I've been creating a series of December/Holiday tutorial videos over on Instagram, Facebook and YouTube! The tutorial posted for December 21, 2020, the Bethlehem Star Card, needed a template to simplify the project. The file below if free for your personal use. It will easily fit on the front of a 5x7 inch card. 

Please right-click on the image to download it. Please click on a link above to your favorite social media site to see a step-by-step video of the project. 

Happy Holidays!

While drawing round ornaments is very fun and satisfying, especially when we add in all the gorgeous details with a little bit of gold and glitter, after a while it can be great fun to explore other shapes and sizes. Using a little creativity and imagination, we can expand on the basic circle to make more exotic shapes!

To do this tutorial, you'll need:

• a circle template OR assorted bottle caps and jar lids in a variety of sizes
• pencil
• tracing paper
• permanent black pen
• watercolors
• eraser

Optional:

• gold gel pen
• white gel pen
• Other metallic or pearlescent pens and markers

Steps:
Draw a straight line on your tracing paper. This is your base line.
Choose a circle on the template or bottle cap. Resting the bottom of the circle on the straight line, draw a circle.
Then move either to the left or right and draw a second circle the same size. See example.
The further apart the circles, the more of an "oval shape" you'll get. Experiment with the width of the combined circles to see what you like best. Add a small rectangle and a circle for the top and you have your first ornament.

In the next example, choose a large circle or lid and again, using a straight line as your base, draw one half of the circle. The circle will be divided in half vertically.
Now move the template or cap and draw the other half so that it overlaps the first half as seen in the image below. Another way to do this is to draw one large circle on the tracing paper and then cut it in half. Overlay the edges until you are pleased with the shape. Tape the edges of the paper to hold the shape.


Make sure to use the straight line as your base to keep the sides even in length.  Add a rectangle, circle and string at the top and you have your second ornament!

One variation on this is to deliberately offset the second half so the "circle" is wider at the top than on the bottom. Play around by moving the template or cap around to get different shapes and lengths.







Moving to a more complex image, let's try stacking the circles to make a longer ornament:
After starting with the double circles like we did in the first example, I added a second row of three circles (second image). I then added a long spike. The second row of circles and spike are the same height as the large circle. This helps to keep things in balance, but it would be easy enough to go much longer with the spiked shape if you wanted to play.

In the last example, I used a row of three circles to get an extra wide ornament. I then added a second row of circles and the long spike shape. Last, I added another circle as a "dome" over the first row of large circles.

There are any number of combinations of shapes you can come up with with a little experimentation!

Let's Add A Little Paint

Since the ornaments are all drawn on tracing paper, turn the paper over and trace the outline of your ornaments onto the watercolor paper. Experiment with different arrangements by drawing thumbnails to quickly see what you like. Avoid drawing all the ornaments the same size and at the same level on the paper. I opted to split my ornaments into two groups to balance my page. Overlap the ornaments for more interest:
Next, paint around the ornaments with clear water and drop in some green watercolor paint. Keep an eye on the edges to keep them soft, as if they're fading away. While the paper is still wet, drop in other colors if you like.

Study a real bulb for ideas on where the shadows fall and where the highlights and lowlights are:

Notice how the lights are different on the frosted red ornament and harder on the shiny bobbles but they all have soft and hard lights in the shapes.

Playing around with color is half the reason I like painting ornaments so I dropped in red orange and pink. I used a granulating violet in the shadowed areas and left white skips for my highlights.

The way the image looks at the moment, it looks like the long ornament is in front of the smaller one. It takes a few tricks to move it to the front of the red ornament!

On the right side, I used cobalt teal blue and violet to paint in the ornament. I left the strip and smaller circles bare until the painted dried and then went back and added orange. I again used violet as my shadow color.

To make the two ornaments on the left look like they were overlapping, I painted the smaller ornament over the large one as if it were not there. After it dried, I added in the details in white pen on the larger ornament with a permanent ink. Once the ink dried, I washed over it with same watercolors we can see in the small ornament.


Technically speaking, there should be swirls on the backside of the smaller ornament, but I found out the hard way the ink in the metallic gel pen was not permanent and there was no way to add the swirls without lifting paint so I opted to leave them out.

