Experiment with my phone camera

I read that you can put a piece of white paper over the flash to diffuse the light and make it softer when taking pictures with a camera. So I decided to try an experiment with the camera on my OnePlus phone using this tip. Here are the results.

This one was taken with the flash on. A lot of harsh glare and reduced detail.

This one was taken with a strip of white bond paper put over the flash part of the phone camera lens.

This one was taken with the flash feature turned off using the natural light in the room. It’s a little darker than the previous image.

Affinity Publisher

I downloaded a 10 day trial of Affinity Publisher from Serif, a company based in Britain. I have been using Inkscape my go-to vector app to create postcards and wanted to see how easy it would be to create them with Publisher. After only two days working with the trial version on my Windows 11 Surface Book 3 I decided to fork over the very reasonable asking price of $54.99 for the unlocked version. That's a one time fee not a subscription fee like some other graphics apps require.

Aside from a few initial learning quirks It was easy to repurpose or convert one of my Inkscape postcard templates to a better template in Publisher that will speed up the creation and production of postcards, greeting cards, posters and more. I have just scratched the surface and there is more to learn.

I had thought of using Scribus and although I’m a fan of open-source software Scribus is just too clunky and frustrating to use.

There are two other Affinity apps called Affinity Designer, a vector and raster illustration app and Affinity Photo, a photo and painting app. For the time being I’m going to continue using Inkscape for vector work and GIMP for photo meddling work.

Screen capture of one of the projects being worked on in Affinity Publisher.

There's a sucker born every minute.

In this case it will take several days. I started working on a piece that will have nine suckers or lollypops in it. I thought of cutting the sucker shapes from a large round dowel but I don’t have a good way or tools to cut them into even thicknesses like I want them to be. So the sucker shapes are made of laminated paper and the sticks are made of wood.

Nine suckers painted white and ready for some lollypop colors.

I have some thick paper material originally used to separate packaged products that come on pallets shipped to Costco. It is quite sturdy and I often use it to build shapes.

I cut disks out of the paper and glued six of them together to make about an 1/8 inch (3 mm) thick disk. Then I cut a notch in the side of the sucker into which the stick was inserted and glued in place before adding a coat of white paint.

Before giving the sucker a coat of white paint I glued one more disk to cover up the part where the stick is inserted into the side of the sucker. This will be the face of the sucker.

An Altered Work

I decided to make some alterations in this painting created in 2021. Here are before and after pictures.

The original painting was created in June 2021.

I added some more details in the water and the land in the foreground.

Creating larger works in a small space

Due to the small work space of my studio I haven't been able to create large works. I can work on larger pieces during the summer months by painting out on the balcony. Not practical during the winter months. Not long ago I learned from another artist how I can create larger pieces by painting on small panels and joining them together with nuts and bolts. Sort of like tiles. Here are the results of my first test piece.

Acrylic on three 8 x 8 inch cradled panels bolted together. Final size is 8 x 24 x 1.5 inches

Four 2 inch .25 inch bolts and nuts are used to hold the three panels together. I purchased a doweling jig to drill the bolt holes precisely.

Printing Pictures

Yesterday evening I spent a couple of hours at my friend Scott’s studio having him help me print a few of my digital works. We printed them with his Epson printer on 13 x 19 inch hot press fine art paper. We were able to get two different sizes on the same page, a 10 x 10 inch and a 5 x 5 inch picture. We had to do a bit of fiddling with print and color settings before finally coming to a solution to get the colors right. It was as simple as using a slower print setting. They ended up printing beautifully.

Four printed digital paintings inspired by scenes of the California central coast and hills above Bakersfield..

First printing. The colors are not as rich and full as they should be. The greens appear more yellow than they should be. Although the blue water in this version is a nice color is not as rich and full as it should be.

Second and final printing using a slower print speed. The colors are richer and fuller. The greens and water colors are richer and more fuller as they are intended to be.

