So, where's Lady Godiva? I hear you all ask. I know, I had said in 2021 - when  Coventry was UK city of culture - that I would do a painting of Lady Godiva, as it had always been in the back of my mind to do, and it seemed like the perfect time. Well, She didn't materialize as planned (in 2021) mainly due to a lack of time. In my defence I did leave it rather late in the year to make the decision. Add to this the fact that I've never painted a nude before I soon realized that I'd bitten off more than I could chew. 

I did manage to get a few preliminary sketches done and a composition finalized. But I needed to practice painting a figure. I hadn't even done more than a couple of portraits - me and leonardo (de Caprio) so I decided to practice, initially with some portraits, and then some figure painting.

Due to various reasons it wasn't until this year - 2023 - before I got around to this. As described in my post on May 29 I started off with a copy (well that's how you learn) of Van Oust's 'portrait of a boy aged 11'. This was followed by Botticelli's 'portrat of a young man'.

I was fairly happy with the finished piece - I didn't bother with the decorative tunic as my objective was the skin tones.

I chose Robert Campins 'Portrait of a Woman' for my next attempt. I made a few versions of this as I wanted to try different mediums.

The first was watercolour which didn't turn out too bad considering my lack of painting experience. 

Unfortunately I used cardboard - as in a cereal box - instead of watercolour paper, because the student grade paper I have claims to be 90lb but it buckles very easily. I wasm't going for a likeness in any of these pieces as they're only experimental - which is probably just as well.. There was an unforseen problem with using the cardboard though in that the fibres began to loosen when it got wet and consequently the paint became mottled as it dried.

So my next attempt was on watercolour paper.

Not too shabby though it could probanly use a wash of cad yellow as it's a bit pale. I never realized how transparent watercolour black is - that small section used half a pan (and thats a small -A4 - portrait)

I'm also doing both acrylic and oil versions of this image as I'm really struggling with using watercolours - although that's probably more to do with the paper (I'm a bit reluctant to use good paper for practicing due to the cost. Is it a bit over-priced?) 

I will be showing the results of the other attempts in my next post.

Easter island head part 2

 

Part 2 of making an Easter Island head (in miniature form)

My statue uses a polystyrene armature/base and stands about 2 foot 6 inches (circa 750mm) high.

Once the basic form was established, I then set about building up the features.

I have to admit that I had no formal plan for the proceedure - apart from a few sketches I had made from my research of internet images. 

I rolled up some damp newspaper to use as nostril plugs - whose removal would leave holes - rather than drilling into the hard plaster after it had set. I made up rough wire armatures for the ears - which I then gradually built up with plaster. The other features - such as the eyebrows, nose, lips and chin - were gradualy built up in layers until they could be smoothed into their finished shapes.

 I have placed the finished head on my lawn as a garden ornament, and I might make a few more - just for the hell of it. I have a second polystyrene form which is ready to be worked on, so thats something I can start on one of these days.

Now to plan my next project.

Easter Island head

 I'm a big fan of the Easter Island statues. I mean, how on earth did those primitive craftsmen manage to make so many of them on such a grand scale. And why? To ward off nosy neighbours perhaps? Anyway I decided to make one of my own - but on a much smaller scale. Something to put in the garden, as an ornamental piece.

Now I did toy with the idea of carving into a large block of stone - 'coz there are a few hidden in the hedgerow, since the foundations for the house were dug. I imagine I would've had to carve the initial 'rough' shape with an angle grinder and then start refining with a hammer and chisel. That's something I would have to research as I've never tried anything like stone carving before. I decide to experiment with alternative ideas that might be a little easier to execute. My first thought was to build a statue out of something light,  and then coat it in cement plaster - which I would then shape the features onto. I have some experience with cement plaster from my time in construction so there should be no problems working with that (I hoped)

I had some pieces of polystyrene foam lying around that I was able to stick together with masking tape to form the basic 'head n shoulders' shape.

Working outside, on a rare dry day, I mixed some mortar (3× sand to 1x cement + softned water) and began building up a coat of rough plaster around the form by just slapping handfuls onto the polystytene (which is very theraputic I might add)

I had not intended to remove the base polystytene form - luckily enough - and so didn't need to plan ahead/ make adjustments for that. Also retaining it keeps the overall weight down whilst still giving support.

By the way to soften water add plasticizer (or washing up liquid for small amounts - roughly a teaspoonful to 2 litres of water)

The next step is to build up more plaster onto this layer and gradually form it into a more recognizable figure.

It's been a while - yet again - since I've made a post on here, mainly due to the facr that I haven't really been making any art. This is mostly due to time constraints, I find myself continously putting off starting any painting sessions as I never seem to have a decent amount of time to spare. I have done a few sketches to work out compositions (for new paintings) and have done a small bit of watercolouring, and a bit of writing & artwork for my 'Zippy the zebra' series of childrens books.

Following on from my proposal to do a painting of Lady Godiva during Coventry's time as UK city of culture this is still a "work in progress". I had established a composition and began work and then decided that I wasn't happy with it (the composition). More importantly though, I have never painted a nude, or even painted many portraits. So - not surprisingly - painting skin isn't easy. It's something I need to practice.  I have my new composition sorted out ( although I have to review the buildings), and have begun practicing watercolour portraits. Watercolour - for the moment - is the most convenient as I can spend an hour (or less) working, and then leave all the brushes and paint in situ until I can back to it at a later time.  Although it's one drewback is that it's a very difficult medium to control. And the paper is quite expensive. Luckily I have a pad of student grade paper as the good stuff is too dear to be using for practicing. 

