Tag: #painting

Pastel Painting Atelier — Ellen Eagle

By 5t4n5

Pastel Painting Atelier -- Ellen EagleA super good book with Ellen taking us through everything she knows about art and her own approach to working on a artwork, from conception to completetion.

I would consider this book a must read for pastelists, but also i would think that a lot of artists of other mediums would also really enjoy it and get a few take-aways.

It’s also full of some wonderful art works, both by Ellen and others that she has something to point out about.   I would rate it very highly as just a book to look at the pictures if that’s also your thing, as there are a lot of wonderful pictures to browse.

#art #painting #pastels #elleneagles

30 Minute Pastel #1

By 5t4n5

30 Minute Pastel #1
20 x 15 cm.   Using various hard pastels and pastel pencils on Winsor and Newton Tints grey pastel paper.

This was a painting of a painting from the book 30 Minute Pastels by Margaret Evans.

I really don’t like this paper, it was just soooo hard to get the pastel pencils to do anything with it and i ended up breaking a few leads pressing too hard just trying to make a mark.   But it’s good to try various supports, maybe it’ll work better with soft pastels.

All in all i’m quite happy with how it turned out, even if it did take me quite a lot longer than 30 minutes.

Another painting for my living room wall though.

#5t4n5 #art #painting #pastels

Farm at Dusk

By 5t4n5

Materials:   Jinhao 992 fountain pen with Lotte flavour SketchINK, my new Winsor and Newton Professional Watercolours (i’ll get around to swatching these soon), and a Pink Pig 270 gsm hot press watercolour book.   After the last picture i went and bought a Cotman 13mm flat brush, and i also used a number 2 round.

Plan:   To do another of Peter’s enjoyable paint along tutorials which you can find by clicking here, and get to play with my new 13mm flat brush.

Learned:   The flat brush is very nice and i really enjoyed painting with it.   The Cobalt Blue Deep is very granulating, that sky, whoops.   I bought this colour just because i was curious, well, my curiosity has been served.   Not sure what i shall be doing with this colour in the future, but painting skies on hot press paper doesn’t appear to be one of its good points…

Soooo:   …back to French Ultramarine for skies then.

Next:   As i’m really enjoying doing these tutorials i’m gonna keep on doing them as they’re good drawing practice and challenging plenty enough for me to be learning about my paints.

I forgot to take a pic of the drawing before i painted it.

Back soon with another picture.

#5t4n5 #art #painting #watercolour #lineandwash

Barn

By 5t4n5

Materials:   A very cheap Jinhao 992 fountain pen from China (£1.25 on eBay, inc. postage) with Lotte flavour SketchINK, my new Winsor and Newton Professional Watercolours (i’ll get around to swatching these soon), and a Pink Pig 270 gsm hot press watercolour book (we like Pink Pig).

Plan:   I wanted to give my new watercolours a play so i followed along with Peter Sheeler’s tutorial of this old barn.

Learned:   That the Pink Pig watercolour books are very good.   This was a much better experience than painting on the Handbook sketch book, and oddly these Pink Pig watercolour books are much cheaper.   I already own a Pink Pig sketch book which i used for this drawing.   I think they’re incredibly good value for money with paper and everything made right here in England.

Soooo:   I’m fairly happy with how it turned out for my second ever watercolour.   Obviously plenty of space for learning and improving, which i’m looking forward to doing very much.

Next:   I definitely need a few more brushes.   Peter was using a flat brush throughout this tutorial and the only two flat brushes i have were either way too big or way too small, so most of my painting was done with a number 7 round with a number 2 round for the fine lines.   So i think my next purchase is going to be a Da Vinci Casaneo size 12 flat to have a play with.

Here’s the ink drawing before i painted it:

This was drawn mostly using the reverse side of the nib, which works incredibly well with this pen and gives these amazing consistent fine lines.

For £1.25, including postage from China, this Jinhao 992 pen is really sweet.   Yeah, you read it right, £1.25 including postage from China.   And it works lovely with the SketchINK which is super important.   If you like spending lots of money on disposable pens, wrecking the environment, then carry on, but if you have a couple of pounds to spare get on eBay and buy one, or several, of these pens and give it a go with some SketchINK — i think you’ll be surprised.   The pen comes complete with the convertor as well.

Back soon with another picture.

#5t4n5 #art #painting #watercolour #lineandwash

De Waag — Amsterdam — In Colour

By 5t4n5

De Waag -- Amsterdam -- In ColourMaterials:   My watercolours, a tiny bit of white gouache and my ink drawing.

Thoughts:   I was very anxious starting this as it’s the first time ever that i’ve used watercolours and i really liked my ink drawing and didn’t want to mess it up.   I know i totally used the wrong paper for this and the washes and a few other bits just fucked up because of that.   But, regardless, it was good to make a start with my paints.

Learned:   I’m not sure what i learned in regards to mixing colours, but i did enjoy playing with them and seeing the colours change as i added new colours to the mix.   Certainly some colours leave a bit to be desired, but i’m sure these things will improve in time as i play more with the paints.   It was also quite difficult to judge the amount of water in the mix in regards to how light or dark the colour will be on the paper — but again, i’m sure these things will improve with practice.

I definitely learned not to use this sketch book for anything i intend to paint with watercolour.   I bought a Stillman and Birn Zeta for future painting projects as i do like the smooth paper to draw and paint on so i’m just going to explore that for a while.

Soooo:   I’m quite pleased with how it turned out for my first attempt at this kind of thing, especially the painting with watercolour thing.

