Sharon Whitley's Challenge

Some of you may know I run the loose group on Paint my Photo and each month I choose an image from the many wonderful photos on the site for members of the group to have a go at painting in a loose style. It is sometimes quite difficult to choose images which I think everyone will like and I have to work on the principle that you can't please all of the people all of the time and there will be some months where people are uninspired or alternatively where the image pushes people to try something out of their comfort zone.

And so it was with Sharon's image this month, although I have been working with flowers recently I haven't tried a foxglove for a few years and wasn't sure how to approach it... I decided to start using my sketch book again (where I did actually do a drawing) mainly to try and get a feel for how to paint the flower heads and what colours to use, so this is my sketch book effort

Paper wasn't quite dry but this is quite close to the composition on the image and I do like the light and colours.

The main painting I did on the back of a practice tree so if I ever sold it might have to do as a seconds!! I decided to do the bg first hoping to get a looser feel so went in with the greens (green gold and a touch of May green) splashing some Opera rose around and allowing it to blend. Once dry I formed some flower heads where I could see the wash was "inviting" them, trying to keep some form of the flower in an upright stance, so no predrawing, just formed the flowers with the paint and brush

I can see from them on here the second looks a lot more delicate and could maybe stand a bit more work in the bg but will leave for a day or two and maybe it will tell me what I should do. The colours are more "fluorescent" looking as opera rose is a very bright pink colour and on the painting shows as more pink than on this image. I also used Quin magenta and permanent rose to darken areas and to calm it down a bit but it is still quite vibrant in real life. If I try this again I will be more adventurous with the colours as these are quite true to the photo and less bound by the composition... I have used a touch of turquoise in the greens to darken them a bit but think I would also like a bit more contrast. But as with my previous posts on Daffs and Pinks I will use this as a starting point for working out how to give the impression of foxgloves with less information... more practice needed on that score but this is a start!!!

If I could already do all this I would have nothing to strive for and as readers of my blog will know it is the desire to improve which keeps me going... as I do improve all that happens is there is an imaginary shift in my head where the goal posts move and I am still striving!!!

One final tip... I did the drawing in my sketch book to learn the shapes and how to depict them.... this is good practice so that you can paint them more spontaneously as you become more confident in the shapes and proportions, so do lots of studies and get to know your subject so that one big element ie the drawing, is less of an issue and you can concentrate on the painting!! You know it makes sense!!