If you've enjoyed this tutorial, I invite you to check out the free tutorial, "How To Sketch and Paint The Eiffel Tower," as well as "'Tis The Season Holiday Class" (just click the class title for more info!). We'll be creating awesome holiday art all year long and you can do as little or as much as you want based on the class option you choose.

And once again, I'd like to take this moment to send my wishes for the season's best to you. I hope your holidays are fun, happy, healthy and full of those you love!

It's entirely possible, maybe even probable, that I have all things Paris on the brain these days since I'll be going to teach a Travel and Art Workshop there in October 2018! And what could be more Parisian than the Eiffel Tower?

Along with having Paris on the brain, it seems I have the holidays on my mind as well and what could be more fun than rendering the tower as a gingerbread cookie?!

French tradition calls for placing special treats into a shoe or shoes left by the fireplace. However, I couldn't make up my mind on what kind of shoe to have, so I went back to the traditional stocking instead. Once I chose the stocking, it seemed only fitting to fill it with delectable treats, art supplies and useful things for a trip to Paris (maps, passport and boarding passes)!

Then I decided you all needed to share in the fun and joy with me. So I created a FREE TUTORIAL over at The Imaginary Realm!


The Tutorial also serves as a free preview of the holiday class, 'Tis The Season, where we'll be exploring a holiday theme each month through 2018. If this sounds like fun, you can find more info HERE.

I hope you will come and join the fun, both in Paris and the holiday class!

Are you familiar with Chinese seals? They're sometimes referred to as a chop. They are used as a means of signature to show authorship in personal documents in several Asian countries. They can often be seen in artwork and they have since become favorites of artists the world over. They are almost always used with red ink and they come in a variety of styles, shapes and are carved from many different types of material.

If you google Chinese seals or chops, you will find a myriad of sellers that will carve a seal for you...if you know what you want it to say. And that's where I get stuck! I've wanted a chop for several years, but every time I start looking at all the possibilities I get overwhelmed with way too many choices.

You can even carve you're own if you're handy with a knife. You'll find instructions here. There are several articles and some videos as well. Uncle Google will be more than happy to provide you with several hours of links to "help!"

The other evening when I finished the sketch above, I wanted a small stamp to go in the area just below the cap but did not have anything appropriate. I couldn't help but think if I had a chop, it would be perfect for that small area...and so the adventure began.

I've been hoarding some styrofoam I'd cut from the tops of clean takeout containers and as I pondered my stamp challenge, my eyes happen to land on my stash. Could I, I wondered. I figured there was only one way to find out and I'm happy to say it was just too easy! In fact, I created several temporary chops in a little under an hour.

Let me be very clear upfront, these faux seals are TEMPORARY. They're not going to last long and they are ridiculously easy to damage...but...they're so easy to make, if one gets damaged, you just make another one!

Supplies
Styrofoam - clean and flat from either a takeout container or meat tray.
Stylus - the smaller the ball the better
Black pen
Ballpoint pen with a fine or extra fine tip
Scissors
Template of Shapes
Pencil (not shown)
Wine corks or acrylic stamp blocks
Double-sided tape
White scrap paper
Piece of tracing paper

Be sure to read the entire tutorial before starting as there are several tips at the end of the tutorial!


1st Method (Slightly Difficult)
Draw out your design on a piece of tracing paper. I kept mine to my initials, the year and the copyright symbol, ©. Drawing out the borders first made it easier to figure out the placement of the various elements I wanted. I kept the overall size of my stamp under one inch. I already had a space in mind when I started so I didn't make any attempts at stamps much larger than 1.25 inches. Most traditional seals are small.

