Today I wanted to share about something that I went through at the end of 2020. I haven't spoken much about it to date, at least publicly. I wanted to talk about this little commissioned memorial pet portrait, and in doing so, talk about that tough part in my life, since this little painting had a big effect on me at that time.
I don't normally venture outside of my usual art supplies too much -- maybe here and there -- mainly because I really like the supplies I currently use, and because art supplies can be expensive, so if I like what I've got going on, why not just keep going with it. But, I have been wanting to do more work with gouache for a while (haven't used it since college), and, conveniently, Arteza reached out to me to see if I'd like to try some of their art supplies a few weeks ago. I've seen a lot of fellow artists out there giving them a go, so I thought I would too. So, in this post, you can watch me make a little gouache painting and review some of the products I was sent. Take a look...
Bounce lettering is one of the easiest ways to add some extra style to your hand lettered projects. There are a few things to keep in mind when it comes to creating bounce lettering, so that's what I'll be going over in this post in the Hand Lettering Series. Let's get into bounce lettering...
We're just over halfway through the Hand Lettering Series with this post; only 3 tutorials left after this one! In this post I'm teaching you one way to create your Uppercase Brush Letter Alphabet. I say "one way" because there are many ways, or styles, when it comes to brush lettering, but I feel this way is most commonly seen.
I'm finally back with the second half of the Lower Case Lettering portion of my Hand Lettering Series. I want to thank all of you who have been very patient with me in getting these videos out spaced so far apart. I know you can always go to someone else to find this information, but I am so thankful that many of you just enjoy my delivery of the information, and are still amped for my Brush Lettering Video Tutorials. It has been a few (a ton of) minutes since the first half of the lower case letters, so here's Lower Case 1 of 2 - Ascenders & Descenders as a quick refresher if you need. Then let's move on to Part 2...
Today I am back to show you one of the itty bitty paintings I recently finished. Check out the time-lapse video in this post if you want to see my oil painting process for this little 4 x 4" piece...
It's been a while since I've posted here on the blog, sadly! But it's for goo reason; I've been working really hard on my art and growing that part of my career, and working on getting the rest of the videos in my Hand Lettering Series ready for you guys! In this post I will start showing you Lower Case Brush Lettering starting with the half of the alphabet that has Ascenders and Descenders. Confused? Well, watch the video to learn all about it...
In this Art Series post I have another one of my oil painting time-lapses for you! This piece is my favourite I've completed to date and in the time-lapse of it's creation I share about how I named it and the feeling/meaning behind it. I also talk about how I create my original compositions, and also about developing my art style and how I feel about having an art style.
I don't often do vlog style videos, but I was recently inspired by some other YouTubers to share a little more of myself on my channel. I shared a few things here and there, but have felt like perhaps there isn't a lot of place for personal stuff on my blog and youtube channel. I mean, I assume people come for the DIYs... which is probably mostly true, but for my regular subscribers, perhaps they'd like to feel more of a connection with me personally, and feel like they know me a bit better as a person, not just a DIYer. Perhaps my youtube family would grow to have more lovely people if I share more of me. It can be hard to put yourself out there... but today I'm starting out simple and inviting you to follow me along for a day in my life. If you'd like to see what I get up to in terms of my work day, keep reading... and perhaps I'll do more posts like this in the future... even if I think my life isn't exciting (is boring)...
Spring has finally arrived here and I'm very excited, for warm weather of course, but, also, because it means beautiful flowers and hopefully lots of practice painting them! Today, though, I am sharing the last of the small oil studies I did in January, "Hand Study", 5 x 7", Oil on Canvas Board. I shared the final painting over on Facebook and Instagram back when I finished it--follow be on social media to get those first looks at my finished pieces--but, in this post you'll get a closer look at it and the detail and colour of it! I am very pleased with how it turned out! I'll also share the time lapse of it's creation and my art story, so continue on for all that...
I really wish that everyone could see it in person because I feel in photos the texture of the canvas gets in the way of the actual painting. From now on I think I'll add a couple of coats of gesso to my canvases before painting on them to get a smoother surface. I got a few GessoBoard panels for Christmas and I can't wait to paint on those. I think for practice paintings I'm going to get some MDF board and prepare some of those to paint on. It's basically the same idea as GessoBoard, but not quite as lovely. What's your preferred painting surface?
That's it for this Art Series post, friends! Check out some of my other Art Series posts here! See you soon!
