Cayman Islands Water Bottles

I got a surprise in the mail yesterday. My cartoon map associate in the Caymen Islands sent me these Cayman Islands cartoon map water bottles. It's one of the ancillary products that he has spun off of my Cayman Islands Cartoon Map.  He has also produced giant Cayman Islands Cartoon Map beach towels. I put the water bottles on the book shelf along with my new Monster Safari How-to-Draw Book. Thanks, Paul!

Discovery Bay Rhododendrons: More Progress on the Background

 I've been working on my Rhododendron painting on the side since last November 27th. I'm keeping track of my time, and I shudder to think how many hours I will rack up on this painting. Instead of working in watercolor, as I had originally planned, I decided to render the flowers in Prismacolor pencils, then use a colored pencil blender to add the "wet" effect. I'm quite pleased with the results in using the blender for the first time, but I learned that the tip of the blender doesn't last long. I begins to break down fairly quickly, which makes is more difficult to be precise in your blending. I will go through three or four blenders before I'm finished with the painting. For tips on how to use colored pencil blenders, see the post below.

The finished painting will be posted on my Painting in Paradise web site. Our next workshop is scheduled to depart this coming March 30, 2014. Details at the web site: www.PaintingInParadise.net

Have you seen my other blog, The Trowbridge Chronicles? trowbridgechronicles.blogspot.com

Discovery Bay Rhododendron Progress - Colored Pencil Blender Tips

Here's the latest update on my Discovery Bay Rhododendron painting. Since my last post I've filled in considerably more background on the right side. I will continue filling in background information in a counter-clockwise direction until the painting is finished. Then there will be a little visual surprise at the end of the painting. 

COLORED PENCIL BLENDING TIPS

Have you worked with a colored pencil blender before? Here are some tips that will help you get the most from using a colored pencil blender to enhance your colored pencil work.

1) When you've been blending in a dark area, like the dark background behind the flowers above, roll and dap the point on a tissue thoroughly before you move into a light-colored area, like the white petals above. The point of the blender will pick up the dark color and transport some of it into the light area, and "stain" it with the darker color. When you're blending an area of dark and light hues, blend the light color area first, then move into the dark area. 

2) The tip of the blender doesn't hold its point very long. After  blending for a while, you'll find that the tip has crumbled slightly. You will then have to be careful when blending in tight areas. If you're not careful when blending in a tight dark and light area, the dark color on the tip can stain the light area. Once the area is stained, it's not easy to remove. You can scrape it with an exacto knife, but in doing so you can easily damage the surface of the paper. This is the big advantage that Photoshop has over traditional painting. I must admit that I've been spoiled by Photoshop. 

3) To get the feel of how the blender works, you may want to experiment on a separate piece of colored pencil art that you don't mind practicing on. The above painting was my first experience with the blender, but I just dove in and got the feel of the blender through the course of the painting.

4) As you apply the blender to your colored pencil, you'll find that it makes your "dry" colored pencil strokes look wet, like watercolors. Yet the colored pencil strokes will still be somewhat visible. The blender also fills in the tiny white specks that occur when you don't thoroughly cover the paper with the colored pencil. You may prefer to practice using the tool before starting your painting to get the feel of applying the blender solution in different strokes, like long and smooth, or tight circles.

5) The blender I used is called: Artist's Loft Colored Pencil Blender. I bought it at Michael's Arts and Crafts, an art and craft chain store. The blender has a large tip on one side, a small tip on the other. To give you an idea of how long the blender lasts, I will go through three or four blenders to complete the above painting, which is 8.5 x 11 inches.

Check out my Painting in Paradise web site for the date of our next workshop. On the "Package Info" page you'll find the departure date for the fantasy South Pacific island of Rarotonga. In the course of the workshop I will teach you how to paint flowers in the realistic technique that you see above. www.PaintingInParadise.net

Have you seen my other blog, The Trowbridge Chronicles? 

Discovery Bay Rhododendrons Painting Progress - Lower Background Finished

My Discovery Bay Rhododendron painting is slowly coming together. I started the painting on November 25, 2013. I wish I could move more quickly through the painting, but it's one of many projects that I'm dealing with. Plus, painting in a realistic technique is painfully slow. This is my early morning-late night project. The lower background portion and the foreground rhodie on the lower right is now complete.

I found this rhododendron along Highway 101, just west of Discovery Bay, in Washington State, USA. There was something special about this flower that you can't see yet. It will be revealed at the very end of the painting. 

