Tag: yellow

Strawberries and Bananas: finishing the watercolor still life series

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For the official final painting in my watercolor still life series I call the “going bananas” series, I decided to finally tackle some strawberries. It makes sense to my weird brain – I love that flavor combination, so why not draw and paint the two together? Famous last words, y’all ….

collage of the reference photo and my finished watercolor painting Strawberries and Bananas

Choosing a reference photo and making changes to it

Choosing the reference photo was not difficult. I saw this one with the two bananas encircling four strawberries, and loved the layout and how the light and shadows played. What I simply did not like was that background color. Setting the fruit on any red was a bad idea (to my eye) as that overwhelmed the strawberries. So I took the color out of the reference photo and began working on the sketch.

collage of the reference image in grayscale and my preliminary sketch for Strawberries and Bananas from my sketchbook
ref photo and preliminary sketch from my sketchbook for Strawberries and Bananas

As y’all can see, I do use a 3 by 3 grid to do my sketches. This keeps me from starting in the center and then going off the right edge like I used to do all the time. That was a big weakness I had from as long as I could remember. I just can’t explain why I didn’t start using a grid sooner than I did. It was probably the same reason I didn’t start using transfer paper until this past year – the mistaken belief that I shouldn’t need it if I am a “real” artist. I guess there really is something magical about turning fifty, in that I can now laugh and say I don’t care what others think.

Coloring it in (with watercolor paint)

Once I had the basic lines transferred to my paper, it was time to play with color! The two bananas were no problem, especially since this was the third day in a row for painting the yellow fruit. I just kept using the same tubes of yellow. Seriously, why change it up when I was satisfied with what has been working?

I decided I wanted the background to be purple, but first I tried a lighter and redder shade called Cobalt Violet. Even after it dried, it looked too pale and far too pink. So, back to the dioxazine purple. Again, if it ain’t broke, don’t try to fix it.

For the strawberries, first I laid down a base layer of red. Then I went to work on all that green, trying to catch the shadows to make it look three dimensional. It was while I was working on the strawberries that my back started to really hurt. Since this was the finale of the series, and no one had dropped out of the art challenge yet, I had to get to some semblance of done. I gritted my teeth and painted on.

third painting in my watercolor still life series I call "Going bananas"
third painting of my watercolor still life series exploring the shapes and color of bananas

Links to purchase!

If you have the perfectly-sized blank spot on your wall to accommodate the 9 by 12 inch original watercolor painting, then head to my Daily PaintWorks gallery and purchase through them. Trust me, it will be easier than getting my attention when I am in the art zone. If you need a different size, you can order from as small as 6 by 8 inches up to as large as 45 by 60 inches through my Pixels shop. They also have some good swag, and I’ve heard they’ve improved their jigsaw puzzles.

Going Bananas: New 3 day still life art challenge

Published on by kmgunnart4 Comments

I could not resist jumping in on a quick three-day art challenge over on Fine Art America’s artist discussion board. Like most of the art challenges over there, this one has a theme: banana(s). I have thought about doing a series of banana-themed fruit still life like my Apples and Oranges series for a while, so I figured this was my cue to just do it. Just to be cute, I am calling this short series “Going bananas!” and intend to execute it in classic still life format as I see it.

graphic collage of the reference photo of bananas I used for my still life watercolor painting for the short art challenge
reference photo of bananas I used to make my still life watercolor painting

(I should note that I have not abandoned the 100 faces challenge. I am only taking a quick side-quest, as the DnDers would say. I’ll also say that I successfully completed the challenge, and just need to get caught up on blogging it.)

Finding paintable reference photos

I’ve probably mentioned before that what makes for a good painting reference is not always what makes a good photograph. Hunting up some reference photos to use proved that – most have softer lighting so the subject can be seen as well as a two-dimensional image can allow. A good painting, on the other hand, works best with dramatic lighting, with a single light source ideally. Dramatic lighting produces dramatic shadows, which a lot of photographers seem to avoid. I did manage to find three photos with a more or less classic still life arrangement … and one that is more of a wild card that I may do as a bonus.

