A challenger (for my art time) has appeared!
I posted a while ago about trying a new media (in Always Be Pushing Your Art Boundaries) with some new techniques at one of those paint-and-booze places, and that was pretty successful. I then went back later with a friend and did another painting there, and tried a few extra ideas picked up from watching Bob Ross and they
Side note: Did you know that Bob Ross episodes are streamed regularly on twitch.tv? I did! It’s soothing to listen to and kinda fascinating to watch!
So, I picked up the next $5 set of assorted acrylic paints and some brushes and pulled out some of the stack of 8×10 canvasses. After all, it’s so easy when a professional like Bob does it, surely I can!
About that conviction that I can teach myself anything …
It’s not totally unwarranted, though that doesn’t mean I’ll be good at it any time soon.
On the other hand, I’ve been hearing lately that the whole Ten Thousand Hours thing isn’t necessarily the be-all-end-all of learning, because that’s to mastery, which isn’t what we need or want to do with everything. To get basic competency is only about twenty hours, if the Internet isn’t misleading me.
Side note: as usual, that’s hours of mindful practice, not just a few minutes here and there of dicking around.
I’m getting closer to twenty hours of work on doing backgrounds! I have figured out that watering down the acrylics for smoother coverage is a legit thing! I am getting a little better at this blending thing for skies! I have spent another $50+ on more paint and brushes!
However, I am still having a heck of a time with line thickness. This is, as you might guess, kind of critical for painting trees.
So, instead I’ll share this photo of one of my first paintings, in which I tried to reproduce from a thumbnail a paint-and-booze take on Manet:
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