I normally teach painting in a watercolor technique. But I decided to try something different with this painting and render it in Prismacolor Pencils using a colored pencil blender, which gives the wax pencil more of a watercolor appearance.

I'm still a bit unsure about how I will handle the background in the upper portion of the painting. Will I fill it with detail as I have in the lower portion of the painting? Or use more dark areas with less detail, so the flowers stand out more? I will be addressing that issue soon.

Have you seen my other blog, The Trowbridge Chronicles? 

Discovery Bay Rhododendron Progress

I'm still plodding away on my Discovery Bay Rhodie painting. I try to put in an hour early each morning on the painting before I start on my regular projects. I'm painting this to add more floral images to my Painting in Paradise web site. This is the painting style that I teach in my Painting in Paradise workshops.

It may seem difficult to you to paint anything in a realistic style, but in my workshop I break it down into easy, understandable steps so that you can get results like what you see on my web site. If you don't you could do this, just check out the "workshop" page on my web site. The two paintings that you see by Alice were her first realistic paintings. Karen's pink flower was her very first attempt at painting. I was very proud of her.

Regarding the above painting, I decided to depart from the usual realistic watercolor technique and experiment with a Prisma Color Pencil technique, using a colored pencil blender to "seal" the colors. This gives the image a watercolor-like appearance. Now that the petals and leaves are finished, I will  be working on the dark background. I'm looking forward to this phase of the painting because the flowers will finally begin to "pop", and gain contrast with the dark background behind them.

You'll find more information on my workshops here at my Painting in Paradise web site.

Yaro Starak: Living "The Laptop Lifestyle"

Yaro Starak has an enviable lifestyle. His primary workplace is coffee shops in his native Australia. 

I can identify with his "laptop lifestyle" because I, too, am part of that small band of people who don't have to report to work somewhere. Most of my writing and illustrating is done in coffee shops. The above Yaro caricature was drawn in a coffee shop in  Puyallup, Washington, USA. 

I might add that some people are very easy to caricature...Yaro Starak doesn't fall into that category. He's a very difficult subject to caricature because he doesn't have many outstanding features that lend themselves to capturing a likeness. 

I have been a faithful follower of Yaro Starak for many years. I never miss his blog posts. He is one of the "white hats", one of the good guys in the Internet marketing business. You can sense his integrity in his writing. 

Yaro's career began during his college years at the University of Queensland when he set up some hobby sites for the popular trading card game, The Gathering. His work on The Gathering gave him the foundation of technical expertise and online marketing knowledge that he needed to begin building his Internet marketing career. 

After selling his most popular Gathering site, he created BetterEdit, an online proofreading and editing service.  Several years of success followed in his BetterEdit business. Then, one day he installed a blog on the website to improve its SEO. That first blog was the spark which ignited his career and led to creating his popular Entrepreneur's Jouney blog in 2005. He has been at it ever since, making a pile of money along the way. Not a bad gig. 

If you want to take a closer look at making money at blogging, Yaro Starak is a great place to start. At his web site, http://www.entrepreneurs-journey.com/, check out his Blog Profits Blueprint and The Membership Site Masterplan. It could be the best decision you ever made.

Check out my other blog: The Trowbridge Chronicles here. 

Joanna Penn: Indie Writer Luminary

STARS Of the NET - I first discovered Joanna Penn while perusing on Twitter a few weeks ago and I have since found her to be a prime source of inspiration, and a wealth of information...flavored by a crisp English accent. It's the first thing you notice when you listen to her podcast.

She launched her writing career in 2009 by joining National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). Since then she has been writing books and garnering accolades at a dizzying pace. This year she was voted one of the Top 100 Creative Professionals of 2013 by The Guardian.

Since her writing debut she has penned six novels: Pentecost, Prophecy, Exodus, One Day in Budapest, and her most recent book, Desecration.

Her prolific career and her fan base has been largely fueled by the strength and longevity of her engaging podcast, which she launched in March of 2009. At this writing she has posted 172 podcast episodes, most of which feature luminaries in the field of indie writing, marketing and Internet entrepreneurship.

If you want to learn more about the burgeoning field of indie writing, you'll benefit greatly from Joanna's podcasts, and her Author 2.0 Blueprint book, which will take you step-by-step through the process of writing and marketing your book.

To learn more about Joanna Penn, or book her for a speaking engagement, go to her web site: www.thecreativepenn.com.