bad site for animals..and people too

[Richie12345]

I was thinking it was a very ugly bull frog, lol

 

[Richie12345]

Smkie how long have you been painting? Is the other two color pencil?

Jeeze I am never going to be that good! lol I am horrible at painting and coloring. My grandpa is an artist and tries having me paint, Im so bad!!!

 

[smkie]

painting about 15 years, drawing forever..painting is something you suck at forever and then you get better..pay close attention to blue loves yellow..red loves green. orange loves purple..those are the colors you use to nutralize your shadows..like if your painting a leaf and want a shadow..ad the tiniest bit of red (sounds weird i know) and suddenly it will just shift to the background and be the perfect shade..those colors compliment each other as well so you use a yellow background to set off a blue ..anyway it took me forever to finally accept that and when i did things got a lot better quickly..both frogs are acrylic..a good cheap way to get use to color and completely forgiving in the fact that you can let it dry and go over and over until it gets right.plus you can water them down and use light washes to ad tint. (just make sure you never let your brushes dry out..i either freeze mine after cleaning or rub vasoline in them..and then wash it out again before i start..nothing destroys a brush faster then acrylic...i love it too because it doens't fade and is nearly indestructable. I had my cleo cat painting on top of the car after showing my brother drove off forgeting it was there...got home and when ohoh..went back found it face down on the road with tire track across the back, picked it up and not even a scratch..your brushes are everything...don't ever buy them in a package they rip you off right and left..don't let them sack them either......probably more info then you ever wanted.....get me started and i practically have to stuff a sock in it to shut up...i have thought about teaching later in life..hoping one of my new flock of children might have the interest..neither my son or daughter did and i have soooooo much i could give them. sigh last thing to add..i never but never use black or straight white..they look awful..use dark burnt umber for black (it mixes nicely with colors so you can add a tint of anything) and white i always add a tint of something to take the chalky out...now i will shut up..sorry

 

[Richie12345]

Smkie- You don't know how much I appreciate the tips!!! I can't believe niether your son or daughter have an interest in art! I have always loved drawing animals. My grandpa bought me a few drawing books. I've been practicing how to draw the great dane a lot. I have been drawing bears, Cows, and cats also... I need lots of work on humans tho. Especially hands, I hate drawing hands... My grandfather gave me this book that mostly taught him how to draw... He's been painting the same type of stuff all his life, but now he is trying to do abstract paintings and stuff. I only made one decent painting and that was with the help of him... I've been wanting to do sketches also, so I can draw those cute, or funny things my cat does all the time, I am trying to be more detailed in my sketches tho... I usually get impatient or angry at my work so to cool off I love making dumb little comic strips, lol. I have also been intrested in making films if you could consider that art, lol. Nothing interesting usually goes around here so I just make skate videos, or whenever I can get the chance make videos for school projects and try to make them funny. (I have made two: first one: A+ second: A++)

 

[smkie]

awesome..and oh yeah film was a huge thing at the art institute..we had a media library..you could go in and check out just about any type of equipment you wanted ...sigh..they said we would miss that the most when we were gone..the access to equipment was incredible..just keep practicing..but don't try to do a perfect right off..just do gestures..looking at your negative space as well as your positive..those little spaces inbetween things are huge keys to getting everything where you want it to be..with animals and drawing from life..i like to do gesture sketches..little quick 10 second things..and see how much i can get..it is devine practice and fun too..first line i put down is the spine..a quick line that tells you so much..the second and so on would be the weight bearing then everything else falls in place and if you get a gesture that says what you want..it isn't hard to go back in and put your muscle hair and bone at your convenience..you got the "life" with your quick lines....i always put my most detail in the eyes..i spend more time there then on anything else because all the life is there..the emotion..everything..once i saw Gg come out of her bedroom and i saw a tiny flash of a reddish color in her pupils..later that day i was painting a bird and i added the tiniest bit of red to the dark burnt umber i was using for the pupil..it was like i had pumped life smack into it..and i have done that ever since..i saw a pic of a squirrel once that had the loveliest blue reflected in the pupil as well so sometimes i go that route..either way the animal seems 100 percent more alive. study bones..once you understand the skeleton and how it moves your structures get stronger..especially in birds...i learned a great deal from those "how to draw animal" books when i was a kid..then as a teen i drew from any animal thing i could find..as an adult..i prefer life, if not, i prefer to take my own pics..but one thing i adore being able to do is play with them in my head making them do "people" things..not a new concept, but i enjoy it anyway. Some people can draw from the heads and others need a resource..i thought everybody could until i was in visual language at the art institute and my teacher asked how many could..there were only two of us..if i am doing a true to life tho, and especially from a photograph..i turn that sucker upside down, and will even use a magnifying glass to see each fold and shadow..following one to the next, lining everything up..i am slow and methodical, but i think accurate. Best thing about being an artist is u never get worse..and if you suddenly see that things are wrong, it is actually a great thing because now you will fix it..i know if i am in a slump to slow down cause i am about to make a breakthru..the saying the Lyfe so short the craft so long to learne...is something i believe...no one starts out great..it is practice that leads to the rewards....i had to put off for so long while i raised my children..working health care jobs for the insurance..now i am making progress i should have made a decade ago..and i still have a long way to go to be where i want to be.

 

[Richie12345]

Yeah, practice, that's what everybody says, but it's so hard for me... At times I just stop drawing, because I was sick of my work. People think I am a pretty good drawer, which suprises me because I have never been satisfied with my work except for a couple, plus I just have phases where drawing becomes my life. Then Film becomes interesting to me. I don't constantly paint or draw like you do... I love drawing eyes, b4 I would just put two ovals and a dot inside each one, now I like to put much more detail in it... It only took me a day to draw and shade an eye that seemed to have moisture, that reflected light, one that looked much more realistic... I then started experimenting with different eyebrows. It's pretty easy to make them, and I really get to be creative with it. I usually make thin eyebrows, but sometimes I make them thick and hairy, but I think the eyes play a major part with the eyebrows, whenever I have the eyes very watery like the person is crying iI like to make thin delicate eyebrows and stuff like that... I gotta work on sketching, I focus in detail too much. I gotta draw tha important lines so then I can work on the detail... I don't get waves tho, when I draw a person on a beach, I can never get the waves down... Anyways, I wanna get something done this summer for your "Year of the Dog" thread, I have a bunch of ideas...

 

[smkie]

Thank you so much i really hope we have a show.even if our best buddies don't give a hoot about art.(i know i show them all the time and they say so what wag wag).i am just thrilled you wrote that..most people just try to hard and that takes the fun out of it...just let it be your expression...like playing music. No one sits down to the piano and expects to be able to play mozart the first time...or the first year.. Have you ever had a day when looking at people u just notice eyes, or heaven forbid i won't ever forget the day of noses..it started at the bank..and this man in front of me had a peculiar nose..so i started checking out everyone's nose..it wnet on all day. or hands or ears really you learn with your mind not your hand..first there then later it transfers to your fingertips..it is all in seeing the world and it can be a delightful process..if you just let it flow.

 

[Richie12345]

Yeah, a lot of times I draw books, curtains, and stuff in my mind, whenever I am in the mood for drawing but don't have a pencil and paper near me. I wish I do right now... I am near lake michigan as we speak... I would just love to sketch out the beach, I am visiting there for a week... I am living in a cottage in the woods right now, and there is so much nature here