I brainstormed for this piece by picking a few pictures of myself from different angels and different lighting , I ended up liking the one in the car because of the lighting and where my hand was placed. I then sketched and began my painting , I encountered many challenges with this painting . It’s really hard to get the proportions right on a face , especially when it’s on such a large scale. I’m used to drawing faces with pencil, so painting it was difficult as I had to add tiny details and the right amount of shading , as when you draw a face you need a lot of shading so I kind of went off what I learned from that. I felt successful in the colors I chose and getting the colors right , I also liked the way my facial features looked but I don’t think they were exactly right now that I look at it from afar . I could’ve done better on the face/ lip and eye shape. I’ve only used oil paint one time before this, so it helped me get used to blending oil paint and creating value. I used oil paint on a later piece that i liked the outcome of , so I think the self portrait definitely helped me learn stuff about the medium overall , and how to l use it.
Animal Portrait - Prisma Color
We had to pick an animal to draw or paint , I chose my favorite cat ever which isn’t my cat but it’s my friends . I chose the reference picture I did because I felt like it had a lot of emphasis on his face which I really wanted to show in my piece because his face is so cute and different. I chose to use prisma because I felt like I could get all of the details like strands of different colored hair and the different colors on the nose , I am not that skilled at painting yes and I wanted it to look as good as I could make it. I faced challenges in the way the body was and the proportion of it just because he was sitting in kind of a weird angle , but it ended up looking right and I really like this piece. I felt successful in the way his fur looked and the face looks exactly like him ! I like the colors I reached in his nose and eyes. I’ve never drawn an animal before with prisma and I really enjoyed it. I think I learnt a lot with this project , like how to make fur realistic and layering really helps with this! I was scared going into it, but now I think I will explore drawing animals more now.
Nature Turns Mechanical - Prisma Color
In Progress
Final
The brainstorming for this piece was a little bit harder for me , I knew I wanted to do prisma color and add a lot of color because that’s honestly just my style , but I didn’t know quite how I wanted to incorporate the subject. I decided to do an underwater scene and make the coral the mechanical piece of it. It ended up working really well. I felt challenged in making the metal look like metal , but I think I did it well and i’m happy with the way it turned out so I felt successful with that as well. It was a good learning experience to think of an idea that was kind of out of my comfort zone and to draw pipes in prisma which again - i’ve never done. so I will use both of those skills on future pieces.
Landscape - Oil Paint
In Progress
In Progress 2
My favorite part of this piece is probably the water, i had a lot of fun blending together the different colors and i liked the way it turned out. I've never painted water in oil paint before this so I think I will take the knowledge and technique i practiced in this piece and use it in future pieces. Other than that , I don't really like the way the piece is turning out. There are still a few things i need to add. I had trouble making the tree bark look realistic and the branches in the top right corner look really flat, I also had trouble with the sky because in the picture it was really light and didn't have a lot of colors so i just have to over exaggerate the colors to add more value. But overall I think I learned from this piece and like the way it looks so far.
Final Reflection
This semester, I learned a lot about myself as an artist, i really struggled with time management in this class, that was probably my downfall this semester. I realized, if you sit down and set your mind to something instead of procrastinating and waiting until the last minute and being rushed, your work will come out better and you will feel a lot more accomplished by the end of it. I realized where my strengths and weaknesses lie in art. I really enjoy Prismacolor and graphite, i think that makes those my strengths because i realized when i enjoy doing a piece, i usually like the way it turns out better in the end. At times, this class can be stressful, but at the end of the day it helped me a lot, even though it was fast paced and a lot of work, it taught me things i know i'm going to take and use in future work , not only art but other work/responsibilities too. I know i want to practice to get better and be more confident in my skill. I see myself improving every year, but i know i can get even better, with practice and effort. This class is one of my stepping stones of that, Ms. Rossi has taught me so much and this is definitely not the end of my art career. I hope i can continue to practice all of the skills I've learnt such as color, texture, shape, shading, e.t.c and grow even more as an artist.