Once you draw out your design and are happy with it, flip the paper over so that you're looking at the reverse image. Measure out the dimensions of your overall design and mark it on the styrofoam. I found it easier to go ahead and cut out the shape with scissors before I added my design, but this isn't absolutely necessary.
Next, draw your design, in reverse on the styrofoam with a stylus. Use the reverse image as a guide. I have four stylus tools and I found the one with tiniest head worked the best, but I was also working very small.
Once you have design on the styrofoam, go over it two or three times with light pressure to get as smooth of a design as you can. Cut it out with scissors if you have not already. Apply double-sided tape to the back of the styrofoam and stick it to a hard, firm surface like a wine cork, acrylic block or piece of wood. Ink it up.
Stamp out an impression on the scrap paper...and there's your first stamp!
Thoughts On This Process

• Don't expect perfection—you won't get it! Styrofoam is very soft and easily damaged. 
• You'll make mistakes. Don't worry about it. Just get another piece of styrofoam and go again. 
• When drawing with the stylus, you may run into resistance from the styrofoam. If this happens, don't force it. Instead, go to the other end of the line and draw towards the area where you met resistance. 
• It's better to go with several gentle impressions than one heavy application of pressure. It's likely you'll dig or tear the styrofoam with too much pressure. 
• If you have fingernails with any length, take care. It's quite easy to "dent" the surface with the edge of your nail. I figure it adds character, but it could just as easily damage the stamp. 
• Make sure to adhere the seal to a hard, smooth surface larger than it is. Otherwise, it will not make a good impression. 
• If you do not have a stylus, you can use a ballpoint pen, but I didn't get as good of results using a pen as I did using a stylus. 
• I used double-sided tape that could be repositioned rather than permanent double-sided tape. On the off chance the seal is crooked on the surface and you need/want to move it, the seal will mostly likely be damaged as you try to lift it from the surface if you've used permanent double-sided tape. 
• I found chalk ink stamp pads worked the best with styrofoam. You may have to do a couple of tests to see what works for you. I tried a distress ink pad by Tim Holtz and it did not work well.
• Other than stamping the excess ink off the stamp, I made no attempt to clean it as I don't believe they'll withstand much. 
• Store the stamps in a box or bag where they cannot be hit from the outside or rattle around if you want them to last any length of time. 
• Tradition dictates the use of red ink. Since I'm bucking the tradition of a "carved" stamp to begin with, I decided to be a bit more of a rebel and test out other ink colors. 

If you wind up making a stamp or nine, shoot me a link or a photo as I'd love to see what you come up with!

I don't know about you, but I love to create "a-n-t-i-c-i-p-a-t-i-o-n pages" in my journal way before the actual trip starts! In this case, I'm already creating pages for my trip to England in August! (There are still a few spots left!) Anticipation not only increases my excitement, I also get to enjoy the trip for a much longer period of time!

Anticipation pages can be anything from purchases you make specifically for the trip (a new art bag anyone?) to things you learn about the place you're visiting (see below) to places you want to visit while you're there (umm, everywhere?!). Since this is art journaling, there are no rules and the anticipation pages in your journal can be anything you want them to be!

It's always a lot of fun (to me) to look up slang terms and arcane facts about a place I'm going to visit:

• Have you ever wondered what "high tea" is or how it started? 
• Do you know how many cups of tea are consumed in England on any given day?
• What about how"football" aka soccer got started (hint: a very barbaric beginning!)? 
• Do you know how much it rains in England? 
• How far the coast is from any given point inland? (I'd kill it in a trivia game...assuming it was about England!) 

Below is a series of photos of me prepping two facing pages to be used to capture information about England I did not know until I started getting ready for this trip. The pages have cut-edge borders to make them a bit more interesting.







As I add artwork and information to the page, I'll share over on my Instagram account and on my Facebook page!

What will you put on your "a-n-t-i-c-p-a-t-i-o-n pages" for England?" Why don't you come to England with me and then we can share our sketchbooks with each other over tea?!

In the first Green Tutorial (HERE), we discussed making friends with those greens on our palette by blending them with other pigments on our palette.
In the second Green Tutorial (HERE), we put what we learned in the first post to work by painting individual leaves.
In part three of this Green Tutorial, we're going to apply what we learned about painting leaves by painting a basket of flowers and last, a charming cottage garden in England!

A Pretty Basket of Flowers
The image at the top of the graphic is from a postcard I started at Selby Gardens but did not get a chance to finish. There were hanging baskets everywhere just brimming with blooms. This one was full of Impatiens. In the first layer, I laid down a scribbled wash of yellows and greens after I completed the pot.