Setting some clear objectives

I wanted to do this short (and fun) art challenge with some pre-defined objectives, which is military for goals. (The cranky old Army sergeant in me still rises to the surface from time to time.) I knew I wanted to do somewhat traditional fruit still life paintings, so that cried out for a mostly-traditional medium. Since I hadn’t used my watercolor paints in quite a while, this seemed the perfect excuse to work in watercolor. I did choose to use more modern pigments, and am happy with the results.

Since only one of my reference photos had anywhere near the level of drama in its lighting, another objective was to see if I could adjust for that on my paper.

My final objective was to utilize complementary colors: the obvious yellow/purple, but also some red/green where I could.

Painting the bananas in my still life

With my objectives in mind, I went to work. This first painting simply FLOWED from first my pencil, then my paintbrush. It was one of those days when every step went smooth as silk. In fact, I started the sketch at approximately 1030 and was waiting for the paint to dry so I could scan it before 1530! Only five hours from start to finish, including drying time, is a quick and easy watercolor painting for me.

graphic of my watercolor still life painting simply titled Bananas, in the square format sites like Instagram love so much
square graphic of my watercolor still life I simply call Bananas

Hubby says he loves how the green looks on the bananas, with the comment that this small bunch looks exactly like what I search for in the grocery store – still a touch green. To contrast with the green, I chose to paint the plate as a reddish wood, instead of the really light color in the photo.

Overall, I am VERY pleased with how this one turned out. I feel I nailed both the color and the lighting, though I should probably at some point practice painting wood grain, as that is the only part that I think needs improvement. It scanned even better than it looks in person (to my eye; hubby disagrees) which is unusual for my work. Personally, I think my painting is better than the photo I used for reference.

All in all, a good start to this new art challenge.

How to purchase!

If you have the right space for the 9 by 12 inch original painting, then click over to the listing at Daily Paintworks to handle the transaction. It’s likely quicker than trying to hunt me down when I am in a mood to be unplugged.

Need a bigger and bolder version? I have art prints available through my Pixels shop ranging from as small as 8 by 6 inches to as large as 60 by 45 inches, so that should cover most walls quite nicely. You can also get jigsaw puzzles through this link.

Want to wear my art, like my mother and sister prefer? Click through to see the options at my RedBubble shop. There are also some home accessories – and yes, my favorite is still the analog clock.

I made a video of this post

Check it out on YouTube, give it a like and share!

Bananas – Behind the Art with Katrina Gunn

Yellow Roses in Purple Vase

Published on by kmgunnart6 Comments

First, believe it or not, this is a computer-generated image. I’ve been working for a while on trying to get some classic floral still life style images from the text-to-image software I’ve been playing around with, and after exhausting a certain look, I decided to try some different modifiers to the same basic text prompt.

I’ll cover this other style on Friday, but this particular image gets its own post for the simple fact I will be working on doing it by hand in the next week. Even more inspiring to me than the Sunset Palms image, this is a simple but elegant floral still life composition of a bouquet of yellow roses in a purple vase, sitting on a wood table. It is the complementary colors that make this idea pop.

Inspiring digital artwork

Picture of woman holding framed art print Yellow Roses in Purple Vase
Yellow Roses in Purple Vase, digital artwork available as an art print

But first, the important links for print products to buy. I have it on most products at my Pixels store as well as art prints. It doesn’t looks right on objects where the printing is horizontal in orientation. I recommend getting art prints from there because Pixels is owned by Fine Art America, who are big in the art print world. For those who enjoy wearing artwork, I recommend my RedBubble shop. My sister and mother both recommend them and are repeat customers.

The search for a good rose image

No surprise to long-time blog followers here, but I personally love yellow roses. I’ve been trying to paint or draw the “perfect” yellow rose piece since the day after I picked my art back up, and I have a couple watercolor paintings I did one to two years ago – Electric Yellow Rose and Yellow Rose. (If you buy the originals, you can rename them. I don’t try to be cute with what I name my artwork.) While I’ve played around with the idea in pastel and colored pencil, I have not accomplished anything I want to share. I think part of that is a matter of finding a good reference photo for it, because buying a nice bouquet of roses in a pretty vase each time I want to paint or draw would get rather expensive.

