Failed Mini Paintings + New sketch + Work in Progress

Hi peeps, 

So this week hasn't been particularly successful art-wise, which I am trying to not feel too down about because, to be fair, it's "that week" of the month and my body and mind are doing all they can to put spanners in the works. 

I am trying to be content with the fact that I kept going anyway and still gave it all a go. While I do feel like I didn't produce much I can do anything with, if I am a little more analytical and pragmatic about it, I did learn some lessons and did move forward in some ways.

So let's start off with the least successful bits. 

I tried painting the last 2 pieces from my minis and pretty much failed both.
Whenever I do a few paintings in a row, I always end up with one or two that don't work out like I was hoping they would. It's very much part of the process, and I am intellectually used to it, but it does throw me through a loop emotionally almost every time, haha. 

Part of the issue with both of these was that, once again and rather predictably, I did not have a clear plan in mind for either.
So I ended up stumbling along and making on the fly decisions that did not work out.
I make that mistake over and over, and I am learning to take whatever lessons I can from the experience, because there are valuable ones to be learned every time. 

In this case, it is that it is ok to give up and try again, that there is no point persisting and fighting against a paper that is clearly past its prime (painting on the left in particular), and that try how I might, I just don't enjoy painting opaquely with acrylics. 

You may ask, why don't I wait until I do have a better idea on how to move forward with a piece before I paint it, if I know that being hazy usually means I will not like the result?
Well, to be honest, it's because I know that I have a tendency to get too "in my head", which can freeze me in place and prevent me from taking any risks. I know for a fact that doing is almost always better than waiting (in the case of art at least), so I am trying to not shy away from the risk of failure and simply move forward in whatever capacity I can when I can.

above left : the "failed" painting on the bottom, the resized scan on the top, prepped to be transferred to a new piece of paper. 

When I say I didn't have a clear plan in mind, I am speaking on a couple of levels. 

On the one hand, I did not have a colour scheme set out, which meant, in the case of the hand painting, that I had to try a few things out and none of them felt cohesive (I will show you that process in a video), so I ended up overworking the piece too much. And for the piece on the right, the head, I chose a colour scheme that didn't speak to me (the look I was going for was obsidian) and so didn't connect with the painting process.

And then on the other hand, I didn't resonate with the imagery and concepts fully yet, so I didn't know what I wanted to express with each piece.
I don't need to know what my images mean in detail to connect with them, but I at least need to get some sort of feeling and emotion from them, which I am not yet getting from either of these drawings. 

I either need to wait the concepts out a little, or keep experimenting with them. 

I am in the mood to keep trying at the moment, so I have already taken steps to keep working on the hands. Even just writing all this out has helped me think of ways I can attempt it again, so we will see where this one goes.
I scanned the sketch, resized it to be a bit bigger and transferred it to a new piece of paper, this time in a sketchbook, so as to hopefully help me feel less intimidated by the prospect of failure. 

As for the head painting, I do have a colour scheme in mind that might work better, so I will also try to attempt that one again next week. 

Probably in my sketchbook too this time, haha. 

Right, onto a slightly more successful venture this time :

This one is simply a small sketch from this week, but I was attempting a couple of elements I am not entirely comfortable drawing, namely flames and melting textures. 

Wax-like textures seem to be a theme I am drawn to at the moment, and I have a number of variations on the idea in mind, so getting more proficient with the effect is high on my list of priorities right now.
I wasn't sure I would manage to sketch this idea out successfully, but did end up quite happy with the result. 

Specifically how I created the flames. I painted the fire by painting the background, and letting my brush carve out the shape of the flames. I didn't paint the background following an outline for the fire, I just let the brush choose. And I LOVE the sharp, geometric result!
In fact, you can see the contrast between the organically drawn flames at the top, and the ones I tried to draw in pencil closer to the body. The results are so different, and I much prefer the flames that I cut out against the background. 

These days I make my own reference images, so here are the ones I took for this sketch :

And finally, I have started inking the forest painting, and I don't quite remember if I shared these digital sketches with you yet?

Planning this piece is making my brain hurt, hahaha.
I had to digitally colour code the branches in order to get an idea of what plane each of them was on, so I don't accidentally ink them weirdly, or paint the background over any of them...

I also planned the steam coming from the mug digitally, as I want it to have quite a tangible look, and play with the different planes of the forest itself. It will be the last detail I paint but having a basic map of it helps me visualise the composition better.

And I think that's it for this post!

Thank you for reading if you did, I hope you are all doing well, 

Love, M