Sophia’s drawing of Pikachu

This is a drawing, by my grand-daughter Sophia, of Pikachu,a Pokemon character.She just turned seven years old and drew this from memory. Yesterday she asked me how I painted pictures so real. Then we then went to my studio where she drew and colored Pikachu. I was impressed that she showed the highlights in the eyes. I began drawing comic book characters when I was a child, about that age,and many years later I’m still drawing and painting. My son Mike and his two sons went to Pokemon Go in Chicago ,this weekend. That’s three of my grandchildren doing Pokemon activities. I better learn about Pokemon.

 

 

Oil on canvas portrait technique-page2

This is an oil on canvas painting of my wife Carolyn,wearing a necklace,earrings and bracelet, given to her by a friend of her father. This necklace and bracelet was purchased in Egypt. The painting is titled “Egyptian Necklace”

This is a detail of my painting of Carolyn that shows my technique of applying a thin wash of oil paint thinned in turpentine and Liquin paint medium.

This is a photo of  Liquin paint medium, a brush, a rag and a jar that contains purple oil paint mixed with Liquin and turpentine which I applied to a painting I am currently working on.  I applied the paint over the painting with the brush than wiped the surface with the rag leaving paint in the valleys of the canvas.

I used burnt umber for the mixture of Liquin ,turpentine and paint on my wife’s painting. When this wash dried I applied oil paint on the peaks of the canvas using a dry brush technique. The necklace,earring and bracelet  was painted last, using a well used bristle brush loaded with oil paint.

Photo reference for Egyptian Necklace.

Oil on canvas portrait technique

This is my painting of Sylvester that was painted from photographs that I took during a painting session in 1983.

I projected the slide photograph on canvas and drew in pencil on canvas the projected image. When oil paint is applied the pencil drawing is completely covered. Below are photographs of another unfinished portrait using this technique.

Pencil drawing on canvas  that I  drew over the projected slide photograph . Then I used acrylic paint  with a brush to block in values and shapes. After this process is complete I begin to use oil paint over the pencil drawing and acrylic paint.This is as far as I got on this painting.

detail from unfinished painting.The canvas size is 24″ wide x 30″ high. There is more to the drawing then I have shown.

This is a portrait of my grand-daughter Delanie that began by drawing a projected image of a photograph that I took of her. The  hair was painted with a sable brush that had about four strands of hair on it. This is an oil on canvas painting from the early 2000’s.

This is one of the many photographs that I took of Delanie, but is not the photograph that I used for the painting.

When I begin a painting on canvas I apply oil paint that has been thinned with turpentine to fill in the valleys of the canvas and then I begin adding oil  paint on the peaks of the canvas using a dry brush application.

Painting from life of a Native American

Portrait,in oil, of Sylvester a native American model,painted from life.

I painted this portrait ,from life, in 1977. This was one of the first painting sessions that I joined  a group of St.Louis illustrators and was the beginning of many years of painting from a model with this group of friends. I sold this painting to another artist, while I was employed at Maritz Motivation Company. It had hung along with other of my illustrations in the company art gallery.
Several years later this same model posed, and I took reference photos of him posing.
I used this photo as reference for an oil painting. I will describe the painting process of this painting on my next blog.

portrait Painting of a model

Oil on canvas painting of a model named FritzFritz

Painting from a model is relaxing and fun for me. On this blog post I have including paintings of models in various stages of my process. The painting of Fritz is an example of the final stage. I focus on seeing shapes not a nose or ear or mouth.

This is the first step of my process. I block in broad simple shapes

This is another example of the first stage.

This is an example of oil paint on cardboard.

Oil paint on cardboard.

Creating an oil on canvas portrait

Egyptian Necklace

I will be discussing various techniques that I use to create oil on canvas portrait paintings in future blog posts. I will be describing various techniques used to paint the portraits on this blog post.

Delanie portrait

Ed Bright

Fritz

Brady

Friends Stan and Red

Syvester-Native American

Drawing of vines in a forest by John Dyess

Forest Vines drawing

My drawing of forest vines is based on a photograph I took on the property of my wife Carolyn’s cousin in North Carolina.  Yes it took a long time. Lots of shapes to draw with lots of ink dots.

detail of forest vines drawing

A walk in the woods page 2

“End of a Season” by John Foster Dyess

This image, that I created in 2000, is based on several photographs that I took in the fall of 2000, of leaves,mushrooms, a work glove and a dead bird that I found. I have been recently creating images  of life cycle: death, birth,renewal and metamorphose ( “change or cause to change completely on form or nature”) Although this image was not based on a photo that I took on my recent trip to North Carolina, it fits into my new body of images titled “A walk in the woods”.
This is a mixed media painting which includes digital and pen and ink on paper. The size is 12.5″ wide by 9″ high.

A walk in the woods

“Old Tree” is a black pen and ink drawing with color liquid acrylic added. It is based on a photograph I took of a fallen tree,which is on the property of my wife’s cousin Russ and his wife Stacy.They live in Burnsville, North Carolina,which is near Asheville, N.C. . While there we  visited about eight studios which were part of the 2017 Toe River Studio Tour. This drawing is the first drawing based on photographs I took , which will be part of a body of work I call “A walk in the woods”.This drawing is on bond paper and is 16.5″ wide x 8.5″ high.

Detail from “Old Tree” drawing

 

Journey

This is a recent image that I have created for my Inner Space series of digital and traditional paintings that relate to themes of space,time,and inner thoughts. I will continue to work on this image until there is nothing to add and additional work will take away from the image