I started this painting a few weeks ago, at the first class at the local adult school with a new teacher. This is from a photo I took some time ago. I was at the bottom of a hill, looking up.
This painting has taken a lot of time – several hours – but the work has been worthwhile. I have been applying the various principles I am slowly garnering from hours at the proverbial grindstone, memorizing techniques, concepts, whatever. For instance, I think this painting actually has a nice sense of depth and perspective – something I have struggled with for a long time. The light on the trees also pleases me, as do other bits and pieces of it.
I have also learned just through doing how to get the heavy body acrylic paint into a more viscous and enjoyable mess to paint with, and that is a big help! It’s a combination of matte medium, water, and the paint itself. I dislike the plasticky quality so often that accompanies acrylic paints, so even thought my colors are bright, I think they moosh together fairly well.
I’ll ask my teacher’s opinion when I see her next week. Meanwhile, here is (to my eye at present) finished work. Below is the photo which is the basis for this painting.
Module 2 – Study 2 – Andy Evansen’s “Watercolor for All Seasons” Class
This is my second foray into the series of photos Andy Evansen has posted for studies in the second module of his watercolor class. Here the focus is on value studies.
One of the things I am attempting to do, from both my classes with Evansen and with Ian Roberts, is to work on value. Evansen is a watercolorist and Roberts is an oil painter. Evansen demonstrates the use of a value study on his YouTube channel by creating the middle value(s) as large shapes. Roberts emphasizes shapes rather than things as well. Unlike Roberts, though, Evansen begins his value study with simply the middle value, leaving lights as white. After he has painted the middle values in his painting, he returns to the value study to put in darks and perhaps details.
I managed to do the middle value study, and then painted in what I considered to be the middle values, working left to right as I am right handed. But, before that, I laid in the sky with paper turned upside down as I wanted to have a darker value at the horizon.
I am not sure if the paper is improperly sized, but the paint and paper did not interact well. This is a 300# CP Kilimanjaro paper, natural white, and the first time I have used it. I also wet both sides of the paper, which is a habit I have for watercoloring with 140# paper. I need to see what happens in the future with other paintings.
I don’t really think this painting has a focal point, but that is not the purpose of this study. This module is to paint left to right, working in midvalues and sky first and leaving areas of white or light colors intact. From there, darks.
Evansen has provided a number of photos as references for the basis of a painting, and for values, I think I will work on that and try to apply what I am learning from Roberts and Evansen to create some things worth the time I spend. The reference photos range from landscaapes to cityscapes – animals and people. I will begin with the landscapes and then try the harder subjects for me. Here, there are cow shapes – blobby things. I have also done geese – more blobby things. All thesse blobs have characteristic shapes for the critters.
So! I am dipping my toe into new territories . . . let’s see where it takes me!
Awhile back, I started a 30-Day drawing challenge. The goal: Create 30 small drawings, value studies, to see shape, value, and ultimately a focal point for a painting. The last means thinking about how you want to lead the viewer into the picture and keep him there – it’s a compositional element I am still learning to implement. I have benefited in the arena of shape and value, so now the focal point is becoming another element to work on.
But, I blither. Here are the 30 pictures.
Today is the last of the Zoom meetings until the next class begins. I have already enrolled in it, so expect to see a few things as time goes by.
You can see more of my artwork, if you are interested, at Journey By Paper.
I am getting burnt out on these drawings! I decided to take a few days off and will pick up again tomorrow. Since I have committed to 30, I only 6 more to go by 4/17. I think I can handle that!
Day 21
Cannon Beach, Oregon. Figure is too big, some foot prints too dark and too big in the distance.
Day 22
Initially I had drawn this shack so that the beach and waves in the distance were parallel to the edge of the paper. After scanning it, I realized it looked better with a bit of an angle to it. Interestingly, a comment said it made no sense because the ocean is out there, straight ahead. Obviously, too realistic of a person, or someone who hasn’t taken a photo. Really, to me, a very interesting and odd comment and viewpoint!
Day 23
Here is a scene of looking down onto a beach. The distant cliffs look okay, but the descent to the shore in the midground is definitely confusing.
Day 24
During last Saturday’s zoom meeting, Ian talked about cross hatching. I use it a lot in ink drawing, but not in pencil since the idea for a lot of this 30-day challenge is to limit marks to horizontal and vertical. The idea is to create value studies, not finished drawings. Interesting lines do not make for good value studies of light, medium, dark. However, a simple use of lines, cross hatching, vertical, diagonal, horizontal, helps delineate shapes, such as curves. I based this drawing off a study of 3 pears by Cezanne.
Commentary
These studies are making more sense and getting easier to execute so that shapes have shape, even if not always understandable.
I really like coffee, far better than tea, although o-cha is a strong second!
Green Coffee Beans – Unroasted
Sometime ago we bought a 5-lb. bag of green coffee beans. Sulawesi beans specifically. We planned to try to roast them in a popcorn popper, and to put it bluntly, it was a pain in the ass. Beans flew everywhere, smoke belched out of the machine, and luckily it was outdoors so the smoke detectors didn’t go off. The neighbors didn’t call the fire department either. The result was a charred mass of ick. I put the remaining beans in a drawer and ignored them.
