Lime 19

This one was fun. If I had time I would have started over at the inking stage. The shadow under the foot got way too heavy. I tried to save it by making the lime shadow heavy too, but that got way too heavy. Oh well, no biggy. I also do not like the blue shadow on the ground. I would rework it a little, but this lime is so yesterday. Time for a new lime.

Lime 18

My daughter is sweet. She asked if doing this lime project is keeping me from my other art. I said it was. She asked if I would rather be doing other art than the limes. I told her I love this lime project. It is exciting to me to come up with something different every night. It is a very fun, challenging project.

Here is tonight's effort. I tried to go a little more traditional I guess. It's a little boring compared to most of the others. 1/4 sheet arches cold pressed.

Art Walk

My home town is having it's 300th anniversary this year. They have had parades and special events and so on. One thing they are doing is having an Art Walk. Local artists submit their work and if accepted a store is chosen to hang their work. I just found out I was accepted. Woo hoo! Next saturday I have to hang my work, then hang around for a couple of hours during the art walk. I'm excited and nervous at the same time. I've never done anything like this before.

Lime 17

I had the idea of the lime opening up and the green pouring out. I did the ink first. Then I added a horizon line. I didn't like the line, but couldn't get rid of it because it was ink. So I added more background. 1/4 sheet arches hot pressed. Ink was done with a brush and rapidograph.

Lime 16

I did this by putting on the color then putting super market plastic bags on top. Then a heavy book to weight down. When dry, peal off the bag. Step and repeat to your heart's delight. I think this came out pretty cool looking. I will definitely explore this some more.

Oh, I forgot. Last night brown spots started to show up on the lime. Ut oh...

Lime 15

I got the idea for this one from someone I know on wetcanvas. She goes by bluegenes. You start off by painting gesso first to give some cool textures. Then you paint as usual over it. However, on my second coat of paint the gesso started to loosen up with all the water and the color washed out. But I kept playing until I got a feel for it. It is hard to see the texture with the scan, but live it is really cool.

Lime 14

My daughter started off this session by saying she was really bored with this project. I told her not to worry, only 86 left to paint.

Lime 13

Oh no! the yupo paper ruined me. I can't believe I lost it after only two yupo paintings. It really did throw me off. I guess I am trying to make a lot of excuses for this one. Not happy with it at all. Then I noticed it was unlucky 13 so I have yet another excuse. Tomorrow I come out with both brushes blazing!

Lime Post Cards

My friend Chris got into the lime spirit. He has sent me a flurry of Lime Postcards. He seems to be having as much fun with this lime project as my daughter and me.

Lime 12 another yupo

Having experienced yupo once I kind of knew what to expect this time. I didn't hold back and really let the paper have.

Lime 11

This is my first time using Yupo paper. I hear a lot about it over at wetcanvas and just had to try it. It is a synthetic paper with a very slick surface. My first impression? It is a vile, wretched paper. I hated it. Color beaded up and ran everywhere. When I tried to layer color, the under layer washed into the new layer.

But I kept with it and finished my first yupo piece, I can't wait to try this paper tomorrow.

Lime 10

For this one I used a sponge to apply the paint. First problem was the sponge being too wet. The colors kept washing out. Then when I would overlap the wet sponge took up the color underneath. So I wrapped the sponge in a paper towel to dry it off and had much better results. This technique also uses a lot of paint. The sponge soaked that stuff up like there was no tomorrow.

I used a 1/2 sheet arches cold pressed. I went big to give me some work room with the sponge. I figured it wouldn't lend itself to small areas and detail.

Lime 09

Tonight I noticed a big difference in my daughters work. Only nine limes into it and I can se she is learning. But, she still won't let me post her work. When I said I wanted to post this one she ran off with it and hid it.

I started this with a rapidograph pen. When I finished inking my son looked at it and asked if I was doing the Death Star from Star Wars. Ha, he would have loved that.

This one was a good idea that didn't work out so well. I like the brown area and might try this idea again, but more like the brown area.

Lime 08

This is my first 1/2 sheet watercolor. I thought the size would intimidate me a little, but, no problem. I started with the inking part. Then later at night, around ten pm, I started adding color. I was having a bad time of it and not liking my results. But I didn't want to give up so I kept at it. Then it started coming together. But then I was running out of time.

For some reason I have it in my head I have to finish the piece by midnight to consider it finished that day. I was dripping the water color on heavy and trying to dry it quickly with a hair dry to add the next layer. It was 11:30 and it didn't look good Layer, dryer, layer, dryer, layer....midnight. Rats! Oh well, it doesn't count if I didn't go to bed yet. I finally finished at 12:45.

The white is acrylic paint.

Lime 07

At no point did the brush touch this paper. I filled the brush with color, then ran my finger over the end to splatter the paint. 1/4 sheet arches hot pressed.

Lime 06

I didn't have much time for painting last night. I was suppose to go out to meet some friends at 7:30. My daughter and I didn't get started until 7:30. We keep the lime in the refrigerator to keep it fresh as long as possible. My daughter goes upstairs and tells me to bring the lime, which I do. I set it up and start sketching it. My daughter laughs and says "do you want to draw the real lime?" Not catching on I ask her what she means. She pulls out the lime we had been drawing. The lime in the refrigerator she bought during the day and switched them. She is a barrel of laughs.

So we paint, but I get to point I need it to dry before I can move on. I decide to go out, then come back before midnight to finish the painting. Which I do.

This is only watercolor. 1/4 sheet hot pressed arches.

Arte Y Pico Award Recipients

I have fellow bloggers who have accepted my offer to the Art Y Pico Award.

First up is MaryBeth who does some beautiful watercolors. Her blog is the doodle a day.

