sitting ducks – Stories in My Mind

M Is For Mr. Mallard

Today’s quick paint project. I took the picture of this cute little guy sitting on a log next to his mate this past winter. They were just waking up for the morning and he kept stretching and preening as she swam away. I knew I wanted to paint him when I saw him.

Tomorrow I plan to start including Orin (The Bird-Watcher) in my post. He will give some fun facts about each of the birds I’m painting. By the way, these quick little paintings will be for sale at the Clark County Open Studio Tour, November 14 & 15. I will paint a bird for each letter of the alphabet (the X is a surprise installation).

Enjoy Mr. Mallard.

The Value of Values

This is the messy stage of painting. When I first started painting I thought everything needed to be perfect from the very get-go. I would spend hours on one spot, move to another and there discover, everything was off. At that time I didn’t even really know what was off, it just didn’t feel right.

Then I took a color theory class from William Cochran–teacher extraordinaire. The first course was on values. There lies the key to a good painting. You can have all the colors and perspective correct but if your values are off the painting is flat, there’s no star of the show and to the untrained eye, like mine was when I first started, you stand back and wonder what is off. Continue reading “The Value of Values”