I draw such inspiration from nature, but find it the most difficult to capture. The natural world is always in motion. The sky is changing color, flowers and whipping around to face the sun, shadows are on their never-ending crawl across the grass.
In a recent sketching workshop I had high hopes that I could sketch a horse, but of course by the time I got the sketch down, the horse was gone, and I’d captured a lovely barn.
Sometimes I can draw from nature if it stands still long enough, but other times I have to rely on photos I’ve taken of nature ‘in action’.
Plein air painting –
I was up in the San Juan Islands staying on Lopez Island, facing east. Midday was long and I was able to paint the view from the back porch. Colors turned from near white grey shades midday to deep indigo that evening.
I captured the shapes on the first day and then the midday colors on the next. This only worked because I was painting trees. I am just not fast enough for flowers.
Unless…
Painting from stills:
On a trip around the Great Lakes I saw so many birds and really, really wanted to paint them. So I captured them with my phone first and then painted from that. I KNOW there are a bazillion tools out there to trace from a picture but don’t! The joy of looking at the image and trying to figure out how to translate what your eyes are seeing is a very important part of the process. You and I see the same bird differently, and so what I produce is really not the same as what you would. My brain tells my eyes what’s important and that’s what I capture. Nothing more, nothing less.
And now I have loads more things I can pull from! Birds! Bees! Even a cheetah.