In the second step, I add spots of color to represent the flowers. Again, these are mostly little scribbles of color without any real attempt to look like a certain flower but rather something generic.

In the third step, I started adding in darker greens. I used my base green mixed. This included yellow mixed into my icky palette green to make it more natural. I then added blues and violets to get a variety of darker greens.

In the last step, I went even darker and when I felt I had enough darks built up, I add some "raggedy edges" to the edges of the plant mass to make it read more natural.

Notice the lack of details. There's nothing there but suggested shapes and a variety of colors. I've used my darkest darks to indicate the areas in shadow so that I am suggesting a light source (see the small penciled sun in the left corner just above the border).

When we're out on location doing quick sketches, we don't have a lot of time for details, but we can certainly suggest them to our viewers!

English Cottage Garden
Below is the "inspiration source" I used for an English cottage garden sketch.

Click to enlarge

I gave myself a maximum of 30 minutes to create a sketch based on the image. Knowing my time limit helped me to focus in on what I liked best about the image—the row of trees with the garden and lawn below it. I love the cottage in the background, but with only a half hour, I decided to forego it until I had a bigger window of time to tackle it and do it justice.

In the top image, you see my beginning sketch...just a few outlines to tell me where things belonged. Since I planned on letting the paint do most of the work, I didn't need much. Notice I've used the rule of odds with five trees.

Also, I wasn't shooting for a copy of my photo but rather my interpretation of the garden. 

In the second step, I painted in the lawn using a smooth wash that had a mix of the yellows, oranges and icky green on my palette. Next I mixed blues and yellows with the green to get the tree "balls" with squiggle shapes to suggest trees.

I added the back lawn using more green and less of the yellow and orange.

In third step, I add spots of color to suggest flower shapes and then I added in a very dark background to help establish the middle ground. This also helped to push the foreground closer to the viewer.

Again, this was all done with squiggles except on the left side in the background where I used long strokes to suggest long pieces of grass.

Starting in Step 4, I begin to build the flower garden at the base of the trees. To make sure I was going dark enough with my first layer in this area, I also added in some of the dark, dirt color. If I waited to add the darks until last and my first layer looked too light, I would have to paint yet another layer over the first. Layers take time to dry and are not ideal for location work. It is best to limit them as much as possible by going dark enough on the first layer.

In Step 5, I added more detail in the background, closed up some of the white skips and adjusted some of the background darks.

In Step 6, I've completed the foreground garden and added in a second layer of "squiggles" over the tree balls to give them more of a leafy texture.

I've added in turquoise and Indian yellow which are no where to be seen in the "Inspiration Source" photo.

In the last image, I've added in the sky with some fluffy white clouds meandering by to give the image a more complete look.

This entire sketch was accomplished with a base green and by adding the other pigments on my palette to it.

If the green on your palette is not a natural green found in nature, it helps to go ahead and build a puddle of a base green and working from that. Be sure to use lots of pigment and as little water as possible. It may take yellow, blue or both to make the green look like something you would expect to see outdoors.

The rest of the work was done via texture, shapes, temperature and value.

Texture - the trees, background and part of the flower garden are nothing more than squiggles. The lawns are a smooth wash.
Shapes - the grasses in the background are long lines as are some of the shapes in the front garden.
Temperature - notice the warm yellows and greens that make up the grasses vs. the cool greens that make up the tree balls and the darker areas of the background on the right and directly below the trees.
Values - by using darks, I push the background further into the back. By using lights, I am pulling the trees and the front flower garden towards the viewer into the middle ground. The light value lawn also moves towards the viewer. I also used lights and darks to give the trees roundness and volume as well as to separate them, one from another.

Greens are here to stay and it only makes sense to make friends with them if we're going to find ourselves outside in a England or a Garden (click the words for upcoming workshops!). Just looking out the window can bring greens into your view!

Questions? Questions about greens or another troublesome pigment? Let me know in the comments! 

Happy St. Patrick's Day!!

“Information does not become knowledge nor does it become powerful until we after we apply it and make it our own.” 

