QT – Doodling and Noodling

I remember giving up a while back hoping the next upgrade of Corel Painter would fix the problem I had and it didn’t. I finally finished the image (maybe need to do a few touchups for blending).

I’m posting the high resolution one here.

This is the original:

John Singer Sargent

Here is my study, in High Res.

In a Garden: Corfu - Master Copy

This definitely was about 90 hours or more of work. This was due to the fact Corel Painter has a nasty bug I’ve seen in at least 3 versions.  I often had to go back and rework areas because Painter will quit on you. I did save as frequently as possible though when it will crash was never a certainty.

I really learned a lot with this picture. The goal was to learn about the Sargent Brush in Painter as well as how he did his colors. I spot checked with a picker to see how close or far I was, but I never directly color picked from the source. In some cases, due to the reproduction, I think it would have been worse.  I’m so worn out and will tweak parts of this later. I know I’m definitely spotting the local color now. He definitely had a good eye and knew how to handle color temperatures.

Sargent is definitely a master. If you’re interested in seeing more of his works visit http://jssgallery.org/Thumbnails/Sargent_Paintings_Index.htm

Anders Zorn is another favorite I may try painting sometime.

I definitely need to give thanks to Jason Manley for his color theory workshop and his help in pushing me in the right direction for this picture. I hope I did it justice!

The earlier John Singer Sargent piece I’m studying was very washed out.  I hadn’t opened the file in a while because I was tired of Painter crashing on me. What I realized is that the picture I was working on wasn’t as messed up as I thought. I realized I hadn’t set the color management settings properly.

So this is my study so far (still working on it) with color management set on – the right shows how bad it looked because I had it off.

I also learned if I am to use the Sargent brush, make sure I have blocks of background color painted in first. It appears the Sargent brush treats the canvas as a background color and diluted my colors by adding in white.

I’ve been trying to do some exercises in Painter while my hand heals. It had been getting better but recently when I wake up my arm has been tingling on that entire side again.

I got this book from Don Seegmiller and ended up getting his second book on Painter because it was very helpful. I think books are my sex. I have way too many of them. I may as well use them to learn.

Tree Study from Don Seegmiller

Sappy isn’t it? This book is no longer in print but you can look for some used copies: http://www.charlesriver.com/Books/BookDetail.aspx?productID=18873 His brushes are on that page as well a sample chapter. He does have a new book out called Advanced Painter techniques, but this older book has a lot of movies he saved which I find very valuable.

Been so tired. I probably won’t be able to finish my plate of commissions if this injury keeps up till the end of the year. I thought it would have healed by now.