red, they tend to lose their vibrancy. Reds become pink and orange become dull and muddy when you add white so instead of adding white add orange or yellow to those colors they will keep their vibrant color while also showing light and shadow.
I also started doing some detail on the tower. I added what looks like roof tiles mixing a dark color (blue, umber or sienna and purple make a good dark or any dark colors you have) then using a small flat sable brush, I touched the edge of the brush to the roof line with a series of uneven, overlapping shapes so that it looks like the edges of tiles.
The other thing I did was put the frames around the windows. contrary to what you might think, the windows are not white because they are in the shadow of the roof so they will be a cool gray color. If you have some mud on your brush or palette, mix in a bit of gesso(white) to get a gray color. I used the same small flat sable brush to make the window frames as I did with the roof tiles.
I also started to add more color, highlights and shadows to parts of the tower, I haven't finished with it yet because acrylic dries darker and what looked good in class dulled down later, so I will continue to add more color with variations of the tower color - darks and lights - until I am satisfied with my efforts. I will also add a few simple touches of shadow in places to separate out overlapping boards to give them dimension.
Where things come together there is usually a dark shadow. By adding even some simple shadows you create depth, dimension, and separation between objects.
This is where I left off at the end of class with a bit of what I am going to do along the bottom of my painting. I have some final highlights and detail work to do but I should finish it up in our next class.
Keep painting and I will see you in class.
Acrylic Class Project: Summer Fun Week 4
Last time I mentioned that I didn't like my sand and was going to change it, which is where I started this week. To be clear, if you like your sand or anything else you do not need to change it just because I did, all this is showing you is that you can paint right over something you don't like, you aren't stuck with it. While I like this better color-wise, I still need to make it so the truck tracks don't look like mountain ranges but this is better.
The other thing I did was to add some dark color to the bottom of the canvas before I did the darker sand under painting. The dark color was ultramarine blue, a touch of purple and sienna, I was using my #4 flat bristle brush. Many pointed out that the darker sand color (sienna, blue and white) looks like it is spilling over into an abyss, good catch! A lesson I try to explain often but this accidental "lesson" points out perfectly what I mean when I tell you that your brush strokes matter and they should follow the form of the thing you are painting. The sand looks flat because my brush strokes are flatish slightly curved up on the ends flat strokes, the edges I put in look like they are going over a cliff because the strokes curve abruptly, I did this on purpose because of the way I want to finish the bottom. Remember that I am just playing and experimenting, I want to bring some of the sky colors down to the bottom and this is part of my plan - at least for now, it could change.
I started working on the lifeguard tower to get some of the the railings and posts in. I switched to my #4 flat SABLE brush to do this detail. the sable brush gives you more control and finer brush strokes.
I am using a turquoise color and lighten it with white, you can also use pthalo blue or ultramarine or whatever blue you have, to lighten it use white/gesso to darken add a touch of purple.
I will be doing more on my highlights, this is just the beginning.
One thing I do want to point out for my beginning students - because I saw several of you doing this - in acrylics we work from our mid-tones to our lightest lights and to our darkest darks, we don't start at the finished color because all the layers are important, they become the texture and form of the thing you are painting and the mid-tones are more dominant than the darks or the lights. I heard one instructor pass on some words of wisdom he had learned from his teacher when it comes to value range: If you were going to a paint store you would buy a gallon of mid-tone, a quart of dark and a pint of highlights. Start with the mid-tones and you will have more success in the long run.
Overall, I think my painting is coming together, I should finish this maybe next week but more likely the following week.
Keep painting and I will see you in class.
