Our Christmas Post Cards 2011

In past years my husband and I work on a Christmas card together.  He usually draws it out and then I paint it.  But this year he was really busy with work so it was just me working on it.  It was a 3 day rush job to get it finished up and to the printers in time.  :)   I was pretty happy with the result even though the brush strokes are sort of sloppy.  I need to get better about trying new brushes in photoshop.

Elver Park

Today I went with my friend Helen to paint at Elver Park.  I love the fall colors.  It really gives some wonderful range in contrast to landscapes.  I think it's my best plein air landscape yet!  I tried to keep in mind some great advice that really helped me define the form of a tree.  (Thanks Eric!)  This will probably be my last outdoor painting of the year as it's been cooler and windy out.

DRDC Roller Derby Poster

This is a quickie photoshop paint project that I did for my favorite roller derby team. :)  Graphic design by Jenny Terstriep.

Restoring a Statue of Joseph and Jesus

While John and I were in Nebraska visiting his parents we went with them to their Bible study that Msgr Nemec was teaching.  Stella told him that I just restored a statue for my parish priest.  Msgr Nemec asked if I'd like to do another one and I said sure!  He disappeared up to the church attic and came down with this broken plaster statue of Joseph and Jesus.  The statue had a large part of it's neck missing with a few holes and cracks in other areas.  I said I'd love to restore it!  :)

When I got it home I washed the statue and decided to fix the broken parts of the statue with Spackle because plaster is very chalky like drywall.  

 I sanded it smooth after a night of drying and primed it with a few coats of gesso.

 Then I began blocking in colors with acrylic paint and adding highlights and shadows to the robes.

 Next were the skin tones and hair and finally the gold edging.  I'm really happy with how the statue turned out.  It was so nice to get more experience restoring statues.  I look forward to more statue work in the future. :)

Statue height: 27"

Plein Air Painting Class

I'm really enjoying my Plein Air painting class.  Here are some photos from our last class.  We met at Allen Gardens and set up under cloudy skies.  It got a little rainy but thankfully there was no wind and we could continue to paint under umbrellas.  I really want to go back to finish this one but it's been too hot to get out there with the temperature a few degrees shy of 100!    It's sort of addicting to just pack up and go paint outside.  I wasn't expecting that when I signed up.  I love to paint portraits but landscapes have always been more challenging for me.  I'm going to keep working at it. 

Here's an update today, hopefully I"ll finish up next time. :)

A special thanks to Veronica for giving me this great easel! I think of you every time I go out to paint!

ZBrush Class

Here are a few screen shots from some of the work I did in my Zbrush class.  I learned a lot about the program and look forward to learning more.  :)  

Mary in the Dahlia Field

This is a watercolor painted for my mother-in-law of her beautiful youngest daughter, Mary.  I finished it a few days ago.  I love working in watercolors.  Layering colors can be sort of an endless process so it's hard to know when to stop.  I sort of like the fading to one layer of paint on the right bottom sides.  Of course now I'm thinking of working on portraits of the nieces Madison, Breanna and Isla.

Restoring a Sacred Heart of Jesus Statue

This is a before and after photo of the work.  I'll include some process pictures too. :)

When I began I wasn't sure what the statue was made of so I lightly sanded off the old paint with a soft sanding block.  When I realized it was metal it was an easier process of using steel wool in the deep folds and a dremel with a wire brush on the rest of the surface.  

When I removed the old paint I wiped away the paint dust and brought it inside to begin priming the statue with white gesso paint.

Next I began blocking in colors.  This step is important because you can't see the true colors next to white paint.  

Then I worked on the face details next.

Then I started to detail the rest of the statue.  I painted the darks in the folds of the fabric and used a sponge with a lighter color to pullout the highlights.  Then I used a pearl on the natural white cloth and a antique gold on the red cloth.  The trim work was done with a bronze paint instead of gold leaf.  And then I put a few coats of exterior varnish on it to protect it from the elements.  

I had a lot of fun working on this project.  I hope I get the opportunity to do more work like this. :)