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Archive for the ‘pastels and charcoal’ Category

Happy belated new year to all blog readers! Okay, so I am late wishing everyone a new year but I’ve been busy this month painting, reading new material on logo design, working with a client designing a website, prepping to craft different from wood…and painting. It is a good to begin the new year busy with the same hobby, new career and lifestyle (excluding personal relationships unless there is a good reason for leaving). There is topic I am currently writing to discuss my experience with round brushes and how to prevent it from flaring. Maybe most of you know how to prevent a round brush from flaring and it is probably not the most exciting topic to read. But if you are painting or crafting, do you always wonder why brushes are made to stroke a certain position and why it is not perfect? Well, I do… I will have this article ready for you blog readers in another day.

As I mentioned earlier, I have been painting the same canvas for awhile and I am no rush to complete it. Below you will see of my progress that I painted since last December. I am keeping my color palette simplex with three colors — Titanium White, purple and Mars Black. You will not see purple on the canvas, and that is because it is mix with Mars Black. Mars Black seems to be lenient of a dark charcoal, so I want to make sure it is pure black. Yes, any black pigment is going to black but it is not as toxic as other black pigments. In addition the label on the acrylic tube is stamped as AP (Approved Product). There are different types of black acrylic paint colors such as Carbon Black and Dioxazine Purple I would have purchase but I rather stick with mixing colors to experiment.

There are three sections on the canvas to balance the negative space from the dark space on top. I am working to complete the bush object the left to add shadows before I continue painting on the main “white flames”. I am using acrylics, pens, marker and charcoal to add texture for the curvy lines. I’ve added black marker for heavy dotting on the shell-like object to include shadow and texture.

Besides focusing on the canvas, I have added two more sketches in my sketch book before I mail it to the Art House Coop tomorrow. These sketches do not relate to the other sketches I have complete in this book, just a story by itself. I will post these images soon.

As the year draws near into the new year, I would like to mention how much I have accomplish this year. I had spent most my time outdoors — biking, yoga, meeting new people from social network sites, art groups from Meetup.com and sketching. There been times I did not feel like walking outdoors because I just felt sad at times cause of the protestors, homicides and technology heroes whom passed away. When I do participate in outdoor activities, these activities help me improve my creative process and charisma.

Other times, I have spent eighty percent of the time working full-time and staying indoors because of the cold temperatures. I keep hoping for rain until today, December 31, 2011 because I love the rain, fog and…hail (whenever that will occur). Within the last month I have practice duplicating my drawings from my sketch book to the canvas. For instance, this current black and white painting below is similar to the drawing on the right in pen.

I have used acrylic colors: Gesso – white and black for the background, black spray paint for speckles and TitaniumWhite. When I painted the flames in Titanium White, I have spent two days painting layers until it was thick and waited a week before adding gray and black flames for the background. I am in the process improving the “flames” so it will shape similar to the drawing. I am not in a hurry to complete the flames; I just want it to look there is shape for me to work into the dotting. I will do a series of these painting until I decide to make it colorful.

Besides the painting and outdoor fun activities, I finished the last few pages of my sketch book for the Sketchbook Project as well the cover of the booklet. I am happy that I accomplished more than five drawings comparing to last year’s SketchBook Project. Last year I focus on pen and pencil sketches of sea animals. This year I focused what I dreamed of being a kid again except the last image of my father which that will be part of my next sketch book project for 2013. Below are a few images of my work and I hope you like it.

Well it is time to end this blog of the year by wishing everyone, Happy New Year! Cheers.

Few weeks ago, I went to the Alameda Art Works to meet and practice my drawings with members of the Painting and Drawing Practice Meetup group. It was fun and a lot of talking that distracted me from finishing my drawing within an hour. So, each week an artist from their studio presents a object for each of us to draw or draw whatever comes to mind. I decide to sketch two bowls and utensils that the artist displayed in the middle of the room. I drew the fork towards the bottom of the page instead inside the bowl to give it some meaning to be a lurk or soloist. I used soft pastels to soften the background and bowls and HB pencils for shadow and shape. Since I did not have my rubber for smudging, In addition, I used an old torn pink shirt to blend pencil and pastels together.