Good Morning Glory

It is a glorious morning to celebrate one of my favorite flowers, the Morning Glory.  I have for several years now been featuring this cheerful annual by giving it a grandiloquent presence in a number of my paintings and now drawings.  This flower is one of several flowers that has strong memories of childhood affiliated with it and beside who can resist this cheery morning flower.

I just read that I can grow morning glories in a container and so today I'm off to the home improvement store to purchase a pack of seeds and a few color flowers to accent the front of my home.  I'm so excited at the prospect of once again enjoying these climbing beauties and yet having them contained as not to get out of hand.  They will be my inspiration in a pot during the hot summer months that are coming.

Whither you want to see them or not, this is where I'm going to share just a few of my MORNING GLORY artwork work with you.  READY OR NOT, HERE THEY COME!

These first three photos are taken while the artwork is still in my sketchbook.  These pieces are drawn using Prismacolor pencils and pen and ink.  All have been done in the just the past 2 weeks.  I'm currently working on a large canvas piece that features a small jersey calf lying on the ground just in front of a huge cluster of morning glories.  This piece has been a challenge because of the size and shear number of flowers and leaves needed to pull it off.  Drawing in my sketchbook helps me be a better painter and besides these three drawings stand on their own as cute artwork.

The next five pieces are all paintings that I have complete over the past 2 years for a series of work the I call "Down Country Roads".  Each large piece features a different farm animals standing near a fence covered in bright blue morning glories.  Of these five pieces shown here in this blog post, only the last one featuring the trio of noisy geese in "Neighborhood Watch Committee" is available as an original.  I can make prints but they have all been sold and have found new homes.

If you like my artwork and are on Facebook, you might consider following my art studio page.  I always post my newest work there and on Instagram first.
@JulieTownsendStudio

Sharp as a Tack

It is no surprise that I love working in colored pencil.  I love the portability and just how flexible they can be as an art medium.  Keeping your pencils with a good sharp point is a whole other matter.  They are expensive and so you don’t want to unnecessarily waste them by over sharpening them or having the leads break.

I try to be careful but using a small portable sharpener is okay when you are creating art on the go but doesn’t make sense in the studio.  So I purchased this Mitsubishi KH-20 sharpener on Amazon for $24.77 when I saw it recommended by another local color pencil artist.  It arrived yesterday and this morning was my first chance at playing with it.  As I already knew to be the case, the box and instructions are all in Japanese and so I tried to figure it out myself.  That didn’t work so well so I then turned to YouTube.

I found a excellent video by Baylee Jae that answered all my questions.  I’ve included her link below if you decided to check out the sharpener in more detail.  As for me, I’m a happy girl and my pencils will soon be sharp as tacks.

I will leave you with a couple of cute little sketches that I have finished just this week.

KH-20 Instruction video

Is There Rain in Your Forecast?

There are many things I remember from my childhood growing up in the Missouri Ozarks and gentle rain showers was one of them.  Nothing could wash the dust that had accumulated like a steady rain.  Everything was made fresh and clean. 

I also remember singing this old hymn written by Daniel Whittle in 1883. (Read about the life of Daniel Whittle)  What a sweet and powerful memory. 

1. There Shall Be Showers of Blessing
2. 
   
3. There shall be showers of blessing:
   This is the promise of love;
   There shall be seasons refreshing,
   Sent from the Savior above.
   • Refrain:
     Showers of blessing,
     Showers of blessing we need:
     Mercy-drops round us are falling,
     But for the showers we plead.
4. There shall be showers of blessing,
   Precious reviving again;
   Over the hills and the valleys,
   Sound of abundance of rain.
5. There shall be showers of blessing;
   Send them upon us, O Lord;
   Grant to us now a refreshing,
   Come, and now honor Thy Word.
6. There shall be showers of blessing:
   Oh, that today they might fall,
   Now as to God we’re confessing,
   Now as on Jesus we call!
7. There shall be showers of blessing,
   If we but trust and obey;
   There shall be seasons refreshing,
   If we let God have His way.

Here is my Verse of the Day to share with you.  This color pencil drawing is titled, you guessed it, "Showers of Blessing".  It is available in prints, magnets and cards and I currently still have the framed original.  Please feel free to share.

Blackberries and Sunflowers Equal Summer Days

I finished this colored pencil piece that I’m call the “Little Berry Picker”.   I'm pretty happy with the end results. I should have added more stickers to my vines though. I remember, as a child, just how much work it was to pick blackberries. We each had a pair of garden gloves that my mom had cut the fingertips out of to attempt to protect our hands from all those sharp thorns.  You came home sweaty, dusty and covered with plenty of battle wounds.  I’m pretty sure that anyone seeing us would conclude that the bushes won.  It was worth it though when you had a warm bowl of cobbler with a scoop of cold vanilla ice cream melting on the top. Yum!

I also wanted to share with you my most recent sketch.  It can’t be much more recent.  I will give you a series of work in progress photos of this drawing so you can see how I start out each of my little color pencil drawings.

All of these colored pencil sketches that I have completed in the past 2 weeks will be made into a series of greeting cards that will be available on my Etsy Shop and Website very soon.  

If you want to keep up with what is going on in my studio, then consider signing up for my studio VIP email or by liking my Facebook Art Page @Julie Townsend Studio.  This fall I will be having giveaways and discount offers via these two avenues.  You don't want to miss out.

1st, I use my .005 Micron pen to add fine details

2nd, I begin coloring in the flower using my Prismacolor pencils

  









  

You can see how I blend the different yellows by building layers

Original Art Can Make the Perfect Birthday Gift

I have tried now for the past couple years to create a special piece of birthday art for my grandchildren.  I've now decided to try to include my grown children in this tradition.  Today is my son Jason's birthday so I will start with the piece I made for him yesterday and then share a few other pieces that I have done in the past few months.  