This week I have attempted a copy of Van Oost's 'portrait of a boy aged 11'. I wasn't trying for an exact copy - but more to use it as a reference. I didn't measure up or anything, as my main concern was to practice the technique of painting in watercolour. Learning how to lay washes and understand how to deal with bleeding.

I thought the hat would be an easy wet-into-wet experiment but it wasn't as straightforward as I expected. Still, I was happy enough with the skin tones.

The second portrait I attempted was a copy of Botticelli's "portrait of  a young man". This reference image is a frontal view with a fairly graphical quality, but again, I am more concerned with trying to capture the variations in skin tone, along with application of washes.

I haven't been doing a lot lately with regards making art. I've had a few ideas for new paintings that I've composed in sketch form, but I haven't got around to getting started on anything yet. I have had a few Ideas for animation shorts which I will probably work on in the next few months. Having tried a bit of 3D modelling and animating before - mostly using 3ds max - I have since began learning to work in Blender (because it's free). It seems that most modelling software packages can only be rented now, which is fine for a profit making company, but its a bit expensive if your not earning from its use. There are some student versions of these software packages - which is good for learning them - but they have limited functions and cannot be used in a commercial application. So my reasoning, for switching to Blender, is that freelance video/animation producers may start using Blender more and consequently require the services of skilled Blender artists. 

Luckily a lot of the modelling techniques are similar across all the software packages so having had some experience is an advantage. In fact only having a small amount of previous experience may be better than being skilled in another program as there is probably less confusion when trying to transfer over. So far I have only done a little polygonal modelling and trying out materials etc. I'm staying clear of line modelling for now as I want to try and create a few environments to begin with. I have done a bit of animating on the 'suzanne' base  mesh (a monkey-head) that comes with the package. I was just experimenting and used shape tweens to create mouth movements for vowels, 

I didn't spend much time on the mesh appearance for this clip - I just added a basic colour material and attempted to add eyes (unsuccessfully) as the texture maps for the eyeballs failed to render. I think the shape tweens worked fairly well though, which was the objective on this occasion.

Since then I have added some improved materials in the form of textured eyeballs, a more realistic skin colour, and some hair (applying hair is new to me and quite a steep learning curve).

I think that having eyes makes a big difference although they could do with being a bit more reflective, or maybe its the light shining on them, I'm not sure so I'll have to experiment a bit more as eyes are so important in animation.

I was toying with the idea of widening the mouth opening and adding teeth. I will definitely be doing this on another project - which involves a gorillas head - and having the 'suzanne'

base mesh to practice on was a helpful coincidence. I have the basic gorilla head shape constructed but i still have to add an internal chamber for the mouth and add textures, hair and set up the lighting. I won't be updating on that though until it is finished, but I could add a breakdown of how I made it after I publish the final clip/short.

Hi, so this is a new blog that I will be dedicating to all my creative work from the recent past and for the foreseeable future. I have a feeling that I've spelled foreseeable wrong (it just looks wrong for some reason) - and that wasn't deliberate - but it does give me the opportunity to warn you that spelling mistakes will happen here, possibly quite often.

When I used to create blog posts on a regular basis I was in college - LSAD - and it was something that was encouraged, mainly so that a; you would have an online back-up of your work, and b; your contemporaries could view your work and offer some feedback/critique. Which made sense, to me at least. But I won't have any constraints here so it's very likely that I will occasionally stray off topic or sometimes rant and rave about something totally irrelevant. But you'll get used to it (if you persevere) and hopefully even get to enjoy my musings.

Hopefully I'll get around to posting regularly, at least once a week, so that I can keep things up to date. I also hope to get plenty of comments/ feedback/ critique from you as my intention for this site is to offer some sort of help or guide to anyone wanting to learn about making art. On my part I will be adding any tips/ tricks of the trade that I have learnt from my own experience, and also pointing out my mistakes (which are sometimes obvious after I've made them - see below) so that others may avoid them. So any tips etc from other artists can be added via comments as my personal experience - in painting at least - is rather limited.

Have you spotted the GLARING mistake?

 



 I started a series of 'Island fishermen' paintings which are meant as a humorous depiction of traditional fishermen who carry their "Currach" with them all the time. This was a provisional draft for one of them when the lads get rained off and so go to the local pub for the day. I've almost finished the revised version and will be adding it to the Gallery (which is currently a work in progress).

I'm going to start off with a look at what I've been doing over the past year, as this is when I really decided that I was going to try and become an artist to earn a living. Mainly because I found it almost impossible to get a regular job. Even when it came to doing work that I had several years experience at - must be my age or something. I had a studio set up in the loft space of our shed (yes, the same 'The Shed' studios where 'The Oldest Lion' was shot (no I didn't shoot a lion in our shed)). This gave me the idea to rename my old blog and start afresh with some of my current activity. Hence the name 'The Shed Studio3'. It wasn't supposed to have a 3 on the end but I also renamed my Etsy shop (feel free to have a look if you haven't already) and needed to add the 3 for that. Fortunately I like the number 3 - except for maybe when it's a crowd - or it's the amount of legs that second-hand table came with - but it does make the name seem a bit trendier.

 In the next post I'll probably have a look at some of the earlier paintings that I've made and gradually work my was up to what I'm doing now, until then - adios.