Never Learn, or Never Give Up?

For years I thought that I was hopeless at capturing a likeness in a portrait. After taking a workshop from a premier colored pencil portrait artist (Ann Kullberg), I learned the all important principle, “Never draw a face smaller than an egg”. (not talking quail egg or hummingbird egg, preferably a goose egg)

This information helped, but I have never gotten comfortable or confident about capturing a likeness. I can spend hours making tiny adjustments, and in the end, I still have just drawn the guy’s cousin. 

When I asked a friend/blog reader/customer, let’s call her M, if she would like a print of the Sisters in the Orchard (2 girls drawn from the back, no faces involved), she declined, but then sent me a photo of a photo that she would like me to draw.

The original photo is about 3×3″. This version is blurry. I said that it was too hard because it was too small and too blurry.

She sent me the original so I could scan it, sharpen things, lighten and brighten and enlarge and SEE!

I really really like this person and never want to disappoint a friend. So, rather than sticking to my conviction that this is really too hard for me, I went with the principle of It Never Hurts To Try.

I scanned the photo and worked it over on the computer. Then I employed every tool that I have (not going to bore you with technicalities or give away any secrets—I save those for my drawing students).

The plan was to do Dad’s face first, because if I couldn’t make him look right, there would be no reason to continue.

I am more of a “precrastinator” than a procrastinator; in other words, do the hard thing before there is time to fret, backpedal, renege, or chicken out. 

I sent this to M, and now we will see if the drawing passes the recognition test.

I am incapable of perfection, but I can see right now a few adjustments that need to be made. When the face is only the size of an average chicken egg, every adjustment is the barest little pencil stroke, a gentle tap-tap with an eraser, a teensy blur and a smudge, all done under a huge lit magnifying lens.

Will I ever learn to say no to these types of jobs?

Prolly not. . . eternally optimistic in the growth of my skills, the continual triumph of hope over experience.

Commissioned Pencil Drawing Begun

The orange grove commissioner (doesn’t that sound like a job title?) chose view A. 

She would like 2 drawings of the same scene, sort of. 

I asked if she wanted the mountains visible toward the north end of her view—Alta Peak, Moro Rock, Castle Rocks—or the mountains toward the south end of her view—Sawtooth, Homer’s Nose. 

She said one of each, beginning with the south end, so that if she changes her mind and decides on sketch B, C, or D, then she still has her first choice mountains.

Let ‘er rip, tater chip. (Or perhaps, “Gentlemen, start your engines”.)

First, the layout. What height for the distant mountains, where do the rows belong, get the hills right for Pete’s Sake!, where shall the main wind machine go…? Many little decisions, but not too much fussy detail in this landscape.

I looked at several photos of the mountains and foothills, enlarged Sawtooth from how it appeared in the photos provided by the customer, and tried to get in enough texture in the hills to be recognizable without actually counting boulders.

 

This is a combination of believable scribbling and very close scrutiny underneath a magnifying glass to make sure that no scribbling is actually noticeable… no loop-dee-loops or Ms & Ws (ems and double-yous look like rick-rack) or scritchy-scratchy lines are allowed to show. So the scribbling isn’t as random or casual as it sounds.

Never mind. This is how my drawing students and I talk about drawing. You might need to be present for a demonstration, or more likely, you wouldn’t care. Just be polite, ‘kay?

The bottom right corner will have closer leaves and oranges, with a touch of color.

I love these types of pictures—orange groves, foothills, mountains. 

Name That Painting

My current favorite subject for painting is classic Tulare County—citrus and mountains, two things I consider to be the best parts of living here.

Today I am asking for a little help. My most current painting is nameless, and I am out of ideas.

Would you like to name this painting for me?

Thanks! (You know it looks better in person, don’t you?)

Here are some ideas that were submitted in response to my emailed newsletter:

Here and There

The Elephant and the Orange

Beyond the Trees

Foothill Bounty

Sierra Oranges

Orange View

Oh Beautiful!

