Dada with a D. Think he’s finished. I think I hate the way WordPress doesn’t work anymore. Makes everything harder. So I don’t want to use it because everytime I do it’s A royal pain.
Won’t load photos. Won’t let you type. “Corrects” words and makes them misspelled. Sigh.
My live model posing with her portrait. Lol.
Got off my tired self off the sofa and took a picture with my iPad Pro. Much closer to the actual colors though it darkened a bit on the left. If it’s not one thing it’s another right?! See below. U told u the trees weren’t the right color in the photos.
Mostly sennelier Pastel on mi teinte 15×20”also used a few Unison. And a variety of other hard pastels.
Did I say I bought a new bigger set of pastels from Amazon. Sennelier of course. Yes I did!! I bought that. It will be here first of February. Can’t wait.
One set of Sennelier wasn’t enough. If Sennelier was good enough for Degas Monet and Picasso – well I need.
So nice and creamy but don’t drop them on the floor. Oops!! Hmmm maybe I need to put a rug down?! Or a towel??
What I am working on. Pastel on Mi teinte. Why is that the iPhone won’t take accurate pics. All the colors are off but closer to the way they look than the unedited photo which is next. Aren’t u thrilled?!! The trees are brown for Pete’s sake yet my phone takes them as black. What the heck?! And the background is much lighter though not as brilliant as in the first picture. What do I need an $800 phone for if it won’t take accurate colors?! Please tell me. Thanks.
Margaret ready for bed. Xoxoxox tired from drawing all day.
Was bored on Friday and decided to take a class from artist network taught by Johannes Vloothuis Paint Along 84. How could you go wrong to get three classes for $18.99 on three consecutive Saturdays?! One is acrylic and the last is pastel. What a deal right??!
The reference photo. He also provided a template to trace onto your paper if you needed too. But it was quite easy to draw it. My sketch.
To quote my friend Mike it was the best watercolor class she had ever taken. I think she might be right. You could text with him on live messaging during the whole class. He explained everything from how to alter your photo to painting a tree. The class was thorough well prepared and the video broadcast was excellent quality. No racing to keep up like you have to do with Vlad Yesileyev or Don Andrews.
People would say demo a fir tree or a palm and he did. Five solid hours of how to at a terrific price.
I finally left while he was demoing a wave. Zoe had to go potty!!
My youngest grandson Dada on Ampersand Aquaboard. 11×14 watched a NWS zoom video on how to paint on Aquaboard with Ali Cavanaugh then we painted on our own. Came together for a critique on Saturday.
I never realized David has my son Ben, his daddy’s eye brows til I painted this. Funny the things you notice when you paint people. The eyebrows on those two are identical shapes.
Lots of thin layers. Rather reminded me of the class I took with Mario Robinson a few years ago. Lots of sheer thin layers. Sorry the pics aren’t better. Hours later. I scratched his hit with my Olfa box cutter as I listened to the critiques.
Need to work on making the bubbly background Ali does which I love. This is a screen shot from her Instagram feed so you can go followed her. She also has a patreon page for $20 a month to encourage portrait painting which I think I will do sooner or later.
Margaret xoxoxo
Fall trees in my yard. If I could change anything about my house it would be to put some of my front yard trees in the treeless backyard. The previous owners cut them all down when they put in the pool. Anyone want a pool. Please come and get it. Trade you for a few trees and maybe a patio. Waiting for this beauty to go red. Maybe by my birthday Sunday?! 🤞🏻🤞🏻🤞🏻
A quick sketch in an old Handprint journal. It still had two empty spreads. One more to go. Lamy Ef with Carbon Platinum Black ink. What I was looking at. Now in the trash. They always seem to mold before Thanksgiving.
Fun sketch along with John Muirs Law on Shopkeeparty’s YouTube. Give it a whirl! It goes live shortly.
I think I actually baked a perfect loaf of bread. Gorgeous and tasty.
Who doesn’t want to go to Paris for the day or a week or a year?! Half sheet Hahnemuhle rough
I took a class today on Shopkeeparty with Michal Jasiewicz. He’s a great painter but he can’t paint and talk about what he’s doing at the same time because he speaks Polish.
Of course he speaks better Polish than I speak English but when it’s an online zoom class you don’t pay attention to what he’s doing when he’s not talking. You don’t have time to just sit and watch because he’s painting like a madman.
He would be off painting like a madman someplace I wasn’t because I didn’t know he was painting.
I only realized that after the class was over.
That’s another thing. Why do they have to paint like a madman. I can usually keep up BUT i know a lot cant so WHY!?
