What I’m working on.

Hi People, here’s what I’ve been working on for the last few weeks. The graphite drawing is Dark Kingdom from Frank Frazette. I will only be showing this here because it’s for a friend of mine. I won’t be putting this in my portfolio or anywhere else. I don’t believe in decorating myself with feathers from a different bird. I have the highest respect for Mr. Frazette and I would never try to pass-off one of his masterpieces for something of my own. I have read over and over again how copying a painting or drawing, you learn something about how the artist worked and that is my hope: of learning something. The second piece is an oil painting of a tree that I had photographed, I drew the tree in graphite and am now painting it. This has been really a learning by-doing action, because just last weekend I figured out how to paint the tree bark texture. I painted the upper half and will be doing the rest this week (hopefully).

Thanks for looking in,

Bill

Imaginative sketching.

sketchbook, watercolors

It’s been rain here in deluges. Last weekend it rained 48hrs straight, so going out and sketching outside was out of the question. As usual when I start drawing, and I have to draw from imagination, my tastes run to the mildly fantastic. I love Greek mythology and I often try to sketch some of the gods and goddesses I read about. I now realize I should brush up on my snakes, my snakes could be better. I also need to get some white gauche paint for the highlights, I saw someones sketchbook and he had some awesome sketches (Mike Butkus), and he used white gauche for the high lights, great idea.

Thanks for looking in,

Bill

Watercolor sketching in the park.

We went to the Herzogenried park in Mannheim on the weekend. I finally had the opportunity to sketch “in the wild.” I took my sketchbook and pencils and watercolors and set about looking for suitable subjects to sketch. The elderly woman sitting under ad tree took a nap, so she was the easiest, she held still long enough. The gentleman sitting on the bench got up and continued his journey before I could finish his feet. This was fun and challenging, because I have a very small watercolor palette and have to mix colors.

Thanks for taking a look,

Bill

One Year Smudgemaster Blog.

 

Sketchbook, HB & 4B, about 1.5 hrs.

So, the one year mark has come and gone. I started this blog to actually keep me motivated to keep putting out work (drawings, paintings, etc.), I would probably keep posting even if no one was reading this blog or taking a look once in a while, I like to think of this as my little journal of my progress on this long and winding art road. To my pleasure after about 3-6 months I was getting a following, people were actually taking a look at my drawings (My skull posts), this was enjoyable for me and it also kept me motivated to keep pushing myself. Also the drawings of nude women were getting some attention (What kind of attention?), I just hope it’s all positive attention, appreciation for the beauty of the human body, because there is no better artist then nature.

I’m at the moment working on an oil painting of a tree and starting a graphite draw of “Dark Kingdom,” from Frank Frazetta, which I also want to paint to hang in my computer / Painting room. I want to thank everyone that stopped by and took a look this year. I dream of making a living and being able to support myself as an artist-Painter, Let’s see what the future holds.

Bill

Figure drawing with Pastels.

Uff, after a week filled with stress at my day-job and felt ten-thousand things to take care of, and added to that, Hay-Fever and bad weather (no Plein-Air drawing or painting), I was able to settle down on the weekend and do some figure drawing. I tried to get the shadows right and then concentrated on the values. Here is my resource the lovely Lina Tsu (Katherine) from Deviantart.org. I used Pitt Pastel Pencils.

Thanks for stopping by and taking a look,

Bill

Two years later.

Pastels on Paper.
Date 21.04.2013

Some times it’s good to go back and take a look at what you were drawing one or two years ago and compare it with what your doing today. When you take a look at the stuff that you were drawing two years ago, stuff that at the time you thought were excellent pictures and now feelings of embarrassment come up, but it’s still fun the go back and look. You get the feeling that all the work and practice and studies are starting to pay off and is sort of an incentive to keep going. I know the the picture above has mistakes (but I won’t point them out) and I have a long road a head of me, but it’s small pictures like these that I really like doing. The next picture is from about two years ago and more then slightly embarrassing, but still at the time I thought this was really good and I was very proud of it.

Ballpoint pen on paper

Thanks for taking a look,

Bill

The zinc Bathtub

It was a beautiful spring day yesterday and the temperature got to 23°C (76°F) this weekend. After playing soccer with the kids I settled down to do some drawing and painting. We have this zinc Bathtub in our backyard and it caught my eye a couple of times, so decided to draw and paint it. I drew it with a HB pencil and then set down a yellow watercolor wash and then started adding details, afterwards I added shading with a 4B pencil. Drawing outside is the best, I just have to get up my courage to go outside of my backyard and draw something.

Thanks for taking a look,

Bill

Opening the Plein-Air season.

I now declare the Plein-air season open in Buerstadt Germany!

This is something I’ve been wanting to do all winter; sit outside and draw what I see. I’ve been practicing with the watercolors just for this. I still need to work on my technique, but this was lots of fun to do. This is the view from my back porch on a sunny day. This was Watercolors and HB pencil.

Thanks for stopping by,

Bill

The Twisted Tree, a tree study.

 

My wife has been asking me for about 6 months now to paint a tree or tree branch, she even said she would hang it up in our house (hopefully not in the bathroom), that is if it isn’t so bad (I don’t know if she has levels of bad?). One stipulation was that there should be no birds or dragon in the tree, hmm no dragons? This could be hard. About two weeks ago we went for a walk in Lampertheim Biedensand nature reserve and I saw this great tree and decided, this was it, no birds, no dragons, but a cool twisted gnarly tree, I had found my subject. So after drawing this in graphite, I’ll start next week in oil.

Thanks for taking a look,

Bill

Horse’s Head Watercolor sketch.

I think I’m slowly getting the hang of these watercolors. This one didn’t turn out half bad.

Thanks for stopping by,

Bill