Sunday, July 24, 2011

Sketch a Day #1 #icad


I've moved away from the index cards into a small QuoVadis Habana - forgive me Tammy

Do materials make a difference?


No question!!  YES!!!  with paint the pigments are better and paper holds both water and paint differently


Inexpensive student grade watercolors from Reeves on Canson XL Series 140 lb cold press watercolor paper



M Graham watercolors on Canson XL Series 140 lb cold press watercolor paper



M Graham watercolors on Arches 140 lb cold press watercolor paper

Conclusion - buy absolutely the best materials that you can afford.  Inexpensive papers are okay for learning and trying new techniques, but buy the good stuff to use when you really want to produce quality.

Stay away from the student grade paints for anything except playing and even some student grade paints are been than others, ie W&N Cotman paints are much better that the Reeves paint.

If you are lucky enough to have friends who will provide you will samples of different types of paints, like I did, you can try out several to determine what you like and what works best for you.

Saturday, July 23, 2011

How to Paint a Watercolor Sky







YouTube has some crappy tutorials, but also some great ones. This is a good one, in my opinion, courtesy of Jerry's Artarama.

I do know that I need a few better quality tubes of watercolor, I'm definitely learning that if I really want to succeed for some things cheap is a big hindrance.  Watercolor is one of those cases.






July 23

Thursday, July 21, 2011

Ibis



We had a white Ibis in the yard Wednesday evening, hunting for bugs in the grass.  I'm not particularly happy with this page, however I figure that I need to post the bad along with the good so... a white Ibis on an icky page.

Monday, July 11, 2011

Friday, July 8, 2011

My Model, Jewlz



I've received such nice comments on my ICAD #34, that I thought I would share the photo of my model, our girl Akita, Jewlz.  As you can see I need to practice drawing her more, she's difficult to capture.

Index Card a Day #36 #icad

Wednesday, July 6, 2011