The New Pigments

I've often been deceived by watercolors once they dry out, they loose their saturation and a bit of value. I've read this almost in every book and blog, I thought it was something normal inherent to the medium, and that I was supposed to live with it, Until now... Few weeks ago, I was browsing dickblick.com, I was about to order papers and some new tubes... then the question came... I've always used Holbein since the very beginning, sometime W&N, Schmick but mostly Holbein. It was recommended by the famous Charles Reid, the price was cheap and it was made in Japan. All 3 elements to convince me this was good stuff. I got curious about other manufacturers, ended up my search on handprint.com. So I decided to try out M. Graham & Co. My stuff finally arrived, I threw out the old pigment, put all Graham in my palette and started painting. I was under the impression that the colors were much brighter than usual... but I wasn't sure... afraid of being under the placebo effect. But the next day, without her knowing that I had changed anything, my wife commented on the new painting, she talked mosltly about the unusual bright colors. Bingo! M. Graham & Co succeed the wife test.

So today I have 3 tips,

Watercolors : M. Graham & Co

Art Webstore: DickBlick.com

Information about pigments: handprint.com

With new pigments, come a new approach :) I just wanted to do some fun stuff, I like doing little stubby characters.

5x7 Study

I was walking down FuZhou Lu, and found this skull in plaster. 22RMB(4USD), I grabbed it, it was still wet, not fully dry. FuZhou lu is probably my favorite street in Shanghai, it harbor many art shop, and books stores. For a tenth of what it could cost in any other city. I also found a Kazuo Oga art book. When I look at his stuff, I feel like trying some gouache.

5x7 Study

The more I do it, the more I realize that it's only now that I'm really serious about painting. Alla Prima's book has taught me things I wasn't even aware of. My biggest challenge is to identify value and hue with accuracy. I think I'll make myself 5 punched card of 5 different values, from white to black. So I can evaluate on the scene by looking thru the punched hole, what is the range of the value I'm seeing.

This is our Hotel Apartement.

Shanghai Shanghai

Here are some of the little studies I've been doing recently, walking down the street until something get my attention, but then again, it need to be a suitable spot to sit or lean on something to paint. On my palette I'm carrying, Ultramarine, Phtalo Blue, Cadmium Red, Alizarin Crimson, Yellow Cadmium & Yellow Lemon. Big focus on temperatures, I've discover interesting ways of making greys. I'm using a little block, Fabriano, 5x7 inches, 140lbs, grana fina, cp. 2010 is a year of progress for me, encouraging for what is coming next.

Temperatures

During the last few weeks, I've read most of the book I was talking about, Alla Prima. I was very impatient to go out and try out some of the new discoveries I've found. Especially on color temperatures and ways of identifying colors with accuracy. I was excited to paint in Shanghai, new sceneries & the beautiful light of autumn. It was quite disappointing in fact. I find it very very hard these days to paint, because I have a lot of insight on what I was doing wrong, but also because now I'm more sensitive and aware of many aspect of painting (well i guess).  I will assume that the current setback is actually a good thing, trying to swallow huge chunk of informations, while my clumsy right brain is trying to make sense out of it.

One of the biggest misconception I had about painting was... "Get the value right, and it will look fine!" Wrong!!!  Well it will look ok, but not great, You also need to get your temperature contrast right, if you want your work to stand out. (unless you work in monochromatic, but this is not my lane).

This little "revolution" brought me back to the selection of colors I was using and even on their organization on my palette. Even thinking of designing my own palette. I used to skip the color theory chapter in every book I was reading. Big Mistake, I will practice at least twice a week to paint a color wheel, with variation in saturation and brightness. Using 3 primary colors, with a warm and cool version of each. Also I will restraint my outdoor paintings to 5x7 inches painting, to really focus on color identification and technical mixing.

A Must Share

I would like to recommend a book, which has been recommended before me by Daisuke Tsutsumi. Alla Prima by Richard Schmid, http://www.richardschmid.com/ It is a must have book for anyone serious about painting. Full of Ah-Ha! moment and revelations,  a cheap price to pay for the real value in it. The focus is not on technics, but more on various principles. Relevant to any medium you might choose.

Here we go again

I havent post recently, not because I'm not drawing/painting, I'm still. But mainly because I'm going thru a big change in my life at the moment. Things weren't working well at my job, so I resigned, ending an 11 years at Ubisoft, feels a lifetime. When I joined, I was single, no kid, clueless about art in general. I'm now married, 2 kids, lived in 4 differents country, slightly less clueless about art. I had good times at Ubisoft, learned a lot and met great peoples. But in order to continue to grow in the direction I want, I had to resign. In a few weeks I'll be relocating to Shanghai, for EA. Looking forward to it :) Shanghai has some of the best masters of chinese painting & sumi-e I'll sure join some classes there and pratice the oriental brushworks.