Is it a print or a reproduction?

I see a lot of artists posting they have “prints” of an original work of art available for purchase. What they really should be saying is they have “reproduction prints” of an original work of art for purchase.

An article posted on the website Handprinted titled Editioning Prints explains what a “print” is and what a “reproduction” is better than I could. The article also talks about various ways to edition prints.

I Love Yellow

Yes I do. I love the color yellow. It’s a cheerful color.

The not so obvious color bar at the bottom is a very dark almost black green.

Small painting inspired by a bigger place

For the moment I’m continuing with my Cayucos series of small 10 x 10 inch paintings on cradled wood panels. This size of painting fits the size of my studio space. I’m toying with the idea of attaching some of the small panels to together to make a larger painting. We shall see. Here is one I just completed this morning.

The title for these painting comes from the small community of the same name in San Luis Obispo county on the California Central Coast. Although the climate can be foggy and misty and not always sunny and bright these paintings are abstractions of the feelings I get when I think of times spent in Cayucos and surrounding area. Someone once told me that “A bad day at the beach is better than a good day at work.”

Cayucos No. 29, Acrylic on cradled wood panel, 10 x 10 inches (25.4 x 25.4 cm), November 2021

Links to Software and Apps I Use in My Creative Endeavors

Here are some links to tools I use in my creative endeavors. Except where noted most of them are open source and don’t cost anything.

Illustration, Photo, DTP, and Painting

Inkscape: Free open source vector illustration.
https://inkscape.org/en/

GIMP: Free open source photo manipulation.
http://www.gimp.org/

Scribus: Free open source desktop publishing.
http://www.scribus.net/

Infinite Painter and Designer: Painter is a digital painting app available for Android and also iOS. Designer is the best vector app for Android. Free as well as paid versions.
http://www.infinitestudio.art/

Krita: Free open source robust digital painting app.
https://krita.org/en/

Fonts

Font Library: Free fonts. Interesting fonts some good, some okay and some not so good.
https://fontlibrary.org/

The League of Moveable Type: Some nice free fonts.
http://www.theleagueofmoveabletype.com/

Editors and Viewers

Libre Office: Free open source office suite (Word processor, spreadsheet, database, and presentation software.
https://www.libreoffice.org/

Xodo: Free PDF for mobile and online. I use this exclusively these days.
https://www.xodo.com/#

PDF-Exchange Editor: A more reasonably-priced alternative to that other PDF app.
https://www.tracker-software.com/

Krita or Android

I found an Android version of Krita that I previously wasn't aware of. I installed it on my Galaxy Tab S7 and took it for a spin today.

3000 x 3000 px, 72 dpi. This is a work in progress discovering brushes and how to work the UI.

Out of the Past: Fun With Sculpture

Back when I was having even more fun than I’m having now I made this sculpture using some recycled materials like wood from a pallet and old appliance cords. This is one of my favorites. I can’t remember the dimensions, date completed and where it ended up.

I did this one unfettered by wondering if someone would like it or if it would sell. Back then there was less pressure to create what was expected and is today. I miss it and keep trying to get back to that way of doing things.

TITLE: "I just about, nearly, more or less, practically, well-nigh, can't get over this."

Early Digital Work

Here is an early digital painting from 2015 when I was first starting out using Sketchbook Pro for mobile on my first Samsung Galaxy Note tablet. I was sitting in the library in West Jordan, Utah.

2015, West Jordan, Utah

Toast Man Finds a Home

Here is where toast man that I posted about in the previous post ended up. I wanted to do something a bit different. I had prepared the panel a couple of months ago and couldn’t figure out what to do with it. A couple of days ago an idea suddenly hit me and I immediately began working on it and finished it in less than two days.

A light went on just as the toast man began his evening float over a calm red sea.

