Peace At Last

 

This painting was done using pastel brushes I made in Painter.

I took a painting class from Flora Bowley in September, 2012.  Since then, I have had an idea in my head of how I wanted to paint.  But getting it down on canvas has been a struggle.

I look and look at other art work.  I see what people are doing, but I can’t seem to do it.

This piece was a huge break-through for me.  I am closing in on how I want my work to look.

What I strive for in my art is to have a lots of light and dark contrast.  That is what makes a painting pop.  As much as I try, dark and light values have been a real challenge for me.  It sounds easy, but it’s not.

I learned a trick to use with digital painting.  In Painter, I open a new layer on top of the other layers.  I fill it with black and put it on colorize composite method.  When I am painting, I open this layer and it shows my painting in black, white and greys.  This lets me know if I am getting a good variety of values in my work.

With this piece, I did better than I usually do.  However, I discovered that if I use all highly saturated colors, they will all have the same value.

I was able to get a feeling of depth in this piece.  I have learned that I was able to do that because I used more light and dark values.