Latest Acrylic Project

This is where I was at 1:30 pm

And this is where I am now after several hours' work today. The three gents are at least tied into the scene now, rather than just floating in mid air. I like the train buffers, but the sky definitely still needs a lot of work.

Latest Acrylic Project

Yes, dearly beloved, it isn't just about one sketch a day for a year with me, although I will admit that my output of acrylic paintings has slowed considerably. Still, I do tend to use the Wednesday evening sessions at Artists' Group. This is where I was with my latest project at the start of yesterday:-

After 2 evening (c.4 hours) in Artists' Group

Do you have any idea what is going to be in the right hand side of the painting? Well, there are clues. The three gents are all wearing railway workers' clothes, and there is a railway signal and signal box in the background. This is 4 hours' work, and since I spent a significant proportion of the time just sketching the figures before painting them, I decided to do the sketching before going to the Artists' Group last night.

After about 5 and a half hours

Yes, it's another steam engine, in this case a tank engine. The whole point of sketching in the outlines of the rest of the painting was to give me the whole 2 hours session last night to work on painting in the background. The plan was to paint in the background on the left hand side, and in particular the tree and the sky. This is as far as I got by the end of the session,

After about 7 and a half hours

One Sketch - update

It's been a busy three weeks. You can always keep up by checking out my sister blog - South Wales Urban Sketcher - the link is on the right. Here's some of the sketches I've produced since my last update, including ones I made in Kaunas, Lithuania

One Sketch a Day: Week Two

Here's the sketches I made during the second week of my personal one sketch a day challenge. If you'd like to read the whole story behind each one, and the verses accompanying them, click on the link on the right to my South Wales Urban Sketcher blog.

Sir Anthony Hopkins Challenge

I've finished my 4 hours to work on the Hopkins portrait. Being realistic, with only one hour left there was no time left to work on face or hair. My big problem was what I was going to do with the bottom of the picture. I quickly decided to give Sir Anthony a large greatcoat, which would cover a lot of the space left. This is the finished version: -

If you compare it to the photo I took after three hours' work: -

it might give you some kind of idea just how much work I had to do in that hour. Actually I'm really rather leased with the way that the greatcoat came out.
How well it ranks against the other members of the group's paintings, well, that's a question I can't answer at this point. As far as I know only I and one of the other painters have actually had the full 4 hours yet. So time will tell on that.

Sir Anthony Hopkins Challenge

OK, so if you read my post last weekend, you'll know about the Art Group's challenge to make a portrait of Sir Anthony Hopkins in h hours. Over the 2 sessions I've spent 3 hours now, and this is the state of play at the moment: -

I did a little remedial work with the right eye, but other than that I didn't do any more work on the face. The big idea was to work on the background. I extended the sky to the edge of the canvas, but more importantly I juxtaposed the Port Talbot Steelworks over the left shoulder (our right) with Margam Castle on the left. What I have to do with the hour that I've got left is finish off the bottom of the canvas, which won't be easy since my original photograph of Sir Anthony cuts off before it goes that far down. I'm going to have to give some serious thought about how I am going to finish off his figure.

One Sketch A Day Personal Challenge

Last week, beginning on Monday, I challenged myself to try to make at least one sketch a day for a whole year. It's easy to do at the weekend, since I usually go off on a solo or group sketchcrawl on a Saturday. However during the week it's a different story. Here's this week's sketches - haven't made today's yet.

Monday - Surface Pro Charger

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

Friday

Saturday