Paramount Ranch

I absolutely love painting on location and on this particular day I was drawn to the atmospheric effects of a warm California morning. I've realized that there's a particular advantage to working on location for me as well. Besides enjoying nature and learning how to capture what I see I can't work on the painting too long....I have a set amount of time to work, which prevents me(hopefully) from over working it...Still want to get better at making loose, painterly brushstrokes to describe the foliage though.

Painting on location - Plein Air

These are some sketches done on location over the last few months. In the sketch right above, I tried this technique that I learned about in Nathan Fowkes workshop last year.
http://nathanfowkes-sketch.blogspot.com/
It seemed so appealing, since it's such a light way to travel. He uses watercolor and white gouache, and he makes it look so easy in his beautiful sketches, but I got a little frustrated by how the colors dry lighter and darker than expected so I've gone back to oil again. I'm really enjoying painting outdoors again and just enjoying the serenity of being in nature.

Printmaking class

I really love the work of David Weidman
http://weidmansart.com/prints.htm
so I was excited to take a printmaking class at Moorpark College this spring. Wanting to see if I could create some work inspired by Weidman's great shapes and design it took me quite a long time to figure out how to use the medium to it's advantage, so the fact that our teacher Sexton Stewart was very patient and gave us the creative freedom to take it where we wanted was so helpful. I figured out a few things along the way and the prints below were part of my final project. I like working monochromatically at times but found that with printmaking it almost works better the more contrasting colors you use. And I definitely want to play around making more abstract prints.

Slight improvements?...

Back in Tim Gula's class a second time I'm able to focus on gesture a liiiittle better....:-)


The 2 above I did in Glenn Orbik' s life drawing class. He is really great at explaining things, which helped a lot.



I struggle with leaving the face alone and my infatuation with the curve of the line behind, to focus on the gesture and action instead.
Above are two examples of Tim Gula's magnificent sketches drawn in my sketchbook. He makes it look so easy...

I'm posting some of my life drawing and quick sketches from the classes I've been taking at California Art Institute with Tim Gula and Glenn Orbik. This way I can keep track of any improvements...although I've been told it gets worse before it gets better?!? Either way I'm just going to hang in there:-)

Using photoshop on "My Gympartner is a Monkey"

BG Paint on Balto - Universal Studios

Work on "The Buzz on Maggie"

Mucha Lucha Backgrounds

Before starting the cartooning class and getting back to life drawing.

Just now able to post some of the sketches I did of Sam in January. It's neat to look back at them as they show him before he started crawling and when he was barely attempting to roll over. So much has changed in a month or so. I love the smile I was able to capture of him laying on his back. It is so much him. He's a happy little guy most of the time.

Sometimes I wish it was possible to regain the clear vision and wonderful way we capture the essence of things when we draw as children. This is my son Ben's drawing of a germ. He clearly gets the message across.

Sketching over the last week, or so: Jan 06-Jan 13, 2010

011310 - Second attempt at capturing the idea of multi-task dad, adding a second son..the one on the right works better, pulling dad along. Now I think I need a light table or doing it on the computer to keep improving on sketches, keeping what I like and changing what I don't.
011210 - Working on a sketch for Jon on the multi-task dad. First attempt - I like the feeling of baby on the right.
011110 - I'm a little tired and distracted these days
010810 - This is a first sketch of a visual representation I had of Manda and one of the games she enjoyed a lot with all of us, connecting pointing fingers. Something I want to develop more.
010710 - Working on capturing Sam and Theo, more than me.
010610 - This is a very common sight in our house. Ben looking like he's squeezing poor Theo, because his expression is so intense (didn't capture that expression in my sketch though:)
010610 - Practicing turning Ben into a cartoon (Theo's legs need some work?!), and some action poses from my Cartoon Retro Drawing "Cartoon Cool" book. Check out Chris Hart's site: http://www.chrishartbooks.com/ for more great books of his.

Adding a little color in between my sketching