Studio Update

This week (and part of last) has mostly been about learning new skills and studying value and colour. I have done a few small practical exercises, for example making a gray scale and using that gray scale to paint a round ball. This exercise was very helpful and has changed the way I look at making an image.  I did this exercise in oils and though I was not entirely happy with it, at one stage it was much better than how it ended up, and every time I added paint to fix it, I got deeper an deeper into a mess.  However I did learn the valuable lesson of the importance of values, so it was diffidently worth spending the time doing.

 The colour swatch in the foreground is an inventory of my oil paints.

Mr Owl benefited from my studies and today I was able to quickly finish him with my gained knowledge. Getting the value right is so important for making an image 3-dimensional, I learnt this from the practical exercises. I tried something new with this painting, it was done in acrylic with a thick and really sticky gloss medium. I worked wet on wet in a few quick sittings. I wanted this piece to be very gestural but still capture the owl realistically.  It is based on the rhyme "A wise old owl lived in an oak; The more he saw the less he spoke; The less he spoke the more he heard. Why can't we all be like that wise old Bird?". As promised, and without further ado here is the finished owl painting:

Also today I photographed some fruit (apples, pomegranate and persimmon) to use for studies for my fruit head royalty bird series.  I'm going to do small paintings of each fruit to understand the shape, value and colour of each.  I can't wait to get started on these!  I will do one a day, along with working on the next larger painting. I will keep you posted on how it goes!

 

Happy Week all! 

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