Just playing around with an idea Katie gave me.
Day 211 (Sun July 30) the watercolor universe
Tag: painting
Day 210 (Sat July 29) Dogs are difficult!!!
This is my second attempt at my neighbor’s dog… she made me the beautiful pencil holder, remember? And I’m painting her dog in exchange. It is much better than my first attempt, but still looks very little like her, and certainly captures none of her personality. I AM learning things each time, though, so while it frustrates me not to be able to paint what I feel and see, I do see progress with each attempt, and at this point that is more important anyway.
I think it is a decent dog. But a sad Reilly.
I purchased a big sheet of quality 300 pound paper to try for this project, and am using Daniel Smith and Qor paints. And two sable brushes (So my supplies ARE NOT the problem, not even a little) In spite of my disappointment in this attempt, and the exhaustion I feel now, the tools are all a pleasure to work with! And they make me want to try again. Plus, attempt two is so much improved over attempt one, maybe tomorrow I’ll love my result!
My eyeballs are blurring inside my brain, I feel like one may have come lose is swimming around in there, so I’ll come back to this. 🙂
Day 209 (Fri July 28) Qor watercolors
Just a little playing around tonight to see some of the Qor colors. I love them. So vivid. Such interesting flow and movement on the paper. Nothing beats the lightfast ratings of the Daniel Smiths, of course, or the quality of the pigments. But the Qor are good, and fun to play with.
Here is a link to the Qor High Chroma Set on Amazon, currently $21.36
Day 205 (Mon July 24) Look at me, painting a real picture!
I’m proud of this one, even if Angela Fehr had to show me the techniques. She was exploring Qor watercolors (pronounce it “core”, made by Golden) and demonstrating some of their more interesting properties. When the Qor paints touch water on the paper, the unique binder they use causes the paint to quickly feather out into the water, little tendrils of color spreading out like tiny rivers on a map. It’s very cool to experience, and even Daniel Smiths don’t react exactly that way. I received a free set of three small Qor tubes recently and had one of the colors she was using. I found adding a Qor paint to a Daniel Smith, I still get that reaction. So of course I ordered the Qor High Chroma set of paints she was demonstrating. (try the link!!) I mean, really… I kind of had to once I saw how interesting their response was.
You may be able to see some of the texture added on the foliage area by using plastic wrap on the first layer as it dried!
Very happy with this one.
Day 202 (Fri July 21) rainbowy watercolor newfoundland
An artist in Virginia Beach does something similar, although his is a more interesting pattern. Looks like this newfie has been in the Color Run!
I think I may try some more newfie patterns.
Day 201 (Thurs July 20) watercolor daisy
Another Peter Sheeler tutorial. A few mistakes but I love following his tutorials. 🙂
Day 200 (Wed July 19) caran d’ache pencils!!
Can it already be day 200??? (Have I counted correctly? Several times I’ve found and corrected mistakes in my count. We’ll know around December 31st, I guess!)
Caran d’Ache Museum Aquarelle pencils. These JUST arrived today and I am loving them already. Here’s what the packaging says …”not a watercolor pencil, it is a water-soluble in pencil form….100% water soluble, immediately and totally. Optimal transparency with no veiled effect. range of 76 brilliant and vibrant colors. Exceptional colour lightfastness applied wet or dry…high pigment density.”
How did I not know about these????
They are so smooth and creamy. Amazing. And absolutely brilliant when water is applied. I received 2 pencils in my “artsnacks” package last month, tried them and fell in love. I agonized over which set to order (they aren’t cheap) and settled on Landscape (thrilled with the set so far) I imagine Marine is in my future… one day… maybe… 🙂 I don’t even know what to say about these. I hope I can find exciting ways to use them.
Using watercolor paper, here’s my sketch… it could look less grainy with flat paper…
After applying just a layer of water over the whole thing:
Not thrilled that I’d lost a bit of lighter colored area I had left on the top of the apple, I tried pulling some color up by erasing… perfect! It removed just the right amount. I’ve read that I can also rewet it and lift color just like watercolor paint.
How cool is that???
You could even create a little travel paint set for a quick day out by scribbling colors on a flat page (they write on a plastic folder I have sitting here, so strips of an inexpensive plastic report cover set inside a small tin or even an envelope) then using a few drops of water to activate them and use like regular watercolor.
This is too fun.
Day 199 (Tuesday July 18) watercolor
Playing around with color. (following an angela fehrer exercise)
Day 196 (Sat July 15)
Cover to a birthday story my nephew wrote for my granddaughter. She calls him “My Jon”. (“Is My Jon coming to the party?” Etc)
Day 195 (Fri july 14) more watercolor crayons
Using these Caran d’Ache watercolor crayons
for the second time… they are so fun!! Obviously I haven’t quite figured them out yet, but I will keep playing with them.
First I drew an image… they spritzed water over the surface. See how the colors just flowed immediately??
Then I used a brush to move it around a bit, and after it dried I used more crayon (oh my goodness you can crayon white right on top of the colors!!!!) and a little more wet paintbrush and a little more crayon scribbling… well I couldn’t really tell when I was finished and felt like that might go on for a while, so I just stopped. I can imagine some gorgeous simple backgrounds with these things. And I’ve read that both these and their watercolor pencils have great lightfast ratings.
ThreeSixFiveArt 