Portrait Practice 2

Back after a Christmas break. 
Before the holiday I took some time out between landscape studies and the next set of studies to do a portrait practice.
 

Portrait practice 2

Happy Christmas

This is a piece I did last Christmas.  Did not manage to create a new one this year. Heading home to family for Christmas. A welcome break after a tough year.  Fortunate to be able to celebrate. 

Desert Landscape 5 Photoshop Study

Oops thought the last on was the last in the series but it was not.  So one more dose of sunshiny deserty goodness, 

Landscape -Utah Desert Photoshop Study 4

Landscape -Colorado Desert Photoshop Study 4

This is the last in this series of landscapes.  Still a lot of work to get done.  Did not manage to get the crispness I wanted - especially in the foreground.  I will be returning to these again.  I had planned to go into some figure drawing after this.  I have been practicing sketching poses and would like to do more detailed studies.  I am still torn between doing this and going for the challenge running on Crimson Daggers- Swamp Elder.  Hmm...

Landscape -Utah Desert Photoshop Study 3

Landscape -Colorado Desert Photoshop Study 3

This is the second to last of this series of studies of desert rocks in photoshop.  Still not nailing the sharp lines and textures. 

Landscape -Utah Desert Photoshop Study 2

Landscape -Utah Desert Photoshop Study 2

Continuing the landscape studies The famous arch in Canyonlands National Park.  I did try and lighten the image - maybe a little too much.

Landscape -Utah Desert Photoshop Study 1

Landscape -Utah Desert Photoshop Study 1

Still doing landscape studies.  So moved away from the misty landscapes to some images with sharp detail.  I did capture that here but I have planned to do a series of these as well so still some time to learn and improve.  The photos are from Canyonlands in Utah, USA.

Landscape -Canada Photoshop Study 4

Landscape -Canada Photoshop Study 4

Number 4 in this series.  This one definitely got away from me.  The water was OK bit the mountain is a total bust.  By the way I limited myself to 2 hours for all these studies so if things went in the wrong direction there was not much time for me to fix them.  Still more practice to come. 

Landscape -Canada Photoshop Study 3

Landscape -Canada Photoshop Study 3

I continued this series.  The biggest challenge for me is getting texture in these images and controlling edges.  I am still exploring different brushes to get desired effects.

Landscape -Canada Photoshop Study 2

Canada - Landscape

So this is the first of a series of landscape studies - all performed in Photoshop.  I have not done many studies of landscapes so I will spend some time working on these. 

Over all my work practice has taken on a little more focus I hope.  This is because I have made a commitment to practice and get better at Photoshop and traditional media.  This was a decision I made towards the end of the Summer.  The putting it in to practice has been aided by the Deathline Challenge.  More about this later. 

Cactus Plant Photoshop Study

Cactus Photoshop Study

Photoshop Study - Some still life practice.  After this I am going to try a series of landscapes so this is a warm up.

Art for Alexandra - Update

Great news the auction Art for Alexandra raised over  60,000 euro.  This should allow Alexandra to be fitted with a prosthesis which will allow her to continue painting.  A report of the auction here.