Reverse color portrait -

Today I started with acrylics to do a reverse color portrait of a photo of me.
I had reversed the colors in my Paint Shop Pro software and liked the brightness of the colors in reverse.
I also fuzzed the photo a bit with the brush stroke filter.
Copying the photo was Hard!!!

Ultimately, I used less colors than the photo, but finished the exercise when I felt like I had done enough!




Sometimes, just time finishes a project for me. At least with this drawing and painting stuff.

When I make a skirt or knit top, enough comes with the final hem. That is a nice bonus with sewing. There is an obvious stopping point.

Not so with drawings and paintings!

Oh well, what are you goin' to do? I have too much paint and too much paper hanging around to quit now.








The other interesting thing is what happens when you take a photo of your work.

It's an opportunity to see glaring flaws.

This left eye crease shadowing is too well defined. The eye color is good, though.













The right eye looks OK, but I'm still working on tilted faces.

The angle of the eyes and cheekbones require a lot more attention than a full front drawing.

Additionally, I did a very fast sketch in order to get to the color and perhaps that limited the shading effects.

Still learning what I like to do.









Close up of the right side eye shows lots of color in the iris which is something I know I like to do.

Acrylic paints are a challenge! They sure do dry quickly, and sometimes that is good because I can lay another color on top to change direction.

Of course, using glaze is a option and is a really great way to go over a graphite sketch to "nail it down", but today's play was just that.

Play.

Very good, Adrian! Now smile and when you come back in a week or two, this is gonna look even better.

A graphite portrait -

This weekend I picked up my pencils again to see what I could do with graphite and no paint to confuse me!

This took a few hours, but it was fun to do. I'm not so happy with the paper. It is a 9 inch by 12 inch, 65 lb. sketch pad that I am dedicating to just portraits, but the paper seems to fill up with graphite very quickly. I've noticed that drawing on watercolor paper is a lot different. The graphite smears more and I have a much easier time getting shadows and shading the way I like. Oh well, live and learn.

Does she look black and beautiful?

I think so.

January - day 2 of journal

Day 2 of January journaling.
Since I was taking so many photos with my new Zumi camera, I just had to put them somewhere. This was so much fun! I know it's hard to see these photos, but they are intensely colored and slightly grainy.
so cool.
I printed out 9 to a photo page and then used a punch to cut them out. Since I just couldn't limit myself, I made a little booklet of water-colored paper and double-stick taped them down.

Adding more photos to the page is easy when you have a journal within a journal - yes?



Did some stitching to decorate and secure the booklet and the pix.
The background page is gessoed,water color spray painted and highlighted with wax pastels in rose, one of my favorite colors.
See how the booklet opens? My first.
sigh.






This is page 2. More pix, more color, more fun.
It was a chance to use some stamps to "auto journal", too.
My husband, the house, our dog, Candy is her name, the feral cats eating (they're always eating! I feed them three times a day!) the pool, the sky, my garage/studio, a messy unmade bed.
All good fodder for fun camera pix.







See! Page 2 on page 2 opens two!











And this is how it looks all closed up and done.

Happy Saturday, January 2.

My new Zumi Camera!

I got a new camera!!!! It's a Zumi! Formal Name: Digital Harinezumi 2. How's that! It's a wonderful, little, digital, plastic lense camera that even takes videos!!! Yeah!!! Last year I got a Holga and loved the pix, but couldn't keep buying all that film. Now, I can take hundreds of photos and load them into my computer to pick and choose which ones to print. Oh, how I love this camera! It has two ISO settings- 100 for daylight and 800 for low light conditions and it even takes black and white photos with just a few pushes of the few buttons that are on this little camera. I got it on-line at www.photojojo.com - the place for cool photo stuff! I cannot stop taking pictures!!! My pix look like I have an old camera that is slightly amused at being asked to take pictures because it is so not perfect. Love the distortions, love the grainy-ness, love the super saturated color I sometimes get in daylight, love the strange color tinges that come up, and it is so small! Fits into the palm of my hand and I just point and shoot. There is no window to see you picture before you take it, but there is a nice review display so you can delete a photo if you want to. (I never do, I'm in too much of a hurry to get another photo and see how it turns out. Everyone is different because the effect of changing light conditions changes your photo amazingly.
My P.T. Cruiser never looked so - interesting.
Our Florida sky never looked so - painterly.
Our house never looked so -blessed by the Light.
And, I never looked so - mysteriously curvy?
Oh, I am in love with technology. Thank you PowerShovel,Ltd! Fantastic! Fun! Fully functional and all mine......

A New Year, a trial journal -

OK, so I'm taking the plunge, like so many others. Taking time to do some art in a journal of sorts.
Not worrying about how much I do.
No rules.
Get to it when I can.
Do it when I feel like it.







First day of January - easy peasy because I don't have to go to work!
Yeah!
Step 1. Flop around my garage/studio with some music on and a few spray bottles of watercolors in pretty Florida colors.
Step 2. Use double stick tape to adhere some photos. So easy and so not messy.
Step 3. Sew the photos down with metallic gold thread (my favorite- hands down, all time, go for the glitter even though it shreds occasionally)



Step 4. Take some pictures.
Step 5. Admire.
Step 6. Take a nap.