Monday, July 29th, 2019 at 11:54 am
One of Two-Wet on Wet vs Wet on Dry
This week I spent some time working on sky studies. Clouds and sunsets, colors and techniques to improve my landscapes.
Prompted by World Watercolor Month for clouds last week, I decided to spend more time getting to know skies a bit more. After all, I’ve spent a lot of time up there and I certainly have seen some beautiful skies.
Two of two Wet-on-Dry
Steve Mitchell, The Mind of Watercolor, had a good tutorial on clouds the other day working in both wet-on-wet and wet-on-dry techniques. As you can see in these to photographs each has its own merits depending upon the affect I’m trying to achieve. Naturally I didn’t want to waste the paint and time so what do we to with two cloud/sky studies? We add a landscape of course!
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Monday, July 8th, 2019 at 6:16 am
Pink Crape Myrtle
I like to experiment with different techniques of pen & ink. Recently I bought a dip pen with several nibs and went to work on a couple of botanical studies.
On the Pink Crape Myrtle painting to the left I penciled in the overall outline before going to the pen & ink. Usually when I’m using a fountain pen I tend to just draw out the sketch without first penciling in the outlines. Freely inking the sketch forces me to concentrate more as I draw my subject. Read the rest of this entry
Monday, July 1st, 2019 at 6:04 am
Photo and work in progress
Is quantity, quality, or is both that are important when it comes to learning to paint with watercolor or sketch with pen & ink?
Learning a craft is much like playing a sport—to get good at it, one must practice, practice, and practice some more. Sports legends like Michael Jordan, Tom Brady, and Tiger Woods spent hours, days, and years practicing their sport to get to the level they have all achieved. Read the rest of this entry
Wednesday, October 31st, 2018 at 2:24 pm
That’s it, Inktober 2018 is in the can! Today I finished the last of 31 days of pen and ink drawings for Inktober 2018.
As I mentioned in my post last week it’s been a stretch. I decided to stay with the prompts and challenge myself to draw/ink pictures I might have otherwise avoided.
Some of the drawings I’m very happy with…others, I’m glad I did them but can tell I was rushed or didn’t spend much time planning the art. But that’s OK! I’ve learned a lot and can now concentrate on improving my work.
As you look at these pieces please understand how hard it can be to try and come up with a work of art from a single word prompt. 
Some ideas came to me right away…others, not so much. One of the fun things this month though was sharing the art on Instagram and having the chance to see what other artists came up with.
If you click on the pie you can see the whole month’s efforts. Compare them with the prompts and see if you’d have other ideas…I’m sure you would.
I hope you enjoy my art as much as I enjoyed the process of creating the daily pen & ink drawing. In the future I’ll work on my photography skills so my pictures will be cleaner and more indicative of what my pieces look like on paper.
Now I’m off to the next challenge—I wonder what it will be?
Shout out to Steven B. Reddy @steven_reddy, Alphonso Dunn @Alphonsodunn, and Steve Mitchell @mindofwatercolor for their guidance and inspiration.
Happy Trails, Safe Travels, and Make Art!
I’m officially retired after over 40 years of working with the US military in one way or another. My bride of 45 years and I settled into a nice home in Fredericksburg, Texas, USA, and are enjoying the many events, organizations, and attractions the Texas Hill Country has to offer. I enjoy urban sketching, watercolor painting, dabble in writing, and do an occasional voice acting gig.
Wednesday, October 24th, 2018 at 9:13 am
I’m a firm believer that artists may have talent but it’s only through hard work that artists get better. Just like athletes, writers and other artists can only get better by practice, practice, practice!
NaNoWriMo
To that end I have challenged myself over the years to practice my limited talents and skills with the help of online challenges. In 2015 I participated in National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) and completed 30 days dedicated to completing 50,000 words on a NEW novel. You can read about my exploits here.
Now that Ilene and I are full-time RVers one would think I’d have more time to dedicate to my artistic activities…and you’d be wrong. It seems like the more time I have, the more time I don’t seem to have. I still have a home to take care of, this one on wheels. We do a lot of sightseeing since we travel more. Oh, and I seem to ADD more hobbies as time goes on.
What started as being interested in watercolor painting last November has morphed into pen & ink drawing, urban sketching, plein air painting and drawing, blog posting on three sites, working as a voice talent, and building an RV inspection business. And yes, I saw City Slickers—but I can’t seem to do just ONE thing! Read the rest of this entry
I’m officially retired after over 40 years of working with the US military in one way or another. My bride of 45 years and I settled into a nice home in Fredericksburg, Texas, USA, and are enjoying the many events, organizations, and attractions the Texas Hill Country has to offer. I enjoy urban sketching, watercolor painting, dabble in writing, and do an occasional voice acting gig.
