Category: Painting

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Jenny Portrait WIP

The following is where I’m at with Jenny’s portrait. I started off with a rough drawing and painted in the grisaille ie mostly black and white until you have the main drawing and tones complete. This looks gray because the grisaille is very much still showing. This painting requires a lot more work. A good example of what needs doing is the eyebrow, it looks painted on which it literally has been but it should not look that way 🙂

The reason for the composition came from Rembrandt. He had a tendency to light his subjects very strongly from one side or from above, with this portrait I wanted something similar but I also liked the fact that it looks like Jenny is emerging from the dark. I’m not sure how it’s going to turn out yet but it’s getting there.

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Playhouse

I can remember building sheds with my dad. One in particular was a wendy house built for Jackie Gault that sat in front of the house and was painted in some lovely but very bright colors. He also built numerous sheds, pigeon sheds etc, the materials all seemed to arrive from off casts on jobs he was doing with Jimmy Caves building contractors or wherever he was working.

I think the most important thing I learned from this is if you want to get shit done just start building it, he never had a plan that I was aware of, I’m not even sure he had a plan he just got on with building the shed. I’ve always wanted to build a shed so when the opportunity arose in the form of building a Wendy House for the girls I jumped at it.

  • Shed
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Hiccup for Callista

Callista fell in love with Toothless from How to Train Your Dragon. I painted Toothless and Hiccup, the dragon turned out terrible so I won’t be adding it here. Hiccup doesn’t look much better but he’s recognizable. I’ve been dabbling in watercolor so decided to use it, the more I play with watercolor the more I like it, it also forces me to practice drawing more than Oil or Acrylics do.

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Abbott Handerson Thayer Roses

The moment I seen his Roses I knew I had to copy them. Abbot Handerson Thayer did a lot of work regarding camouflage. His paintings are nothing short of genius and I learned a lot copying his painting.

The image below is my copy. It’s ok but it lacks the tonal variation of the original, it also lacks the brushwork. If you look closely at the brushwork of the original he was definitely painting wet in wet and the way the paint mixes when doing so is difficult to replicate any other way.

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Winslow Homer Fog Warning

I tried to copy Winslow Homer Fog Warning. It didn’t come out as good as I wanted but I’d only been painting for a month when I tried this one. Winslow was a fantastic painter both in oils and Watercolors. A few months after I painted it I bought a 48″ canvas to do a full size version, I had the drawing done but I managed to put a whole in it so that project got put on hold 🙂

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Started Painting

I painted for the first time tonight. The last time I remember painting I was in primary school in Mrs Orrs class with those cheap childrens paints. Tonight was no different, I bought some paint for the kids to create some paintings for Jenny for her Birthday which was fun and messy for all concerned.

Anyway, I’ve always wanted to try painting so after a few beers I had enough courage to try it, I painted a cartoon like snowman, it looks awful but I loved every minute of it. It was a strange feeling to just go at it. I might eventually post the painting here but it’s truly bad, maybe when I can actually paint I’ll have enough courage not to care.