Posted by Stephen on March 31, 2010 under Art, en plein air, landscape, painting, watercolor, watercolour | 
I have edited the first part of the Touw River painting from the weekend:
I have taken out all the parts where I have the brush off the page though in retrospect this may not be the best way to edit. Please let me know what works. I think possibly I should make these short excerpts from a DVD that I can send out at a later stage. But anyway – here it is:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otPjXhI67ow&hl=en_US&fs=1&]
Part 2 is busy uploading now – eek – error – our bandwidth is sweating here – start again
Posted by Stephen on March 30, 2010 under Art, en plein air, painting, portrait, watercolor, watercolour |
Here are two painting of Sinead watching movies again – Adam – seems like we watch a lot of movies:
I had to keep asking her to hold her juice still so she accused me of child abuse. Then she sat curled up like this:
Posted by Stephen on under Art, en plein air, painting, seascape, watercolor, watercolour |
This morning I had ten minutes before a client meeting so I sat at Milnerton beach and painted the people digging for white mussels in the break with their feet. The ships were waiting to enter the Cape Town harbour and Robben Island is on the horizon.
Posted by Stephen on under Art, en plein air, landscape, painting, watercolor, watercolour |
Two days of coaching drained me and I sat down on the river bank in the camp site to do a sketch of the river. There were people from up-country in George for school holidays and a big schools-rugby event. People from inland seem to be far more friendly and outgoing than locals in the Cape and everyone said “Hi” and made a comment about beauty of the area. As I sat, the father of one of the rugby players brought a camp stool and sat with me. Community is such a pleasant thing. While his son plaited leaves from the reeds and he knotted them – I painted this:
Then I went to lie down for a rest, thinking I would go to Pomodoro for supper. A crowd of local families had pitched camp nearby and some played beautiful guitar music while someone else played on a bongo drum. I think someone sang, I am not sure because I drifted off and woke up after midnight as they packed away. I had a shower and went back to sleep. In the morning I got up slowly and wandered up the trail on the other side of the river, with a mission. I wanted to paint and video. And I did. The video is still waiting to be edited but here is the first painting:
This is 19x28mm. There was a lot going on so I used a sheet 28x38mm and had another go:
By then I was getting frustrated by the scene and trying to capture it with a video camera running so I closed it all down and sat with a page taped to my book and did this little sketch:
I also recorded some shots of me introducing the scene which, in the spirit of adventure, I will show here when I can clean them up. And all too soon it was time to pack up the gear walk back to the campsite, pack up and head out for Somerset West. But not before I had picked up a Quattro Stagione from Pomodoro which I started looking out over the mouth of the Kaaimans River.
Posted by Stephen on under Art, Drawing, en plein air, figure, pencil sketch |
I stayed in Wilderness while I worked for a client in George. One evening I went to have a pizza at Pomodoro, in the old Post Host in the town. I had decided to go over some notes for the next day’s session as I sat there and had decided not to take a sketch book or my watercolour set even though I would love to sit there and paint the scene. I was reading. I was! But then I looked up and could not resist the scene. I didn’t even have a pencil so I drew this on the back of one of my note pages with my ball-point pen:
As I got to this point the couple got up and left with the child. So I read some more until looking up again I saw this scene:
And waiting for my bill I worked to get the guy’s head right:
And then I was ready for the next day – and ready for a night of rest, listening to the night-jars.
Posted by Stephen on March 29, 2010 under Art, en plein air, portrait, watercolor, watercolour |
Here are two paintings of Sinead that I did not want to post at first – then I thought I should continue to record the journey – the rough and the smooth. I really must make a plan to get some better light on what I am doing. Here is the first:
And here is the second:
Posted by Stephen on March 22, 2010 under Art, en plein air, landscape, seascape, Strand Pipe beach, watercolor, watercolour |
I went for a dawny this morning at the Pipe as I knew the wind would pick up later (as it has). The sun was not yet up and the sky was a light orangy pink etched with small dark purple clouds and the mountains over Gordon’s Bay were blue and purple. I almost ditched the idea of a surf. But I saw I had the break to myself so I paddled out on the glassy water and had a good half hour out there on my own – which is so cool. As the first guys paddled out the began to blow gently and we had another hour of great surf. A few of my mates were out there which is always quite fun.
I was going to rush off to do some work but decided that a watercolour was called for. And here it is:
No that is much too blue – I will take another shot outside. Here we go:
Big difference no?
Posted by Stephen on under Art, figure, painting, portrait, watercolor, watercolour |
Here are two paintings I did last night of Sinead while she was watching a DVD. The light wasn’t great but I thought this was a good way to spend the time. It was an interesting story too. Here is the first one:
And here is the second:
The photos are shifted a little to the blue side but anyway…
OK – here is better one of the second painting:
Posted by Stephen on under Art, landscape, watercolor, watercolour |
Yesterday I wanted to practice taking a video of a painting. I tried putting the camera between me and the board which I think has creates a better image but changes the way I am used to working. mmmm – well I will try it a few times to see how it works for me. Sinead is going to edit the footage for me to produce something for YT – editing is a LOT of work! Anycase – here is the painting:
Posted by Stephen on March 20, 2010 under Art, en plein air, figure, painting, seascape, Strand Pipe beach, watercolor, watercolour |
It was a murky day in False Bay and there was a cool onshore wind blowing at the pipe. The mountains were barely visible through the gloom. I had a short surf and took some time to paint this watercolour.
I need to thank Cecil from Surfing South Africa who gave us some wax. The orange cafe was all out and Ethan, his two mates and I were all in need. They were at the Pipe teaching a whole lot of kids, I think from under-privileged areas about surfing. Way to go guys. When I asked if he could sell us some wax he dug a block out of his bag and gave it to me.
I also had another go at creating a video. I will make a short edition of what I created but it is difficult to get it right – I will have to start using an umbrella for shade and must get the angle right. Anway here is the painting which is from a position nearer the sea. I have captured some of the people strolling along the shore. The couple on the right, decked out in matching wetsuits came down with their boogey boards and glared at the waves for a while before walking back up the beach, without getting their feet wet.
Here is the watercolour:
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