A Person, Artist, Software Engineer, Geologist.

 Just back from our trip abroad as Asheville continues to recover from the hurricane.  This trip has been planned for a long time and we almost didn't make it because our dog sitting business will be closed for a while. But make it we did and now we are back. We love Amsterdam.  What a fun place to visit.  So many things to too and do there.  The weather was not the best but it did not have an impact on our visit.  Just bundle up. Got some quick painting in while on the boat (i.e., Viking) as we moved from port to port.  This painting is of a garden at a heritage site of windmills.  I thought it looked nice. Nice time on the trip to de-stress from what was happing back home.  We were fine back home but not everything is well with many others.

 If I play around long enough my style will appear.  I'm guessing that this is kind of it.  I'll keep working on other techniques in watercolor but for now this appears to be my style. I do like it and others appear (to my face) to also like this.  Not every one of my paintings is a success.  About 1/3 so far, but when they do I am rather pleased that anything good comes out of it at all. I do love color.  Color is happy and outdoors is full of color, be it the west or back east with the greens.  Color color color. Also doing some painting on hot press paper and see how that goes. Later......

It's easy to paint something like you have done before, so once in a while I step out of my comfort box.  In this case it's a landscape but it's a busy landscape.  Lots going on and hard to do.   So it's back to basics.  Photo : check, drawing : check, Paint : check.... and it kinda works out.  Yeah it's more or less the same style but looks alright (at least me wife likes it). I remembered to take a couple of photos while I was working on it.  This photo shows my setup and process with my iPad and drawing from a photo.  Not working on an easel, just on my desk. One last thing.  I have a number of frames squired away for my work as framing a piece can really make a huge difference in how it looks.  I also have a mat cutter and some extra mat board so fitting my work to a frame is not too hard. Anyway, enjoy.

 It's been quite a while.  Yup, I told some time off from art because of ..... pickle ball, summer, travel but more of all, I was very unsure that I could produce art that I myself liked.  Slowly I got back into it and started to "get" a style in my watercolor.   Ink I can do but I wanted to have COLOR.  Watercolor is tough and very tough for me as I was looking for a style to call my own.  I bought a small journal to take with me on hiking the CT / MA section and did some painting.  That was not the breakthrough though. For the first timeI painted with other non-painters in the same room!  Very scary!  It was on a trip down on Dewee's island off the coast of SC.  I had just gotten a new small W&N Cotman watercolor "landscape" set to use and took an afternoon off from fishing to do some work. The results where very pleasing to me.  It was the break through I was looking for.  Not every one was a winner but my style was coming out. Here are some of them.

I've been trying to draw / paint these barns for a couple of years but never felt or got them right.  This time I think they turned out right. So What went wrong before and what's right now with this drawing?  This time, the light was right.  It's coming from the upper right and the shadows just looked right.  The other thing is the corn field on the left had to "be in season", otherwise it's just a plowed field.  I had taken other photos from different angles but they never felt right.  This angle has the road, power lines, corn field, etc. all leading to the right.  The shadows on the lower right helps fill in that corner (don't forget about the corners!).  The last part is trying to draw (ink paint maybe) the trees in the background.  Not so easy when they are kind of a blob is green shades. So yeah, it's composition that is king.  Many times I just don't see it until the drawing / painting is finished and when it's right it feels good.     

Still working on "my" watercolor style.  Lots of videos that you can watch, lots of books (I know as I have them) but it all ends up in your own hands as to what style is yours. I tend to only do some art when I've given up all hope of producing anything so my expectations are really low.  That is when I have freedom and not the self-pressure I put on my self. This is my latest watercolor that reflects a style that I did with my "Kat" watercolor.  Kind of interesting and I like it. As it turns out, I got a bunch of frames from friends that I did the "Kat" watercolor for as they are moving back to Scotland and where cleaning house.  The "Kat" painting is going to Scotland too!  Anyway, I thought the frames where 8x10, but No, they are 8-1/2 x 11, and old size.  So I put my mat cutting skills together to try my hand at double matting.  And it turned out great!  It uses up double the mat but the results are great. Here is another watercolor with