A few more acrylic transfers

'Pidgeon', acrylic and paint marker on 8 x 11 wood board.

'Pigeons on wire' also acrylic and paint marker on 8 x 11 wood board.

I used a gold pigmented base for the background, which isn't incredibly visible in the scans.
More transfer experiments follow :)

Gotye painting on 0 hours of sleep...

In the process of staying awake all night (to hopefully jolt my body back into a normal sleep schedule for a weekend in Michigan) I stumbled across an excellent video by a very excellent musician. Gotye's "Someone I Used to Know" has been on repeat for the majority of the evening, night and early morning. My goal for the night/day was to finish a set of new transfer images - but after a few hours of his music and being so struck by the visuals in this video I decided I probably needed to try to paint it.

Now that I have done that, I should probably go chug gallons of coffee if I hope to stay awake until this evening. My body doesn't seem to stay awake as well as it did in college...

Breaking in the new cintiq!

We made it back to Miami from Boulder in one piece - which is awesome, considering we decided to drive the entire 36 hour trip in one go. The ferrets weren't exactly pleased, but we supplied them with a bounty of treats... so they can't have been too upset with us.

Upon getting home, we found a stellar deal on a Cintiq (wooo craigslist!) and I found myself upgrading from the 12wx, to the 21. Seriously, it's a whole new world. It took me a few nights to get used to it and I still haven't grasped all of it's capabilities - but it is definitely one of the better investments I could have made this year.

This little guy was made as a practice image on the new cintiq, based off a 'hallucinogenic spirit guide' character concept from conceptart.org. I missed the deadline for submission but was still intrigued by the idea. I wanted him to be friendly, beckoning and full of ideas we haven't found yet. Somehow that part manifested as a yellow glow in my head.... perhaps I just miss the Michigan lightening bugs :)

Whirlwind Summer...

What? It's mid-July?? I have no idea where spring even went and it's already halfway through summer?

We've been in Colorado for about 3 weeks and though we have been super busy, it has been a wonderful time. The vibe out is here is fantastic and I could see myself living here, no problem.

As our level of busy-ness with our current project is at about 11 (on a scale of 1 - 10) I have not gotten much chance to paint. I am knee-deep in a pretty emotional portrait, but being surrounded by the scenery here I am finding it hard to focus on the face. Good thing I packed my seldom used watercolors!

I've decided to step back from the portrait (even though I enjoy it) and focus on where my attention seems to be constantly drifting. To the Mountains! The Flatirons, to be exact. I've been carting my watercolors and a convenient pack of postcard sized paper to the park across our street and have been trying my best to practice landscapes. Landscape work has always been a stretch for me, but I am finding the super small format keeps me from getting frustrated and encourages me to move quickly.

I also want to start painting the more interesting beer bottles I have started collecting. There are tons of local, delicious (and cheap!) breweries in this area, which results in some pretty nifty beer bottle designs. I'm hoping to do one each weekend :) Drinking beer, for art!

Saturday night sketching

I started reading Game of Thrones a few weeks ago. It's a beautiful story, but thus far - so very depressing. The story has gotten inside my head pretty well, so when I was looking for reference poses I found myself drawn (pun totally intended) to more medieval costumes.

This was done in about an hour, with mechanical pencil in my sketchbook. A reference was used for pose, but I tweaked the face/body structure a good bit.

Regrets turn to Inspiration

Not too long ago, Dan and I found ourselves reminiscing our time at MSU. I asked him if he regretting anything, and he said he didn't. Dan then asked me the same question. I unfortunately did.

It was summer semester of 2008 and I was in Drawing II with one of my favorite professors. Michelle was the caliber of professor that saw past the work you were creating and into what you 'could' be creating. She was full of wisdom and advice that I tried to take in, but my mind was cluttered. It was summer, I was a few weeks away from a summer in Austria and I was utterly unfocused. I felt myself falling short, which then caused me to step back further away from my work. There was so much potential in that class and though I was trying to grasp at it - the majority of it slipped through my fingers. I'll probably always regret letting that class pass me by, instead of addressing it with the fervor I should have.

Cut to a few years later, I found myself replaying some of Michelle's pointers to me as I worked. Caught off guard, I stopped working and began to examine the memories I had from Drawing II. Thankfully I possess a pretty reliable cache of college, (though I am not quite sure how I managed that!) and I found myself rocked.

Suddenly, everything I was trying to do had an answer. Everything I was feeling at that moment had a root and the root was buried deep in something I remembered from that class. Something that had not quite sunk in during drawing II, was suddenly brought to life. I can't quite explain the exact sensation other than the cliche, 'click!'. In a whirlwind of paint, paper, gel and brushes I started redoing old projects, looking at old work, rethinking old problems. And transfers... I had forgotten about transfers.

Michelle had suggested I play with transfers, (using gel medium to transfer a toner-based image to another surface) and I started to during that class - but never appreciated the process. Until now.

This week alone I have probably made about 10 various transfer paintings as I experiment with the process and materials. Each one takes about a day to fully complete and each one is a bit of an adventure.

This owl was one of the first experiments. I used an opaque gold acrylic in the background, which falls a bit flat in the scan. The paints for the owl itself needed to be mixed with a bit more gel medium as well, but as an experiment goes - I'm happy with it.

In the end, I guess having a regret isn't always a bad thing. Looking back on the situation and seeing where I fell short was the impetus to stumble into my current position and I'm grateful for that at least. I'll be honing my transfer process for the next few months and am very excited for the images in my head to finally have a home!

Thursday night with old pastels

I was cleaning out my desk area (again!) and came across a box of pastels I thought I had used up ages ago. I bought this set specifically for a Drawing II project back at MSU and they have followed me around since then. I've gone through sets of better pastels in the meantime, so it was a happy surprise to find this familiar box in the back of my supply closet.

The set had basically been worn down to teeny nibs of color, (except for the black pastel) so it was a challenge to cover the paper with as much thickness as I usually like. This led to a bit more color experimentation than I usually do; "Oh the brick red is gone? I guess I'll try magenta..."
Made for a fun evening regardless :)