Think about it…how often have you heard a piece of information that seemed helpful, but had no relevance to your life because you had no use for it or didn't put it into use right away?

It is much the same with learning new information with art. Unless it is applied and we make the information our own, it will continue to be just that, information.

However, when we apply it and grasp what it means to us, even if we only get an inkling, then it gains in power and it truly becomes knowledge!

So it is with color charts.

You've created color charts and you've begun to "see"  that icky frustrating green pigment may not be quite so frustrating after all. It's still kinda icky by itself, but we now know there's hope for it.

Without applying what we learn from some of those super-cool mixes we came up with from the first part of this tutorial, well, it's kind of a waste of time. The color charts don't really help us to take a step away from frustrated and towards fabulous. Sure, we have a hint, but we don't have any application.

Welcome To Part 2: Applying Color Mixing To Simple Subjects
If you're like me, there were a few mixes that really caught my eye and appealed to my color sense. (Color sense or preference is as individual as our fingerprints!)

Look back over the color mixes you created and evaluate which ones sparked your interest. They don't have to be "traditional" leaf colors. If you like some of the zanier color combos, play with those as that indicates where your interest lies.

Begin With Simple Shapes
Draw out a few leaves on a piece of watercolor paper or in your sketchbook. The leaf shape can be quite simple, as the focus of this exercise is color mixing rather than rendering a perfect copy of the leaf. If you happen to live somewhere in the world where the only green leaves at the moment are on the artificial arrangement sitting on your table, it's quite acceptable to use leaves from the arrangement.

Draw a simple leaf shape. Someone got the munchies and this add interest to the shape.

I have also taken a photo of some leaves I picked up on my way out to the mailbox today. Click this link to download a high-res copy of the leaves I used. (I specifically chose leaves with interesting color combinations to help with the learning process.)

Mixing on the paper

Once you're ready to paint, choose a two-color combination from your prior mixing exercises. If you have not created any color mixes, take a look at this post to learn more.

Try painting both colors on the paper and let them mix rather than mixing the two paints on the palette and then applying it to the paper. On a different leaf shape try mixing the colors together on the palette before applying the paint to the paper to see which you like best.

Adding the third and fourth color to the combo

Once you're happy with the results of the first two-color leaf, choose a different combination and paint the leaf shapes again.

Note the legend at the bottom of the art.

Remember to keep color notes (legend) at the bottom of the shapes so you can refer back to the color you used to create a specific result. See example on the right.

After you've exhausted the two-color combos, move on to three- or four-color combinations and repeat the process of mixing the paints on the paper as well as mixing them on the palette before applying the paint to the paper.
In these last few images, I have added the color mix I created in the first exercise in the corners of the art to show where I started. In the example on the right, I started with a mix of yellow and the palette green. To get the darker spots, I add a hint of brown at the end.

In the next example, I used a mix of yellow and blue on the paper. I then added in touches of the palette green as well as brown at the very top of the stem.

Whether you mix on the paper or the palette, there is no right or wrong way. There are different uses for each method for various subjects, but it mostly comes down to which style you like best.
In the last example, I used yellow and the palette green for the leaf on the palette. I then added violet and brown for the darks as well as a hint of orange. I allowed the violet and brown to mix on the paper. You can combine techniques in one subject.

While I'm sharing only three of the leaves I created, I have many more. I highly, strongly recommend you play and paint as many leaves as you can stand! Why? Because the more we do, the more we understand. As the information is used and understood, it becomes knowledge and with repetitive use, it becomes reliable. That's where the power lies. It is only with constant use that our knowledge can begin to help us create consistent results that are predictable and remove the guess work!

Next we're going to tackle foliage in the shape of bushes to build on what we've learned from our leaves.

Did you do the first part of the tutorial and come up with lots of great mixes? Are you going to try your hand at the leaves? If so, send me a link in the comments or via email—I'd love to see what you've come up with and even more important if this series is helping you to turn your greens from frustrating to fabulous!!

Even better, come and join me at Selby Gardens in March for a two-day workshop and put your knowledge into action! Click here for more information.

Part three of this series is here.