I don’t recall when I bought the beans, but I found them a week ago and resolved, once more, to try my hand at roasting them. This time, though, I went back to my old idea of doing things before there was electricity. In other words, how could I roast them as in days of yore?
YouTube of course! There are a number of ways to roast them, using home roasters, old-time roasters from the 1800s, and frying pans made of cast iron. I decided on my slotted spoon and my small, heavy metal wok.
Before I watched the video above, which compares washed and unwashed green coffee beans after roasting, I watched a video about how the Ethiopians prepare coffee prior to roasting. The Ethiopian process washes the green beans for about 10 minutes by hand, rubbing the beans together to remove the chaff and dirt. From there, the beans are roasted in a pan or some flat surface. The beans are moved constantly. Videos for westerners showcase using a cast iron skillet and a whisk if you don’t have a roaster.
I decided to roast my beans in my wok, with a slotted spoon, on my gas stove top. I wish I had seen the whisk video prior to roasting as my beans occasionally jumped out of the wok, but that was not a big issue. Next roasting, whisk and wok it shall be. Below is a video my husband took using my phone. You can hear me mumbling in the background.
Beans in the Wok!
So, on to the beans! First, I measured out 1/2 c. of green coffee beans and spent some time washing them in a bowl. I didn’t get much debris off them in the form of chaff, but some dust and dirt did make the water murky. I did this for about 5 minutes and then drained the beans, set them out on a paper towel, and dried them overnight. I could have done it the same day, but there are just some days when virtue in the form of patience is not in attendance.
Yesterday, I dug out the wok and slotted spoon. I set up the stop watch on my phone to time how long it took to roast my small batch. The flame was at medium, I heated the wok for a minute or two, and then put in the beans.
Like all things roasting, time and patience pay off. As this was my first time roasting beans, I made an effort to be patient. The idea of having a house full of smoke did not appeal to me, and though I have a powerful kitchen fan, it makes such a racket I prefer to avoid it if possible.
Once the beans were in the wok, I used my spoon to stir and flip the beans, keeping them moving at all times. It worked pretty well. The depth of the wok kept too many from escaping. Some got stuck in the spoon slots. Handling hot beans was not my idea of a good time, but I did manage to capture any escapees.
Roasting coffee beans have what are called “first crack” and “second crack” stages. These denote the different phases in the roasting process. YouTube and other internet sites can tell you more about them. The first crack stage was met, and then, as the beans continued to roast, the second crack seems to have occurred. I lowered the heat a bit and continued to roast, all told for about 40 minutes. As I had no idea how quickly roasted beans could turn into a charred mess, I slowed it all down, though it seems that about 12-15 minutes should work per various sources.
Above you can get an idea how the roasting changed the beans from green to tawny to brown to dark. Stirring all the time is important, but when I lowered the heat, I would stop stirring, count to 20 or 30, and then stir some more. I don’t think the beans were damaged by this as the heat was not intense.
Finally, I decided the beans were done. Compared to our commercially-roasted beans, they were not as dark, but I didn’t want to destroy them after being a saint in front of the stove. I turned them out onto a kitchen towel and let them cool to room temperature before putting them into a baggy to let them de-gas overnight, as recommended. As beans continue to roast once off the heat, I decided to remove them before they got too dark.
The roasted beans!
Every afternoon my husband and I have a bit of coffee. He drinks his black; I use cream. Today we waited until I got up from a snooze, and then I got to work making coffee with boiled water, a filter, and paper cone. I ground the beans in my little grinder and tried to get them fine, like I use for espresso, but they were coarser than what I was aiming for.
Ground beans in a #4 cone and filter.
When using this method, the ground beans are placed in the filter and cone. A small amount of boiling water is added to the grounds to dampen them, and then a wait of about a minute to moisten and allow the coffee to release its coffee-ness occurs. At least, that is how I do it.
Steep for a minute . . .
I used 4 scoops for 2 cups – we like our coffee stronger than a lot of people.
2 scoops of coffee per cup.
From there, water is added to the cone, and as one cup was filled, another was placed under the filter. And, voila! Coffee!
Josh’s coffee
Altogether, both Josh and I enjoyed the coffee. It was not as strong as we prefer, but we both think the roast was lighter than our usual, which is Italian or French roast. Still, it was tasty. There wasn’t a sense of bitter or burnt taste, perhaps a slightly fruity taste if anything, but I am not good at labeling flavors like some people.
I still have a lot of coffee beans, and they will be roasted. The next round will be another 1/2 cup, but the heat will be a bit higher. I will also use the wok, and a whisk instead of the spoon.
So, was this little adventure a success? Yes! I didn’t set off the smoke alarms, the house didn’t burn down, the coffee was tasty, and I didn’t go crazy stirring the roasting beans. More to come in the form of darker beans.
Ink, Yarn & Beer 