Forest thru the Trees - Part 2

I like to group my learning experiments of paintings to try different types of common themes.  This is another block-in of trees in a forest setting.  I blocked in the basic shapes after drawing and outlining the design.  I will need to add foliage and square away the foreground reflections better.  It is a decent start to another learning and practice oil sketch.

Hand drawings

These are more practice drawings of hands.  These are from the Andrew Loomis book on Heads and Hands.  I have hundreds of these drawings.  They are like practicing scales in piano or other basic skills one does on the way to mastering a skill.

The Forest thru the Trees

This is a small oil sketch I blocked in this evening.  I started it the other night with a simple drawing and outlining the drawing.  I let that dry and tonight I put the basic colors in.  Tomorrow, I will refine and define the foliage, the trunks and the foreground to add depth and shape.  Painting a forest is not the easiest and this is one of the first I have tried.  Practice, Practice, and Practice.

Celtic Designs

I experiment around with different things and tonight these are some celtic designs.  I used a compass to get the circles but I penciled in the basic designs and then went over them with black, grey, and gold markers.  These are classics from long ago and they are still interesting and unique style.

Andrew Loomis

Andrew Loomis is an old school Illustrator and Artist from the 1930s and 1940s.  He produced a series of Art Books which an classics.  Any artist worth their salt gets his books and works thru them to improve their skills and to challenge their thinking.  I have worked thru them and continue to do so.  Above are some copies of his work from Heads and Hands, and from Creative Illustration.

Tree Sketch - Part two

I revisited the tree sketch from a couple of months ago.  I was unhappy with the clouds and the foreground.  I made some tweaks to both and made some small adjustments on the tree foliage.  I will continue to mess with it.

Springtime Dreaming

It has not been too spring like yet, but one can hope.  Today, I worked on a small study of the Cherry Blossoms Festival here in Washington, DC.  This is the Washington Monument reflected in the Tidal Basin.  This is a small 5x7 study to quickly work out problems and determine how I will paint this in a larger size.