Jason has just started to once again be careful with what he is eating and regularly exercising.  I had to make his birthday art reflecting this fact.  The adorable bunny in the corner is from my original color pencil artwork that I call "Don't Forget Your Vegetables".  The beets, turnips and cupcake are also drawings out of my sketchbook.  I added additional royalty free salad graphics to finish off the background.  That picture of Jason I found on his Facebook page is a real hoot and fits perfectly into my composition and with the magic of Photoshop, I can create a one of a kind birthday greeting.

The second piece I want to show you is for my little grandson, Noah who turned 5.  He loves the video game, Minecraft so I went to work figuring out just what I could create.  I knew I wanted to include his little stuffed enderman doll in the picture because he loves to take a nap with it.  I jokingly call it a spider and he is always correcting me on the point.  I drew my grandson, a sword and his little stuffed buddy in my sketchbook.  I used colored pencil to complete the sketch.  I then scanned that sketch into Photoshop and added the royalty free background, TNT and the pig to the picture.  This turned out so cute that I actually had it blown up to a 16 x 20 poster at Sam's Club.  You should have seen his eyes when he realized he was on a poster.  I also made him a sheet of personal stickers.  Here is how his birthday card turned out.

Hunter also has a November birthday so I had to work on a design that was special to a 1 year old.  I was informed he LOVES Mickey Mouse Clubhouse so I knew I needed to add Mickey in there for him.  When he was born last year I painted him a special elephant floating with balloon painting to decorate his nursery room.  He still has a number of elephant themed things so I grabbed my sketchbook and drew both a stuffed elephant and his sweet little face.  I once again used colored pencil to finish off the sketching part.  The rest of the image is from graphics that I used in Photoshop.  I think this turned out super cute!

Finally comes my two sweet September granddaughters.  Their birthdays are just 2 years and 1 day apart so I decided to make their art very similar.

Katherine turned 5 and is the owner of a giant doberman named Odin.  I sketched a simple likeness of both her and the dog and colored them in using Photoshop.  The bees and the purple flowers are also part of my sketchbook.  The rest of the composition comes from royalty free graphics.  I printed out a 5 x 7 image and matted it so she could frame it in her room.  I also had the image printed on a small tote bag using the print on demand services of RedBubble.com.  It turned out GREAT!

Sweet little Jenna turned 3 and she has a GIANT great Dane named Bane and yes the dog has one blue eye and one brown eye.  Both sketches turned out amazing and the girls love their personalized tote bags.

Brad and I have a total of 9 grand kids so just keeping up with their birthday art is a challenge but I'm loving the creativity that Photoshop allows me and all the GRANDMA points I'm scoring.    

To end this blog post, I thought I would show you one more commission artwork I finished this year.  This is a transaction that took place on my Etsy Shop back in May for a woman that lives in Canada.  Here is the 8 x 10 colored pencil commission piece I did using a few reference photos she sent me.    This piece features two curly haired sisters and their doberman puppy.  I believe this is going to be her brother's Christmas gift.       

Just How Many Shades of Blue Do I Need? AS MANY AS I CAN GET!

Who said, "You Can't Teach an Old Dog New Tricks?" This past week I have had several opportunities to watch several artists at work on YouTube.  What an amazing tool we have at our fingertips.  If I had this available to me when I was younger there is no telling how much further along my art skills would be.  Oh well, if there is one thing I do know, you can't roll back time so making changes to ones past is not an option.  None of has have a guarantee of tomorrow. That leaves us only with today in our control.  So today, I am going to embrace my opportunity to practice more with drawing textures and YouTube will be my amazing go to resource.

First artist- I want to share with you is Lisa Clough of Lachri.com.  I've only begun to touch the surface of the vast amount of information she has made available on her website via free YouTube tutorials.  I'm very interested in working on her oil over acrylic techniques.

Color Pencil practice exercises added to my sketch journal

Second artist- I have found a wonderful color pencil artist named Sheldene Visagie at http://www.sheldenefineart.com/ .  She has a great technique and I have learned a number of things about color pencils just by watching her YouTube tutorials.  I worked on several of her blending practice videos and here are my results.   I realized that with the exercise that she had several shades of Prismacolor blue pencils that I don't have in my limited sets.  I made due but felt that I had to use shades that were not really related and had to work hard to get them to have a continuous blended effect.  The blended color wheel was also and excellent practice exercise that I highly recommend.

A few months ago I bought a set of what I thought would be 96 Prismacolor pencils but turned out to actually be more like 72 colors because the set included 12 verithin pencils and 12 watercolor pencils so it wasn't actually what I thought I was buying.  So I just placed an Amazon order for the largest set, 150 pencils and they arrived just today.  I'm SO excited to start using them.   First though, I am going to make a color reference chart that I can use when trying to match a particular color.  That will probably be a future blog.  What made this purchase even more exciting was that during the few days that I had them in my shopping cart the price dropped like $10 to only $89 on Amazon Prime. Down the road I might invest in a set of  Faber Castell Polychromos pencils but right now I'm pretty happy with the wax based pencils.

Fun Practice Exercise for working on different textures.

This week I have also been playing around with textures in drawing.  When you are teaching a basic drawing class each week you have to stay one up on your students and I thought that texture was a good lesson for week 5 of my after school art club I'm teaching so I started with these fun little exercises.  I think they look pretty awesome and I love how it works to use the fingers of my hand to demonstrate the different textures.