Taos Afternoon -- Acrylic 16x20

This is the first painting I ever did in using acrylic paint. The original of this is in an art book. I learned a lot painting this, and one of the major things I learned was that I could not reproduce it the way the artist did. My style of painting is very different. The basics of the painting are the same. I just had to go about it a different way than the artist did. This painting was a lot of work, but was worth it in the end.

Yellow Daisy Flower Basket -- Watercolor

This was fun to do. I had a greeting card that "spoke" to me and I had to paint it.

Stormy Sunset -- Opaque Watercolor/Gouache

This one I did a while back. I have only painted in gouache a couple of times. Most of my watercolor work up to now has been using watercolor pencil. Gouache is interesting to use. You can use it like regular watercolor when you use a lot of water, or it is a lot like painting with acrylics with a dry/dryer brush. Gouache allows you to paint light over dark (with a dryer brush), which is the opposite of regular transparent watercolor. The colors can be much brighter than transparent watercolor. This painting was done in the watercolor mode - lots of water.  I put the dry watercolor paper on a pliable plastic cutting board (Walmart sells them - or you can use a plastic table mat), and soaked it with brush and water. As the paper becomes wet and stretches, it may try to buckle. Just lift it up and lay it down flat again. The paper when totally soaked will lay flat and hug the plastic board. Then you can have fun with lots of paint (wet on wet). I deliberately added extra paint and water to make the paint to "bloom" or move around on the paper. I did have a deliberate picture of a sunset in mind as I worked on this. It came out better than I expected. It was a fun learning experience. (My gouache hydrangea picture below was painted wet on dry. I used regular amounts of wet paint on dry paper. I blotted the sky and green hill to soften them. The hydrangeas have three layers of paint, getting darker and darker. The hydrangea white highlights were done with a totally dry brush.)

Hydrangeas -- Opaque Watercolor/Gouache

This is my first attempt at trying to paint Hydrangeas. I love them. They are one of my favorite flowers (after roses). This was also my first attempt at trying to paint a picture I completely made up out of my head. Found out also that it is easier to paint from a photo, as the highlights and shadows are there to copy. Here I had to make them up, and with limited success. It's not a masterpiece, but it was still fun-- I was playing with paint.

Blue Moon -- Watercolor Journal

This is a painting I did last year and posted on another group site. Therefore some of you may have previous seen it. However, I never got around to posting in on my painting blog.   This was originally painted in my watercolor journal. I deleted what was previously written on the side. It needed a new quote since it was being used in a new way. The inspiration for this painting  came from a photo that  caught my attention. The glowing of the moon illuminating the building and the sky created such a wonderful effect and beauty that I had to try to copy it in paint. Also, the glowing blue of the night sky really drew me in. This was done with Reeve's watercolor pencils.

Pots Still Life -- Colored Pencil

The inspiration for this still life came from a book on colored pencils. The  subject and the colors caught my attention. I fell in love with this last year, but did not get up enough nerve and determination to do  it until now. There were a lot of directions on how to do it, but it seems that directions are not enough sometimes.  On a couple of the pots I could not produce the exact finish of the original, but have learned from painting things usually work out- just not in the way you originally thought it  would. Over all I am content with the result.

Since people are asking-- This was done with prismacolor pencils (the 120 pencil tin set with all the grays) on plain printer paper. I also use the prismacolor colorless blender.

Water Lilies -- Watercolor

This is one I did previously.  The picture I was using for inspiration was from an art book, but the original was done in acrylics. I had to experiment a lot to figure out how to reproduce that picture in watercolor. There are lots of layers of color in the picture to try to reproduce it. Was a lot of fun and learning.