Steel Worker - Mark 2

Though being very pleased with the painting of the Steel Worker, my eye was continually being drawn to those horrible stark white lines in the bottom right hand corner. They were caused by my extremely poor application of candle wax, which I thought would be a good way to generate some highlights for the wet factory floor. I didn't think it through properly and hadn't appreciated just how bold white highlights would look against such a dark background.

Anyway, though trying to resist the temptation to 'fiddle', and despite my wife's protestations that I would ruin the picture, I eventually gave in and tackled the problem. It took several layers of muddy watercolour applied thickly and dried with a hairdrier between coats to finally cover the wax. Then I added a little texture by use of some greys and oranges mixed with a little white gouache. Though I'm not at all pleased with that corner of the painting, it is an improvement on what was there before.

Steel Worker

Here is something radically different for me. I wanted to experiment with lights and darks, in fact, I wanted to try and create 'dazzle'. This subject fitted the bill perfectly, though I usually back away from painting people. So this one proved to be a double challenge.

I have to say that I'm quite pleased with it in general. As always, there are things that didn't work quite as well as I'd hoped, and there are things I'd do different next time. But I guess that's the nature of our art. Are we ever totally satisfied? We certainly never stop learning.

Artist Showcase

As my regular followers will know, I like to showcase artists and their work on my web site. For the first time, I've invited an artist back to do a second showcase. It is my good friend Ingrid Ormestad and I'm delighted to be displaying a new selection of her work. I find Ingrid's excellent use of wet-in-wet quite inspirational and I know of nobody who does it better. To see Ingrid's showcase, click here ... Artists Showcase

If any of my blog followers would like to be showcased, please use this contact form to get in touch.

Rose

This is something different for me, and I'm quite pleased with it.

Most of us have a favourite Rose, or a Rose that has a special meaning to us. Like many pet owners, when our beloved dogs pass on, we like to buy something for the garden as a token of remembrance. Our last pet was a brindle greyhound/sheepdog cross called Tess. Soon after she died we came across a rose at a garden centre called "Tess of the D'urbervilles" and we just had to buy it.

This Rose has no special meaning. It is just one of the Minature Rose varieties, but it's small size in no way detracts from it's beauty.

Gulf Challenge

A short while ago, Sandra included me in her Gulf Challenge. Here is my effort.

Lime Kiln - Mark 2

Well, I did the Lime Kiln in watercolour and I'm really glad I did. When I first chose this subject I had considered it to be an easy picture and when I found it more difficult than I'd expected I thought it was because of the acrylics. Having done it now in watercolour I realise that the picture was harder than it looked. I'm not sure which I prefer and there is less of a difference in them than I'd expected. The acrylic looks flatter somehow.

It's been an interesting exercise and quite eye-opening.

Lime Kiln

I decided to have a go with acrylics. To get the feel of them I wanted a simple picture and chose this view of an old abandoned Lime Kiln that I discovered in Yorkshire last year. I struggled to get a decent wash down for the background hills and found colour mixing difficult, although that applies to everything I do any way. I'm not pleased with the end result but don't know how much of that is down to my using a new medium so I will do this again in watercolour when I can, just to help me better appreciate the differences between the two mediums.

Gulf Challenge

One of my followers, Sandra, invited me to take part in the Gulf Challenge. I have agreed though available time is an issue. Still, I will get there.

In the meantime, I remembered this photograph I took a while ago of a Black Headed Gull. The Gull's expression says it all. Click on the photo to see a larger version.

Artists block.

It's been a while since I last posted art in my blog and that's because I haven't done any. There are many reasons ... very busy at work, jobs at home, family issues, other online distractions ... and there just aren't enough hours in the day. When I do find an opportunity to do something, I usually have only an hour or so and, to be quite honest, just can't seem to put my mind to getting out the stuff and looking for something to draw or paint.

I always believed 'artists block' was where an artist simply couldn't summon up suitable idea's in the same way as 'writers block' leaves an author devoid of words, but now I'm wondering if it's also a case of "can't be bothered". If you have any tips for getting the juices flowing again, let me hear from you.

This drawing was done a few years ago and is of a character created by a friend. It was a project to create a 3D image using computer software and he did very well. I couldn't resist getting it down on paper.

World Cup Forecast

Back in 2002 I was wrestling with financial modelling and as an experiment and learning aid, I built myself a World Cup model that endeavoured to 'predict' the winner. I didn't do very well. In 2006 I built an improved model and successfully forecast 66% of the winners and losers. I've decided to have a go again.

This is only a bit of fun ... most of the scores won't happen as forecasted ... but the model 'learns' about the various teams' capabilities as the competition progresses and it's interesting (if you like that sort of thing) to see the forecasted results changing as the competition progresses.

If anyone is interested, I've built all of this into some web pages and it can be found here ..... World Cup Forecast

As I've stated on the web site, DO NOT rush out and place bets on the basis on this. I know absolutely nothing about football (other than kicking the ball into the other teams net counts as a goal and kicking it into your own net makes your team mates shout angrily). This is just a bit of harmless fun and if the actual results bare any resemblance to the predicted ones, it will be more by luck than judgement.

Enjoy the footie!!!!