Last time I posted about painting, I showed you this…
This painting led me down two avenues; one to work on creating my own compositions with a blurred background and a focused subject (see below) and, for some reason, painting those orange petals made me think of whale’s tails – so I decided to paint one…
then another because I didn’t like the sea on the first…
For my first composition I studiously took photos of the flowers in my garden then played with mixing colours before I started painting.
I was mostly pleased with the background…
… until I realise my flowers where more purple-pink than red-pink and my planned subject was a robin with a nice red-red breast. I played with some red colours…
I also considered paining a blue tit instead, but a blue tit just wasn’t going to fit in that robin shaped space. Finally I went for a not quite robin coloured robin…
My second composition was a male mallard duck on the water. Once again I spent ages considering and mixing colours.
Although I’m much happier with the colours here, and particularly pleased with the reflection of the head, there’s two things I’m particularly unhappy with in all three of my compositions:
- The only blues I had granulated heavily and I didn’t like the effect that had on the water/sky – of course that’s easily rectified by buying some paint that granulates less.
- The paint on all the subjects is just to thick and stodgy. One of the main things I love about watercolour is its magical luminescence. To work on this I’ve now joined Patreon and subscribed to Louise de Masi’s channel. Whilst I’m not keen to paint flowers or Australian birds – which are what a lot of her subject matter comprises of, I just love the way she makes watercolour look like watercolour. I’ll be back soon to show you the results of my first tutorials with her.
Until next time.
Bekki x
Dartmoor Creative 
I think it’s great you’re playing and experimenting and yes, that reflection is fabulous!
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Thank you. Yes, I think it’s a balance of learning from others, but also learning from you own ‘mistakes’ drives lessons so much more firmly home.
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I love seeing how yor painting goes from strength to strength- love the duck.
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Aw! Thank you. Hope you’re settling in well xx
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You are welcome. The box pile is diminishing and who knows I may have something to blog about again.
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Funny. I actually prefer the first whale – there seems to be more movement in it and I can clearly see all the little droplets falling off. The colours on the duck are lovely.
I tried to have a peek at Patreon but the website seems to be geared towards the artisans who are on there rather than the curious who want to have a look..
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Hubby does too. he said the same about the droplets – he also pointed out that on the second one there is no ‘shadow’ under the water where the rest of the whale’s body would be,
I don’t think Patreon is very user friendly all round. The search facility basically doesn’t work – I couldn’t find any watercolour tutors when I searched. I think you basically need to know who you’re looking for in the first place. Now I’m on there, looking through the tutorials my tutor has there is hard work and impossible to know even if you’ve found all of them. My tutor has made a separate page on her own website showing them all with links to the right place on patreon. Feels like they’re just raking in the money and don’t care how bad the site actually is or that they could actually make more money if they improved the search facilities. 😦
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Obviously I share your husband’s good taste 😉
Shame about the site as it’s a good idea.
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Good taste? Have you met my husband? No, of course you haven’t. But if you had you would know good taste and my hubby don’t belong in the same sentence, unless you’re talking about wives. It’s such a shame Patreon appear to have cornered the market, but don’t seem to care about their user experience 😦
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I’ve not ventured into Patreon at all, and now I doubt I will!! Painting and art is HARD, you are doing so well to stick with it and you are getting more depth and detail all the time. I don’t do any art painting at all, or drawing for that matter; I don’t have the innate skill or the patience to work at it 😉
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It’s such a shame they don’t seem to want anyone to find anything on their site.
Thank you. I think the trick is stop if your not enjoying it. Life’s too short to have hobbies that feel like a chore.
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