Before 50/50 bars

California’s Peaks and Navels

Spruce Road, East

On a Clear Day

Citrus and the Sierra 

Classic Tulare County

The Best of California

Last minute update: the painting was spoken for, the buyer chose the name, and then she measured her wall. Oops. It won’t fit. It is my fault for not publishing the size, 10×20″. It is now available, $375 (this includes sales tax if you live in California or shipping if you don’t), here on my website, or in all the usual ways such as seeing me in person, calling, emailing, etc.

 

More Orange Groves in Pencil

I have two new pencil commissions, both of orange groves with foothills and mountains in the distance. 

I love this stuff! (Big happy face emoji could fit here but this is a blog, not a text, and we speak English here, not hieroglyphics).

Here are 4 ideas for the customer to choose from or develop into something else. Good thing she knows that I can draw.

She didn’t specify whether she prefers horizontal or vertical, nor did we establish which part of the mountains she prefers: Alta Peak with Castle Rocks or a bit farther south to show Sawtooth and Homer’s Nose.

She did say that she wanted a little bit of color.

You probably have a clear favorite but it is the customer’s opinion that will prevail.

Sisters in the Orange Grove

There has been a request for a print of this drawing. I will order 2, unless other people tell me that they would like them too. I don’t know the price, but it should be lin the neighborhood of $35-50 apiece. After I hear how many people are interested, I will ask the printer for a price. The original is 11×14″, but I could get them printed as 8×10″ instead. 

Interested?

Wednesday, March 23, 1:30 p.m. I have now ordered 5 prints; 3 are spoken for.

Pencil Oranges, Aiming for Perfection

It is time for me to really study this pencil commission. The pencil drawing needs to be perfect, because the next step is to spray it with a fixative, to prevent smearing when I add colored pencil to a few areas. 

Mr. Customer asked for clouds, so I decided some wispy types would add texture, variety, and interest without becoming too busy. Everything else is highly detailed, so the sky needs to be somewhat visually restful. 

All this remains to be inspected:

  1. The trees must look believable as they recede into the distance. 
  2. The ground needs to have texture, but not so much that it competes with the leaves.
  3. The closest branches need to have the largest leaves and fruit.
  4. The sky needs to be dark enough to show off the clouds, snow on Sawtooth, and the windmachine.
  5. The little girls have to be perfect. 

After I addressed all those items, I scanned the drawing, cleaned up the scanner messes (it ALWAYS leaves spots, and the paper color scans as gray), and emailed it to Mr. and Mrs. Customer for their final approval.

More will be revealed in the fullness of time, or as my dad used to say, “Time will tell”. Meanwhile, I will continue to. . .

. . . use pencils, oil paint, and murals to make art that you can understand, of places and things you love, for prices that won’t scare you.

Oranges in Pencil, The Point

What’s my point? Not the point of my pencil. The point of all this careful drawing and explaining is to make everything in this custom pencil drawing believable.
I have added a ladder to the wind machine, smoothed the sky, and begun the lower leaves and oranges on the bottom left. Have a look at the 2 little girls, the way I see them under the giant lighted magnifying glass. They truly are almost impossible to draw and hardly show up. But they will have color on them at the end, so they will be more visually significant.

Building up the foliage is tedious; some might say “restful”; others might call it “zen”. The tedium is alleviated by the continual need to check the sizes of the leaves and fruit, thinking about where they are landing on the rows of diminishing sizes. 

I also worked on the ground a bit. I want it to look real and as always, believable. Usually within an orchard, there are many dead leaves, broken sticks, and dropped fruit. So, I will put some of this in but be careful to not have it too noticeable, because it isn’t the point. What is the point??

Believability!

Inching Forward With Pencils

The custom pencil drawing of 2 little girls in an orange grove is going to take awhile. I can quickly scribble in the distant orange trees and have them be believable, but everything up close needs to be carefully drawn.

In order for the snow-covered mountains and the wind machine to show up, it needs sky. This is because you cannot draw white; you have to put shading around a white thing for it to appear.

You can see that the leaves on the trees are getting added to, and the distant hills and mountains are too. One side of the wind machine is darker than the other; this will require some attention. 

I think this drawing will have quite a bit of “put some on, take some off, put some on, take some off”. Sounds like a middle-aged woman trying to get comfortable, but I am talking about pencil here. I keep adjusting darks and lights in the distance, looking for the best way to make it look the most believable.