Enter the text-to-image digital artwork idea

So, what does an artist who lives on her veterans’ disability pay do in this situation? Well, I gave in to curiosity about the whole text-to-image software that so many people misname “artificial intelligence.” It is not intelligent. It just generates images based on your text prompt plus a style filter and any modifiers you use from the lists of phrases that will get you certain looks.

First, I tried the basic text prompt “bouquet of yellow roses” without any modifiers, and got a bunch of images that more-or-less fit that. The biggest variation is in that hard-to-define quality of composition. One was good, while the rest were mediocre at best. Here is the one I liked best.

bouquet of yellow roses
bouquet of yellow roses

Using modifiers in the text prompts

Not completely satisfied with this, I began to experiment with different modifiers to see what kind of image style I could get from which modifier. Some modifiers are specific art movements; some are specific artists’ names (and some of those are still alive and still painting), and others are descriptions like “dynamic lighting,” which is one of my favorites. No “chiaroscuro” or Edgar Degas, though my favorites are romanticism and Thomas Kincade, a combination that makes some very pretty images that don’t have much variation.

romantic yellow roses in vase on table
Romantic yellow roses in glass vase on table

Another style modifier I tried was Renaissance painting, which certainly has that feel to it, and I may experiment with that style further, but first I wanted to see how well (or how poorly) the software handled the idea of simulated pastels. These are soft pastels, not oil pastels, and I was disappointed to not find any famous pastellists in the artist list like Edgar Degas or Mary Cassat. Fellow Impressionist powerhouse Claude Monet was on the list, so on a whim I used his name along with pastels as the “medium” used and Impressionism as the style. I also specified the color scheme as yellow and purple. Here is the four-pack of images generated:

four computer-generated images using my text prompt
four computer-generated images using the text prompt “bouquet of yellow roses in fancy vase on table dynamic lighting yellow and purple pastels impressionism Claude Monet”

A bit of variation here, and while the first image is nice enough, it’s the second one (top right) that has captured my imagination. It is so close to being good! I think it is just missing that tiny little bit – perhaps toning down the background colors to make the focal point more attention-grabbing. I’ll also be tweaking that table, perhaps more of a tan than yellow, so it looks more like oak (like the image above).

Bouquet of Yellow Roses in a Purple Vase

So that is the development of a vague idea, “bouquet of yellow roses,” into a piece of digital artwork that you can purchase and I can use as a springboard to create my next work of art in pastel. I am thinking of giving my soft pastel set a proper workout for this, with details added in with pastel pencils. Until then, have a pleasant Thanksgiving week, and watch this space for a new Feature Friday.

Electric Yellow Rose watercolor painting

Published on by kmgunnart7 Comments

I finished up this close-up watercolor painting of a yellow rose this evening. When it was dry enough, I showed it to hubby who immediately commented, “Wow, electric!”  That’s where the electric part of this painting’s name comes from.  Hubby says the combination of yellow with purple (or violet, if you prefer) just pops in a beautiful way.

watercolor painting Electric Yellow Rose
Electric Yellow Rose, 12 by 9 inch watercolor painting on paper, original available

Original is 12 by 9 inch watercolor, sealed with Dorland’s wax, and I will take it to El Amigo Restaurant in Crescent City for display locally, ands also listed for sale at Daily Paintworks for those outside the local area..  Prints in larger and smaller sizes are available at my Pixels store, and accessories at my RedBubble store.

I should mention that I saved the contour sketch for future artwork, probably in different media just because I am very pleased with how well the simple line drawing captured the shape and layout of the petals.

Another reaction to the painting

Along with my husband’s reaction to it as soon as it was dry, Elizabeth at El Amigo was amazed when I told her I painted it with watercolor.

“Wait, THAT is watercolor?! It’s so bright!” was her remark.

I told her I found a brand of paint from South Korea (Mijello Mission Gold, for those curious) that had wonderfully vibrant colors. Apparently, the general perception is that watercolor paintings have delicate, light color. Or perhaps people think of those student sets that have low pigment and really terrible brushes. Either way, I love bold and vivid colors most of the time, and will work to achieve them in whichever media I use.

(Update: she had about the same reaction when I brought in my Flapping Flamingo watercolor painting later. Also, she was surprised at the vibrancy of color in my oil pastel Blooming Pink Rose, because of the confusion about what the word pastel actually means.)