Author: -N-

Winter Trees at Dawn

Second pastel.

Here, I used a medium blue paper and tried out different techniques, such as circular blending with the pastel itself, a torchon, fingers. I used vine charcoal and charcoal pencils for some of the finer lines.

The snow on the trees was an interesting challenge. To accomplish it, I scribbled some pure white pastel onto it, and then used the tip of the torchon to blend around it.

Compositionally, I think there is something missing here . . . I also think the midground could be a bit different to convey a sense of depth.

For a second bout with pastels, I can say I am enjoying what I am doing, even though I have to dress like a hazmat worker! (I wear a mask to keep the dust down.)

New Growth

Yesterday it was over 80F. Today it is a cool 69F. Little rain. Still, life continues. New growth on a pine at the local garden, where flowers are in bloom everywhere. A walk in the open space nearby found mockingbirds singing away, looking for wives, and staking out their territory. It’s a stunning time of year.

Succulent

I started out with an attempt at doing a realistic succulent in gouache. It just wasn’t there. Then my pastels class came between it and me. And this ode to Audrey (from “Little Shop of Horrors” fame) moved into a sort of abstraction of its own. Normally my gouache tends to be done with thick paint and a stiff brush; here, softer paint and a softer brush. Quite a different experience and one I will need to revisit.

Dry Hills in Malibu

Yesterday I started an 8 week course in pastels. Already I am in love with the medium! Add to this, the teacher is a real teacher – she is a professional who teaches full time in an elementary classroom. She is organized, states what she expects, interacts, demonstrates, and all the things that are so important in learning something new. Some teachers just say “have at it” and you stumble along, not knowing what you are doing. Yes, experience is a good teacher, but explanations and clarity really help one understand what is going on. I am looking forward to more classes!

Here is a picture from the Malibu Creek State Park near where I live. We all had a copy of a photograph to use, and then she explained the Rule of Thirds, the Golden Mean, and explained how she changed the composition of the photo to meet the needs of the Rule of Thirds. Value studies, too, were done before even picking up a color.

We used Nupastels, made by Prismacolor. Inexpensive but very nice. I have some Rembrandt soft pastels that I will use later on, or in conjunction with the ones we have in the classroom. As I love colors and drawing, this is a perfect combination of “things” – and these pictures are not “drawings” but “paintings” in the lexicon of the teacher.  I never considered a pastel a painting.

I have not been this excited about a class in a very, very long time.

Ceanothus

Ceanothus is also known as California Lilac. it is a shrub with glossy green leaves (as you can see in the photo!). It comes in other colors, too, but the blue is the original color. To me, it is always the sign that spring is on the way – and today I found it, along with a lot of other plants in bloom. I was as busy as a bee!

I used my Nikon V3 and 70-300mm lens, which, with a 2.8 crop factor, makes the 300mm closer to 810mm. It allows for great shots and I totally forget, until I use it, what a wonderful system it is.