2012, April 6

Not going to lie - I really don't like a lot of things about this. The clouds are not blended well, the hills look sloppy and the graded background did not come out like I wanted it to. But hey, there's a reason I'm not an art major right?

Based on a picture I took while driving back to Pocatello from Devil Creek Reservoir (wow - Having to spell that word out was harder than I thought).

Addendum to this - Part of my problem with the background slop has to do with brush size and shape (the clouds suffered mostly from shape), and my lack of willingness to buy the appropriate materials. I think a great artist could probably have made do, but I'm pretty mediocre.

2012, March 26

This is another piece where I just played around with watercolors. I wish I had used a brighter yellow or orange as the background to make it pop harder, so there would have been a more stark contrast between the foreground and background. As it stands I like the way it turned out, with the near blackness of the foreground fauna, but also the balanced brightness of the green yellow cattails and the green reddish canopy. I think I'm going to be doing more work in watercolors in the future; this only took me about an hour to knock out.

2012, March 22

Delicate arch in Utah, drawn from a photograph in my first college art class last year (2011) - Drawing 101. It has comparatively dull colors; sometime in the future I'm probably going to go back over it and make it pop with brighter oranges and reds, as I've never been a fan of washed out colors, and dull effects. This was also a learning experience in charcoal for me, as most of the dark shading was done in charcoal, and smeared horribly.

P.S. - I generally feel I did a horrendous job on the skyline. As I remember I finished the arch, and just wanted the piece to be done. So I slapped it together.

2012, March 21

Just a little oil work, done in some spare time at work. I think it looks fair, for only the second piece of oil work I've ever done. I'm going to try and work more consistently in oil, as I would like to emulate the van Gogh impressionist style. The striking movement of his paint really brings out emotions for me. As a side note, I really love classic landscapes. Typically, though, they're devoid of any life or action - but the sublime nature of the rolling forest, peaked mountains, and spacious fields all have a uniquely captivating effect on me.