Moonlight

Moonlight, a photo by teshionx on Flickr.

Tomorrow is a Full Moon night..

Last month, on full moon, the view from my window was so pretty, I had to capture it in my journal.

A month now and the tree doesn't have a single leaf on it! I think it will look spooky with just those dry branches reaching into the moon's aura!

Buddy's Pizza

Buddy's, a photo by teshionx on Flickr.

To continue with my Library Sketch, I had stepped out packing in all my plein air gear to go to the library, but didn't find the sunlight and the shadows.. The colors around don't seem the same on a cloudy day.. They look even more muted on a rainy day!

So last week, I headed to Buddy's Pizza instead, since I had been attracted by how the light on the sign shines in a gloomy day.

I have, for some time been trying to understand how you can reproduce the light effect of a neon sign; on a sunny day, the light hardly ever catches your eye!

Very recently, I had the chance of reading James Gurney's "Color and Light: A Guide for the Realist Painter", and that's where I discovered how you can show that. So I just went ahead and sketched this one. I think the book should be put in the artists painter's list of essentials.

After painting it all, I took a photograph of the building from my car so that I could see what was different about the sign in the photograph versus what I painted.. I feel the sign came out better in the snap than the sketch though... 

Too bad, I composed the sketch wrongly. And the camera doesn't do much justice to the colors either!
Next time, I'll just draw the lights close up, rather than the entire building...!

Plein air painting at the Library

Plein air painting at the Library, a photo by teshionx on Flickr.

The Auburn Hills Library is a beautiful building .. I have kind of always wanted to paint it, photograph it or something.. This is a plein air painting study of the library that I plan to work on over 3 sittings of about an hour or so.. That is all that I can afford at one time..

So yesterday, after dropping Tanush off to his pre-school, I drove down to the library and parked near the spot where I had parked last week to draw the pencil sketch of the building. I didn't get the same spot, but got space 3 spots away. That was ok.

I painted for 2 hours..

Then I was so hungry that I had to drive back home, only to be reminded that I had cooked nothing! So I cooked up a quick oatmeal with fruits and nuts for lunch.. I wasn't very pleased with it though, especially with wanting to eat nothing sweet.. I still have this weird taste in my mouth from the cold and sore throat that I had last entire week. But thank God for the good nutritious food..!

I just hope tomorrow I get the same parking spot as I did last week..