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.

Belleek Forest Sunlight in Autumn Oil Painting

Belleek Forest Sunlight in Autumn

As I mentioned earlier I was working on a painting and finished it at the weekend. I was on holidays a few weeks ago and was walking my sisters dog in the local woods. I brought my camera to get some photos with some good brown leafyness. I did take a lot of those kinds of pics but just as I was leaving I turned and took just 2 shots of this scene. I thought it might end up being blown out - facing the sun but this was the one I selected to do some painting practice with. 

The canvas I had was a 20 x 20 cm canvas. Faced the same issue I had with my last painting. A landscape image on a square canvas.  On this one I dropped the detail at the sides.  

I drew the image on the  canvas  using a hard pencil then went to work blocking in the major shapes then left to dry overnight.  

Followed on by working on the foreground then left to dry overnight. 

The next day another few hours on the canopy.  

Then a couple of evenings pushing and pulling areas all over the canvas until I called it done.  All together maybe 10-12 h work.  
It was fun.  Most disappointing element were the tree trunks.  Should have worked on them earlier.  Next time...

Mikado biscuit study in Photoshop

Mikado Biscuit

Another Photoshop study.  Another biscuit.  This one was definitely less successful than the red pepper 2.  The colour is not so good and I wanted to get better texture. Took about 2 hours.   By the way this is a Mikado biscuit - pink marshmallow, jam in the center and covered with coconut sprinkles.  Anyway onwards and upwards.