Month: July 2020

I thought I posted about the books I’ve been reading during the Pandemic to brush up on my knowledge and skills as an artist already, but turns out I forgot to actually que them up so yeah, let me back track real quick and talk about some of them :}!

Color and Light: A Guide for the Realist Painter by James Gurney, he also has a blog and YouTube channel with lots of fantastic information and art. His book combines a lot of lessons and more from his blog and compiled into a beautiful book filled with color theory explanations and examples anyone from a novice to expert can gain something from.

Reading this book gave me everything I wanted from the studio art classes I took in college. They were good classes, but I didn’t get the understanding I thought I would from the on portraying light and color…or figure drawing. I’m still haunted by cow skulls :/.

Anyway, each chapter is broken up to a two page spread or less with all the key points you’d need to understand the concepts James is talking about. Not just talking, but also showing examples of!!

Idk about you, but nothing makes my eyes roll harder than a book about art techniques or color that’s is all text with small examples. I need to see what you are talking about, and I never had a problem grasping anything James talked about because he creates fantastic examples. All art or photos that he has created or taken himself (often from his Dinotopia series) That’s hella baller and makes this book a most have for any artist.

I got so into reading this book I had to crack open a fresh notebook to take notes in bc the highlighters weren’t enough! For each new topic I created an exercise for practicing what I’ve read. It’s actually something I’ve carried over to any reading regarded art improvement. It’s pretty nifty when I’m trying to decide where to start. Just open the lesson planner and pick something.

He has another book as well that’s called Imaginative Realism that focuses on bringing your imagination to life that I also picked up too. It’s also pretty good, but I found not nearly as practical as much of the advice would then say, “make a maquette” and I’m like….I ain’t got the time, clay, or space for all them figures (as cool as that’d be). Buutt when thinking about it, I can translate it into making 3D models for reference so not a complete bust.

I really love a lot of the fun sketches in this book and models (even if I’m not going to be making them).

The next books are geared towards watercolorist.

The New Encyclopedia of Watercolor Techniques is an incredibly helpful book for exploring watercolors. Everything is laid out neatly with ample examples for each technique discussed. This book has a nice balance of text and art that illustrates each point clearly.

It’s hella comprehensives on the many techniques and tools that can be used when painting and discusses terminology native to watercolor as a medium.

The last book I’m going to highlight is actually from a series of how to books by Stephanie Pui-Mun Law that details how she creates her dreamy fantasy watercolor paintings.

Stephanie has created books on making fantasy worlds and the creatures that reside within them. Each book serves as a how to guide for creating fantastical creations in her style. It’s a beautiful style filled with wispy and elegant lines, and soft colors that make a splash on the page.

A lot of my line work tends to lean on the bolder side, but I definitely appreciate studying different kinds of artistic styles since you never know what you may pick up. I’m still reading through the Dreamscapes series, but I’m loving the step by step Stephanie takes from sketch to completed painting and the techniques and tools she used to get there!

When I have more recommendations, I’ll be sure to let y’all know :).

Sat down with my paints and got to swatching! Check out my charts woot!

These are the colors I have in my Studio Palette. I’ll break them down by brand, but they are all mixed up on my palette. All the brands I’ve chosen have fantastic colors, but as I was being very picky, some do have colors that just spoke to me more during my comparisons.

From Daniel Smith I have the most colors from Buff Titanium, Burnt Sienna, Quinacradone Gold, Quinacradone Coral, Neutral taint, and Cascade Green. Daniel smith has a huge line of beautiful colors and a ton of fun colors I just wanted to try out, Cascade Green is one I look forward to playing with more. Daniel Smith makes beautiful earthy colors, but also vibrant jewel tones too. Quin Coral is just a gorgeous color and so I had to have it. Buff titanium is a convenience color I like for mixing skin and pastels. Neutral tint is for darkening without black and more convenience.

Da Vinci: Raw Umber. I want to try out more Da Vinci colors, but many of the colors I picked out for them lost to M. Graham when I compared my swatches before buying. Now that I have it in my palette I really want to try more colors of this brand bc they set up solid and re-wet so nice and creamy! Not to mention that bang for our buck!

Sennelier: Lemon Yellow, Indian Yellow, and Ultramarine Deep. Sennelier swatched some of the loveliest light colors I’d seen, so I knew I wanted to get my yellows from them. The Ultramarine was a last minute swap, but I dig it as It works well as a softer blue.

M. Graham: Quinacradone Rose, Phthalo Green and Blue. M. Graham has some of the move vibrant colors around. They don’t set up as nice in palettes, but so long as I don’t leave them in the heat and then put them in my bag, they set up enough to travel with. I’m totally in love with the vibrant colors I get with these colors alone, and when mixed, chefs kiss!!

Holbien: Terre Verte. This was a last minute addition. I needed something that would be able to create earthy colors and decided on Terre Verte. I wanted the one from Sennelier, but was sold out so went with Holbein. I wanted to play with some Holbein colors anyway since they aren’t as granulating and offered more control when painting, but again, most of the colors I had picked out for them lost in the color comparisons to M. Graham and Daniel Smith. Now that I’ve played with this color, I also enjoy how it sets hard and re-wets well. Much like the Da Vinci, so I’d like to explore them some more in the future.

QOR: Dioxazine Purple. I was afraid to get to many QOR colors as I do enjoy having control over my paints as opposed to letting them fly around the page, but the more I practice with watercolors the less I fear that. I mean watercolor paint only goes where there is water so control where the water is and that settles that ha! This purple is such a fantastic color to mix with and a nice convince purple as purple is my favorite color. I’d be down to try more primaries from QOR for sure, specifically reds!

The colors in my Portable Paint Palette are Quin Rose and Coral, Buff Titanium, Dioxazine purple, Phtalo blue and green, Indian and lemon yellow, Burnt Sienna and Raw Umber. This palette is the one I’ll be using mostly for World Watercolor month.

These are my swatch cards for my portable palette. I just used some practice Bee Watercolor paper and then cut and laminated the swatches once dry so I could tuck them into the palette when on the go. They are front and back FYI.

I’f you are reading this live, I should have a few paintings up on the right where my Insta feed is. Im particularly proud of this one below though :3c.