Honing my Skills

As I don't have any major projects on the go, I thought it was time to brush up on my skills. Since I have been doing the majority of my work with fabric lately, I wanted to exercise my watercolour paint and brushes. I went through some of the photos I took on my visit to the Yukon and decided that before Spring hits (when I might be more inspired to do flowers), I would try my hand at painting snow and ice. Below is my process.

The sketch on watercolour paper

Washes of colour in the sky and water

With the colour in place I now glaze over areas to make
them more pronounced

Sunrise over the Yukon River

 I also want to continually improve my drawing skills, especially portraiture. This drawing of my grandson was challenging in that the proportions in a child's face are different than that of adults. So what I knew to be true in an adult portrait didn't work for this one. I was constantly measuring distances between features and having to make changes in order to come up with a reasonable likeness.

Initial sketch and placement of features

Paul

 When I showed it to Paul, he knew exactly who it was so I guess I was successful in creating a likeness of him.