Nicknames

 

These are the nicknames of my niece and nephews. The goal was to do them in the same style as the monkey. The cricket resembles the monkey the closest but the other subject matter was already to simple, so I improvised and came up with this.

California Sand

My sister is a photographer and took this pic of her kids at the beach. I knew right away that I wanted to paint it. I loved the composition and the bright colors and the fact that it had figures in it but I didn't have to worry too much about the faces. So I painted it. I had no idea how hard it would be. Painting sand is not an easy task. I had never painted sand before so I tried to find out how others had done it but none of them painted the kind of sand I was painting. After practicing on several smaller pieces I finally decided I would just do my best and even if it didn't look like the sand in her pic I would be happy if it just looked reminiscent of sand. I think it does. I was way stressed about painting this .... which usually improves the results and I am happy with the finished product. I see a billion mistakes in this but I feel like I improved during the process and I am just way happy that I am doing some serious art again. Here's to watercolor!