Four Doors Down - AP Project 3

This is one of my favorite pieces I've done this semester. I love making photo transfers and painting over certain details so parts of the photo stand out. I was really pleased with how the doors turned out and I was able to make each door unique by using different shades of brown and grey for the wood. I knew they all looked different in the original photo so I thought I'd do something similar to make each one unique.

I had to be really careful to make sure I had a steady hand when painting the general shape of the doors as well as when I added details because I had to make it seem like you were looking at them from an angle. When I started on this project I was afraid I would ruin the picture altogether if I made even the tiniest mistake; since I was working with acrylic paints, whatever you put on the photo, you can't take off. I tried to add a bit of a shadow next to the first door to make it look more realistic but quickly realized I didn't like how it looked and when I attempted to wipe the paint off while it was still wet, most of it stayed on. I was a bit upset by this but I managed to get off enough of it that you don't notice the mistake very much.  Even though not everything went as planned, I'm still really excited with how the piece turned out and I was lucky enough to find a great frame to go with it.

Seeing Red - AP Project 2

A few weeks ago I set out to find different doors or gateways to use in my concentration, and found myself at my Dad's friends' farm. I found plenty of barn doors on the property, but one thing that surprisingly stood out to me was this gate. I love taking pictures of objects that catch my eye or capturing a setting and messing with the photo so a detail you might have originally overlooked stands out more. 

For this piece I, once again, used white charcoal on black paper, but added a twist: I made the originally grey gate bright red. I was afraid the gate would get drowned out because of all the different textures surrounding it, so I had to come up with a solution to make it hard to miss. I'm used to seeing people use monochromatic colors in their pieces, so I thought I'd take a step in a different direction and make everything but the gate black and white. I tried out pastel pencils for the first time and had trouble blending them out, but eventually got to a position where I was happy with the smooth texture. 

Unparalleled - AP Project 1

I love the idea of painting, but when it comes to making exact lines with oil paint I would rather avoid the activity altogether.  I'm a perfectionist so when I have to make clean lines in pieces like this one, I take a lot of time to complete even the littles bits of a picture.  I decided to challenge myself however and used oil paints because they are easy to manipulate when it comes to making textures and I needed to be able to do so since I was painting things like grass and wooden planks. I added my own twist to the photo and included purple details in the wood and on the chimney.  I think it complimented the piece well and made it a bit more eye catching and quirky. 

The downside of using oils is they take much longer to dry so it was difficult to make sure the colors didn't blend together and become muddy when I needed to make clean lines. It took a lot of patience to make this piece because it was so easy to make mistakes while using this medium, and I had to paint and repaint in many areas because I would accidentally smear the paint in certain areas because I wouldn't realize it was still wet. As time went on however, I slowly got better about avoiding resting my arm against the canvas while working. There were many moments when I just wanted to give up and move on to a new project because this one would frustrate me so much, but I knew I wouldn't let myself live it down if I didn't finish it.  Even if it was a pain in the butt to work on I'm glad I chose this medium because I learned a lot of new techniques and definitely gained skill with shadowing and creating good textures.