Acrylic on cradled wood panel, linen cord, copper wire, graphite, 10 x 10 inches (25.4 x 25.4 cm), November 2021

Another Appearance of Toast Man

The legs and arms have been glued with epoxy and waiting to set. Then a face will be drawn and the sides painted. The bread shape is made from paint stir stick. The limbs are copper wire I found in a gutter on the side of a road.

Creating a Texture

Here is how I create one of the simple textures I use in my digital paintings using Infinite Painter.

Using the Castell brush with the brush Size set to 10 along with the Rectangle shape tool I drew a yellow square. Then with the Fill tool selected I filled the square with the same yellow color.

Using the Old Oil paint brush and the same yellow fill color I drew over the yellow square with random movements of the brush. This brush tool doesn’t paint a solid color but rather a streaked effect of subtle light yellow and grey shades. The streaks are most pronounced when the brush strokes begin. However the longer the brush goes over the color without lifting the brush from the screen the streaks fade and blend with the solid yellow. You can get some random effects that won’t appear until the area is filled with another color.

Finally the yellow square is filled with an orange color. The Gradient Tolerance of the Fill tool is set to 2 or 3 so the color fills the shape leaving some of the streaks showing with variant shades of yellow without filling it solid.

Using Some New Black Paint?

I got some new black paint. I don't use black paint very much. Here is an image of a rough idea sketch for a small acrylic painting using more of the black paint for a change of pace.

Digital painting idea created with Infinite Painter at 3000 x 3000 px on my Galaxy Tab S7 tablet.

Here is the finished acrylic painting.
Acrylic on cradled wood panel, 10 x 10 inches (25.4 x 25.4 cm), November 2021

Oh no! All that work is lost!

At least that is what I thought. I had been working on a digital painting in Infinite Painter and when I came back to it a few days later I discovered when I opened the project that all the layers were blank. No color just a white canvas. The only existence of the work I had done was in the preview in the project library. I thought I was going to have to start over. There must be a workaround.

That workaround to get my lost work back was to take a screen shot of the preview, crop it using Snapseed, then import it back into the original project as a layer. So all is not totally lost and I’m back in business.

The screen shot of the project preview before cropping.

The project after the cropped screen shot was imported and worked on.

Painted Paper Pulloffs

I wanted to try a different technique to create the Rock. I cut smaller shapes from the larger Rock shape then I painted the reverse side of a piece and quickly laid the piece on the surface and lightly tapped it down then pulled it off before it could dry. I added more paint to the pulled off piece and laid it back down. This gave me a mottled and uneven texture. The paint is a blend of gray blue, white, and a little black acrylic paint.

To see the finished painting click here to go to the recent works page.

A Morro Rock Work in Process

A series of photos of a recent Morro Rock painting in process. I usually get so caught up in the work that I don't remember to stop and take pictures to record the progress of working on a piece. Here is the closest I've gotten to a complete photographic record.

I use acrylic paint. For masking I use cut paper stencils and FROGTAPE. I use old plastic cards to spread and scrape paint with the occasional use of a small brush. And I use sanding blocks to smooth the surface of paint applications when they are dry.

First I laid down two rough color fields. I used a piece of paper cut to the shape of Morro Rock as a paint barrier. I used a plastic card to scrape and spread the paint.

Using the reverse or negative piece of the cut paper stencil I laid down a rough field of blue.

On top of the lighter blue green I laid down a dark teal color allowing some of the color underneath show through scratches.

I put some white paint over part of the right side of the painting and some dark blue under the rock shape. After every application of paint I use an old sanding block to smooth the paint and get it ready for the next application of paint.

And now for some blue sky color.

I added some pink and light blue green to the day side of the Rock and water and a little purple on the night side.

A little brown under the purple and some red magenta, teal, yellow, and some neutral colors on the sky blue.

The finished painting with a little purple on the day side of the Rock and signed at the lower right. I used some letter and numbers dies to stamp my initials and year. Then I spread a little paint into the stamp indentations and wipe off the excess on the surface with a wet piece of tissue.