The drawing. Did two because I drew the first one last nite on the back. Hahnamuhle doesn’t have sizing on the back so I has to draw it again. First wash. A mix of red yellow and blue no specific colors. Just a nice light grey. Heading. Down the road. All this was done wet on wet which makes me a little crazy and slab happy with the brush. No idea why I didn’t take more pics. Here it is for now. Already thinking of scrubbing the tree off some but who knows.
At this point I decided to do why I wanted. Started really slapping paint on. Drawing with my saber brush, the Cheap Joe’s scroobys loose Goose, which is always uncontrollable fun.
This is Michals painting. Before I took it out on the front setups and took another photo. The iPhone just takes crap pics as a whole. Still had to lighten it even outside. Yesterday from the front porch. Love my trees. And the bright fall sunlight glancing they thru themFrom where I was painting this am. Chad really has to get over here and get his overspray off my windows. Always one thing or another right?! Sweet Weenie dressed in her fall coat.
Seven to go. Used three pens. Lamy Ef or a micro uniball and sometimes a white pentel gel pen.
What can I say. All Zoe. Here’s the star. She’s run me off the sofa except for the corner of one cushion. She needs the rest today. One of my favs She doesn’t often lie facing me. If at first you don’t success try try again. So I succumbed to too much white pentel gel pen. Might have been a good one otherwise. Love this one. The best one so far I think. Drawn w a micro uniball.
Kicking back. She rarely lies on her back. Out my windows this am!! Love the light hitting the mist.
Margaret excited I have made it this far in inktober. Xoxoxo
Can scarcely believe I am keeping up. 18 days now and 18 drawings. That’s a first for me.
As you no doubt know my model is prone to rolling over stretching and turning her back on me if she’s annoyed. Does she care if she’s holding the pose like a good model?! NOPE!!
Margaret trying to keep the words to a minimum. Lamy Ef w Platinum Black ink black micro uniball white pentel gel pen and stillman and birn alpha. Small books are so much less demanding. Xoxoxox
It’s that time of the year and so far I have done seven drawings. That’s a new high. Usually do one or two and stop.
Blue uniball in a stillman and birn alpha.
It’s the smallest stillman and birn. 4×6” Thought I might actually do the drawings if I didn’t have too much space to fill up. So far that’s working. Giving me the Jack Russel state. No idea what she wanted.
And a superhero quilt for my oldes grandson. His request.
And a car quilt for my youngest grandson whose two.
Also baked and baked and then baked some more. Pumpkin spices cookies. Choc chip cookies. Scratch biscuits. A quiche. Pumpkin streusel muffins. I am tired now. Nite nite.
From a fun paint along with the delightful Berskshire, England artist, Liz Chadderton, on Shopkeeparty.com. She’s always a lot of fun and brimming with ideas, tricks, and tips. Plus she loves to paint any and all animals. I wish I had her energy! We started by drawing eggs off center in the sweet spot. 1/3 up and 1/3 from edge. Used a piece of rough arches. Next we applied masking fluid to our eggs.. Then we drew the nests and applied more masking fluid. I used a bamboo stick. Masking will ruin your good brushes so NEVER use it on them. Then we applied a light layer of watercolor using our chosen colors. Liz said to only use 6 colors. You never needed more than that.
Mine were indigo, Thalo blue, Prussian blue, burnt umber, Payne’s grey, and moonglow. I finally added raw sienna. I needed a lighter earth tone. Then we dried it added more masking fluid for more sticks and added a middle tone layer. As usual I went a little dark.
Hair dried a lot of masking fluid today. Something ideally you should never do as it makes it tough to remove.
More masking fluid added and dried then the darkest color. I tried using Q-Tips to put the masking fluid on. DONT. Yuck.
Lots of blobs of masking were what the teacher ordered. They take a while to dry. Then we rubbed and rubbed and rubbed off all that masking. Now it’s too white. So we used a rigger, in my case a Cheap Joes Scroogys Loose Goose brush. Don’t you love the name? It’s really a slim dagger brush. Makes the best curls and swirls. And terrific curly hair. Last we added more color to knock out some of the whites. Mine were a little over powering. I also used my loose Goose to sling lines aka brushes on it.
I also dipped my Loose Goose into some Winsor Newton white gouache to add a few more pieces of straw and curly bits where I didn’t have any. Bet you can’t tell where I did that.
This class is available for purchase on Shopkeeparty soon if you would like to try your hand at a nest or one of Lizs other classes. All are available as video on Shopkeeparty.com.
Margaret McCarthy Hunt Art 