It's taken me some time to get this tutorial up for you all; it didn't happen on purpose, it just happened! I apologize, and I am super excited to (finally) have Hand Lettering Series Part #2 for you all today! In this post you'll begin to learn a bit of terminology and a few of the lines that make up the structure for your hand lettering, and you'll learn a very basic version of hand lettered capitals! If you haven't seen my first post in this series, Modern Hand Lettering Part #1 - Basic Drills, I recommend that you head over to that post and practice what I presented in that tutorial first. And if you are brand new to hand lettering or brush lettering, I definitely recommend that you start with my Faux Calligraphy post before tackling this series; that's really the prefect place to begin learning how to do hand lettering! By the end of this series, you'll be in your way to creating your very own hand lettered designs!
Today I am sharing with you the second of my oil studies, Study of an Eye, before I move on to my first full size oil painting this year. If you'd like to see my first oil study, check out Art Series #14 - Lips Study in Oils. I set up a poll over on YouTube asking my subscribers what they'd like to hear me talk about in this video, and the winner was "my new motivation" with 41% of the votes. If you missed that poll and want to be included in future polls or other things, then subscribe to my YouTube channel to get those notifications over there! So my new motivation is what I talk about while you watch the time-lapse footage of the painting process of this eye...
I have to say that I've been really loving my homemade glass paint palette since I made it over a year ago! Your paint swirls around on it so nicely--which is amazing for colour mixing--and you can easily scoop up every last bit of paint with your brush, leaving behind barely any residue, which means so much less wasting of expensive paints! And it's soooo cheap to make one! Being that I've been painting a lot lately, and have been realizing my appreciation for this amazing painting tool even more, it dawned on me that this would be a great tutorial to show my fellow artist followers/subscribers, so I whipped up this little tutorial for you - I hope you'll be as crazy about it as I am! Let's take a look...
In my previous post, Welcome 2018 - These Are My Goals This Year!, I wrote about my goals (or resolutions) for the year, and therein I spoke about my goals for my art career for 2018. In this video I speak a little bit more about that topic while I show you the time-lapse video footage of the first oil study I did earlier this month.
Today I'm starting my Modern Brush Lettering Series! In this Part 1 I'll show you the basic drills you need to learn and practice, practice, practice. Repetition will create muscle memory, and muscle memory will help you get a feel for the different strokes--most importantly upstrokes and downstrokes, pen angle and grip, consistency in line thickness and smoothness, and a feel for pen pressure. In each part of my brush lettering series I will also have printable worksheets available for you to use for practicing, and a list of great tools that I recommend.
Have you ever done any sketches, line art, or rough drafts of art that you wanted to display on a much larger scale? But now you have to re-draw it again; that can be a pain in the butt for sure... at least that's how I feel. Well, I have a solution for you in this post! You can actually print your images much larger than you realize with a standard 8.5" x 11" printer! I learned this tile printing method early in my graphic design career in order to create quick mock-ups of posters, banners, or ads which I used to double check everything worked aesthetically, and to present scaled drafts to clients or my boss! In this post I'm going to teach you how to print your images as several tiles to create a large enough template for tracing, or larger reference material to refine as a completed piece!
Well, it's been a while since I've posted -- this is my first post of the New Year! Whaaaaat?! I've had an awesome break for Christmas and New Year, spending time with my family and enjoying a nice relaxing break! The past couple of weeks I've begun planning projects and other things for the blog for this year, and have been thinking of goals for myself as well! One of those personal goals is to be selling some of my art as prints by the end of the year, so that means a lot more art creating--which always seems to be a goal for me every year--and, in return, having a lot more art to feature over here on the blog. So, to kick that off, I'd like to share this oil on canvas piece I did, which if you haven't seen the final piece already it just means you aren't following me over on Instagram or Facebook!
They're live, they're live! Finally, my DIY Christmas Cards tutorial for this year is ready and I hope you all like it! In this tutorial you'll find 3 different designs!
Things have been so busy and all over the place for me with planning for the Holidays-- along with other things popping up--that these cards didn't make it up here until now; I had them scheduled to be up at the beginning of December. It seemed like there was always something unexpected launching at me, or something that V and I had to do. But here they finally are!
This is just a quick little intro to Modern Calligraphy to prepare for my next tutorial: my DIY Christmas Card Designs for this year!! YAY! In this post I'm teaching you some very basic terminology and the #1 rule when it comes to Calligraphy, plus how anyone can create fake calligraphy without having any special pens or tools! Let's take a look now...
In this instalment of my Art Series, I'm showing you a painting I did of a beautiful winter scene in oil on canvas board, as a gift for my grandfather. I've decided to call it "Snowy Sunset".