Next up is Sandy who is another watercolorist. I love her latest pieces on yupo paper. I going to have to give yupo a try. Here is her blog WILSONONTEHAN.

Next up is Deb. And you guessed it, she does watercolors. Anyone seeing a rend here? Go check out Deb'sblog.

Lime 05

I wanted to show my daughter values and shadows so we worked in pencil tonight. She lasted about five minutes and was done for today. She was very tired and it was a long day. She went into the city with me and went to the Lion King on broadway with her grandfather. So after getting home and going to my softball game it was late. So here is my pencil drawing.

Lime 04

Lime number four and I am already feeling the pressure. I;m trying to teach my daughter and work on my own piece. All in only an hour. I feel rushed with my work. I like to look at it and ponder and think about what I am doing usually taking three or four nights to complete it. On the other hand, it is getting me to work faster and make choices quicker. So that is not bad either.

This is my first watercolor only piece in a while. My daughters piece is her best yet, but she still doesn't want me to post hers. Hee is mine...

Lime 03

Last night I tried working with watercolor pencils. My daughter had been using them, so I thought I would give them a go.

EEEK! It was awful. I couldn't use them to paint my way out of a wet paper bag. But at least we were able laugh about how bad it was. Then I thought maybe I could save it with a little conte drawing on top of it. No good. But then, what about pastels? Better, but still bad. My daughter drew a cocktail glass on her. It reminded her of a slice of lime. So I drew some on mine too.

My daughter asked my not to post her pieces yet, but here is mine.

Lime 02

This night went better with my daughter. We had time and she was able to take some instruction from me. She was trying too hard to make the lime realistic. When I told her to loosen up and have fun, she said "Art can be fun?" I said sure, experiment, throw some paint around, enjoy. She said her art teacher at school wouldn't let them do that. Everything was very regimented and had to be realistic.

Now she is enjoying herself and flexing the old brain muscles. She was using watercolor pencils. Then she started stamping some acrylics. Then making thumb prints. She didn't want me to post her piece, so I won't. But here is mine.

Arte Y Pico Award

To my happy surprise I was awarded the Arte Y Pico award for my blog.

"Arte y Pico" is a blog from Uruguay whose blogger has come up with this award, (http://arteypico.blogspot.com/). Quoting her blog, she says: "What is the meaning of the expression: And basically, ironically, it translates into a wonderful phrase in Mexico, “lo maximo.”

I was awarded this honor from Peggy Stermer-Cox (her blog) Thanks Peggy!

The blog that started the award is in Spanish. Since I don't know a work of Spanish I stole the above info from Peggy's blog. After accepting this award I now have to award five other blogs the same award. The deal is to pick 5 blogs based on their creativity, design, and art.

100 Days

My eleven year old daughter read a book where a girl had to do a project of drawing an apple every day for a hundred days. At some point her grandfather took a bite from the apple. The girl liked that and took a bite everyday from the apple.

I thought about it and thought what a great idea to draw/paint the same piece of fruit everyday for a hundred days. I told my daughter I was going to do the hundred day idea and my daughter wanted to do it with me. Then my daughter counted on the calendar and the last painting will be on my wife's birthday.

We chose a lime. My daughter already has ideas of cutting it in half and juicing it at some point. We started last night. We didn't have much time because of a very busy day so I though we could do a quick charcoal for our first one. My daughter quickly got frustrated and took her piece to her room. I finished mine up. I used to love doing charcoals, but I couldn't get into it. I don't think much of this piece, but it is a start.

Odd one out

I have no idea what these flowers are, so I started calling them odd one out. Ink drawn with an eyedropper. I got a lot of ink on my fingers and hand and so smudged, on purpose, the ink on the paper. 1/4 sheet hot pressed arches.

Flower Shower

Here is the latest of the eye dropper pieces. I used a beer bottle to get the black ink rings. 1/4 arches hot pressed watercolor paper.

Bee Hive Post Card

Here is a watercolor post card I made for my friend. It is from a picture he took and sent me.

DaffyDill

Watercolor added to the below inked picture.

New inks

Being happy with my test ink I right away jumped into some new ones. This time for real. On hot pressed watercolor paper. I was trying not to get tight and keep the loose feel from the test pictures. Total failure. I felt I went over board and got too tight. I took a deep breath and decided I would finish these and learn from my mistakes.

The next morning when I looked at what I had done, I thought, hey, these aren't too bad. Ahhh, the life of a fickle artist.

Testing Testing

Here are some new pieces I am experimenting with. I worked on bristol board so I couldn't work the watercolor as well as I would like.

Step 1: Drew the picture with the eye dropper from the ink bottle
Step 2: Worked with a rapidograph pen
Step 3: Added watercolor

Flower Bee

Here is another bug piece.

The Wicket

Watercolor & Pen & Ink. 1/4 sheet hot pressed watercolor paper. I used a rapidograph for the inking.

While I was working on it my 12 year old son looked at it and laughed. He said he liked this one. I told him it doesn't have a title yet if he would like to name it. He said to call it the Wicket.

Cherry Tomatoes

I used cold press watercolor paper for this. I had a difficult time with the rapidograph pen. Not liking the ink part I dragged my feet working on this. Well it's done now. I'm not that happy with it, but here it is. On to the next piece....

Tomatoes in color

Finished the inking. Not very easy with the cold pressed watercolor paper. I bought a few sheets of hot pressed today. Can't wait to get back to that. I put on the first layer of paint.

Cherry Tomatoes

This piece is from a picture I took of cherry tomatoes in my garden last year. It took me a couple of days to get a composition I was sort of happy with. I'm still not sold on this but I am plugging away regardless. Also I ran out of hot pressed watercolor paper. This piece is on cold pressed. It is difficult to ink on the cold pressed. Here is what I have so far.