5X7 Boat Study

Here is a quick boat study that I loved.  I was happy how it worked out.

Landscape Study #5 - Green Couds

I tried copying a landscape painting and I really struggled with this at first.  I debated if I should even finish it.  I decided to go for it and put some time.  Anything you do is great practice.  I was listening to an interview with artist Jane Hunt and she said that everyone has 200 bad paintings in them, and the sooner you get them out the better.

But then I turned it into a palette knife painting, and it looked really great, especially the clouds.  In the past I've just done a palette knife painting without much underpainting, but I think the underpainting greatly enhanced the painting.  It added a lot of depth and more interesting detail.  The underpainting also helped me work out the color scheme.

A couple of flowers

I just love these.  I did this version of flowers about 3 times, and my favorite was the first set.  That seems to be a trend.  If I try to repeat subject matter, the first time is the best.  But then again, the 2nd and 3rd attempts isn't that bad.

Black and white pears

These are awesome. I just sort of love these pears, and have done a couple more sets of them for fun.  They are just fun.  Bright red in the back, and then blues, grays, blacks and whites.

16X20 SLC Temple

Someone gave me a bunch of free paint, so I decided to do a really fun large painting.  I just did a new color scheme with the temple.  I have been playing with putting bright colors behind the focus of the painting.

The final in a dark room.

This makes it look a little brighter than it really is.

Working on My Roses

 I was really struggling with my Trader Joe's roses.  I just struggled so much with my last two paintings with the roses that were in it.  I just feel like I need to hanker down and focus on the one rose.  I am excited to try this out.  It's better to improve when you focus on little things like that.

I'm excited to do this blue vase.  I bought this blue vase at Target so that I could practice painting it.  Looks so great!

This is a 15 minute session.  I'm only doing 15 minutes sessions right now because my neck has been bugging me.  Sometimes I don't realize how long I have been painting, and it's just hard to limit myself. I just tend to push myself as far as my body can handle in all areas of my life it seems.  I have been learning the hard way this year how to cut back in all areas of my life because I push myself too hard.  Isn't that crazy?  It is so hard for me to not do things sometimes.

 The bottom picture is the final. I actually like the version right about me better.  This is an excellent example of overworking a painting.  I especially love the vase up above. The one at the bottom lost it's freshness and I added too much color.  But I do enjoy the final product.  I used it as a wedding gift.

Red apple Study #1

 I'm still no pro at painting and maybe never will be, but I definitely felt like I was sculpting this apple.  It started out looking really weird as I tried putting in some values.  But in my next 15 minute session, I got what you see in the next picture.

Here is the final.  I felt like that was good enough for the study to be complete.  I love the apple.  I don't love the dark blue table as much as the lighter white.  I think I will do another apple study.  I also want to do a study of that blue vase I did with a rose recently.  This was great practice.