Next:   After this i feel a lot more confident having another go, so next i’m going to draw a picture in my nice, new, Stillman and Birn sketchbook and see how that behaves when i paint it.   Fingers crossed it’ll be much better.

#5t4n5 #art #painting #watercolour #urbansketch #lineandwash #waag

Sap Green Swapped

By 5t4n5

So after my recent mix chart of yesterday, i decided i may as well call into The Range, while i was passing, and buy the Permanent Sap Green from the Professional range to replace the Sap Green from the Cotman range.

What a difference.   After faffing around the last couple of days with the Cotman Sap Green struggling to make its presence felt against every other colour, the Permanent Sap Green had no problems holding it’s own on my mixing plate.

So i then had to redo my mix chart.   I cut a couple of 12mm strips of the Fabriano Artistico paper and glue sticked them to the chart covering the old Sap Green — i most certainly wasn’t going to do the whole lot again.

When i finished the mix chart i then redid the swatch in a similar manner.   As the swatch is in my Handbook Sketch Journal i cut the very last page out and made a bit to cover the places i needed to.   The spare paper left over goes nicely into the plastic pouch inside the back cover for future mistake coverings.

So yeah, very happy now with all my colours.   All that’s left to do is to sit and play with them and make pretty colour things on paper.

#5t4n5 #art #painting #sapgreen

18 Colours Mixed

By 5t4n5

As i use the University of Youtube to teach me all about watercolours, it appears that artists eagerly produce mix charts for every palette they use. So, not to be outdone, i proceeded to do just this with my one single palette.

By doing this one can learn many things: it’s not just about the colours, but also the relative strengths of the pigments within each colour.   And i do admit that it was also a rather enjoyable pleasure watching the colours change as i mixed them.

My palette consists of 17 Winsor & Newton Cotman colours, and one Winsor & Newton Professional colour — that being the Winsor Red.

It struck me as i was mixing them the difference in quality between the Winsor Red and the Cotman colours.   When mixing with the Winsor Red i only had to apply a tiny amount compared to the Cotman colour i was mixing it with, else the Winsor Red would simply over power the other colour.   So a good lesson learned there as to the difference between student grade and artist grade watercolours.   I look forward to slowly swapping out the Cotmans for artist grade ones as time goes by.

Certainly the first colour i want rid of is the Sap Green.   This colour, i felt, just totally lacked any mojo and was easily drowned out by other colours.   It doesn’t look too bad on the mix chart, but to get those colours with it i had to use over twice as much paint as the other colours.   So whether i want rid of it or not, it isn’t going to last very long anyway.   Therefore, i shall return to the University of Youtube and find me a suitable replacement to try.

For anyone interested, i used a sheet of Fabriano Artistico trad white for this.

So my next step in my watercolour journey is to simply play around to find the colours i need and learn to apply them nicely in order to paint my recent picture of De Waag.

Ta ta for now.   x

#5t4n5 #art #painting

Cotman Water Colours Pocket Plus

By 5t4n5

As i’ve been exploring my new art journey — wondering around Youtube — i’ve come across the art of ink and wash style urban sketching.   I’m very attracted to it and want to give it a go and see where it takes me.

So i thought i’d buy the bits i don’t have — like the paint.

And whilst perusing ebay i came across the “Cotman Water Colours Pocket Plus” palette. ink and wash Someone was selling them, brand new, for less than £10 including postage: so yeah, i bought one.

When it arrived i had a good look at it and decided that with a bit of coaxing from my Dremel i could turn a 12 half pan palette into an 18 half pan palette.

So, having thrown out the “Chinese White”, as i bought a tube of white gouache instead, i was left with space for another 7 colours.

Which i promptly ordered.

I then hacked out the needless bits that were in the way, cut a piece of sturdy plastic to snugly fit the bottom with and stuck the half pans to that with Pritt sticky dot things.   This allows me to lift all the pans out if i need to and to also remove them individually as well.

All six additional half pans i added were Cotman, and the empty “Chinese White” half pan i filled with “Winsor Red” from “Winsor and Newton’s Professional Water Colour” range.

I then proceeded to make a swatch of all my new colours in my new Handbook sketch book.

I’ve never been very good with paints, but i’m quite happy with how this turned out for a first time ever go with proper water colours.   I don’t think a 6mm flat brush was the best choice, but it got the job done good enough for me.

As a place to start from i’m very happy with my 18 colours and i’m looking forward to playing with them a lot this year, especially when the weather gets nice and i can get outside and play.

I’m thinking of buying a colouring book and just playing with the paints in it.   Seems like a good idea to get some much needed painting practice in.

#5t4n5 #art #painting

Arghhhh!!!

By 5t4n5

I found some lessons on Conté à Paris’ website and decided to have a play.

Materials:   Conté à Paris Black B crayon, Pierre Noire H and Blanc 630 on Pink Pig Sketch Book 150gsm white mixed media cartridge.

Thoughts:   The “Subtractive Drawing” lesson says to use a black pastel pencil to make the paper grey, i didn’t have one so i used the Black B crayon instead.   Need to try this same technique with a black or grey pastel instead and see what the difference is like.

I used the picture from the “Expressive Self Portrait” lesson, which some may think is defeating the object, but my mission wasn’t to do the self portrait lesson, it was to find a challenge that i could apply the subtractive drawing method to and i liked that picture.

Learned:   That i can do a reasonable copy of something.   How to use different erasers for drawing light in.

And:   I definitely plan no coming back to this technique in the future and have some more playtime with it.   It’s a fun way to draw.

In the meanwhile i have another picture on the go which i need to get finished.

#5t4n5 #art #pastels #painting