MHBD's Fake Journal Day 7

It feels like this Fake Journal has taken over my life! Although it takes me no more than half an hour a day to paint and write it. And a few minutes to blog and spread to Facebook, Google+, Twitter and Pinterest!But it occupies a lot of my mind. I feel I can't settle to anything until I have done it. Which means it gets done. Other things just have to wait. Finding a subject to draw/paint is the hardest bit. Maybe, like today, I should just go with something that picks up a colour from the background?

If you think you've seen this vase before, it's because you have. I used it for a Sketchbook Skool assignment. And I will paint it again, no doubt, now that I'm no longer scared of it.

Here are the colours of the day

And the link to the full journal page.

Tree - Deer Park

Another inspirational tree, this time in Deer Park:

MHBD's Fake Journal. Day 6

Here is the link to the page on my Fake Journal blog.

And a little teaser picture (blue background not so easy as a red background, surprisingly):

Bushy Park

The weather last week was much better than forecast (Eat humble pie, Evelyn, there was no rain on the parade). Good for doggie walks. Good for me. Although I like walking in the rain.

Bushy Park is ideal for us during weekends and holidays - we can be there in 10-15 minutes max. Different matter during school term, when we stay closer to home. And because it's a Dublin city park (as opposed to a Dun Laoghaire Rathdown park), dogs are allowed off the leash until 11 am. Whether the runners and other park users like it or not.

At this time of the year, a lot of the trees are still bare, but over the past week or two, we've already seen a lot of green popping out. Plenty of painting inspiration about!

This tree is one of my favourites:

So are these ones:

Killiney beach

Easter Monday, the tides and weather were favourable and we went for a lovely walk on Killiney beach. Timber had a great time. So did I. So lucky to have the sea so close to us (about 15 minutes on the motorway)

MHBD's Fake Journal - Day 5

Link to the latest instalment.

No favourite colour today, as I drew with the Pentel brush pen over red acrylic.

Poem by Rose Milligan

And calendar of vegetables in season in Ireland from Bord Bia

MHBD's Fake Journal - Day 4

Today's Fake Journal Entry

I forgot to do my colour swatches. I don't think they would have been as vibrant as the sketch itself anyway. I'm still sticking to my goal - PITT pen + gouache (no Pentel brush pen today). But this time, like the last two days, I applied an acrylic paint background before painting the scene. Today's background was red, and I'm amazed at how it enhanced the colours.

I think I will apply more acrylic backgrounds to the next few pages!

Today's entry is an extract from a poem, Raised Bog, by Cathy Leonard.

My centre is not bottomless as you supposed.

And soon I will no longer surprise you

with my treasure trove, my black butter,

my bog men, my great Irish elk-

Your history and mine.

Advantageous

Another movie review. Another movie on Netflix (we'll never need to go out ever again). Based on the photo on the Netflix site, I thought Advantageous was going to be a Korean science fiction movie, Blade Runner style. But it's not. OK, it's set in a dystopian near-future. It's set in New York, where Central Park still exists, but all the high-rises are a lot taller, terrorist attacks seems to be a daily occurrence, competition for good schools is fierce, and there are not that many men around. But women still love their children, and would do anything for them. Not everything is explained, nor does it need to be. Days later, the story is still staying with me. My kind of movie.

MHBD's fake journal - Days 2&3

Of course, now that it's probably started, I'm suffering from writer's block! Or I'm finding myself too busy to draw anything worthwhile. But I took a deep breath and drew something anyway. Thankfully, I had prepared three pages with coloured backgrounds - I just applied Montana acrylics (if you are into journaling but haven't come across Montana acrylics markers, I highly recommend you try them - they are great for making a page pop), so a simple line drawing was all that was needed. I haven't tried applying gouache on top of a Montana acrylic background yet, but according to Roz Stendahl, it works really well. Maybe I'll try that tomorrow.

So, here are the links to Day 2 and Day 3.

And for those of you who are not interested in the fake journaling aspect, here are the two drawings I did in the last two days:

Still Alice

Don't watch this movie if you don't want to cry. Basically Alice (Julianne Moore), 50, is a talented linguistics professor, married to a professional man (one of the Baldwin brothers - I can't tell them apart), with three grown-up children. But she discovers she has early-onset Alzeihmer's.

Still Alice tells us how she copes, how they all cope. Until they can't cope any more. Beautiful.

(Available on Netflix by the way)

MHBD's Fake Journal 2016

Here is the link to Day 1 of MHBD's Fake Journal!

And here the gouache sketch and colour swatches:

Dark Skies - detail

Another alternative would be to crop lots of small abstract pieces out of it and get them all framed. Framing costs would be high though, relative to the size of the painting.

Or get a really really large brush and paint proper abstract watercolours! There's an idea!

MHBD's Fake Journal

We're getting close to the official start date of International Fake Journal Month!

And I'm probably running out of steam already. But let's see if I can stick at it for the full month - no cheating, no bowing out. I have too many ideas flowing through my head, like clouds (literally). And let's try and refocus on my art goals for this - so far, I've managed to stick to my limited tools rule (a self-imposed rule). Maybe that's the only goal I'll need. Maybe next year, I'll just paint clouds, or the sea, or faces, or trees, or Timber, or Willow. See, see, it's happening already, my mind is going in all sorts of directions.

So, deep breath, one goal: journal every day (almost) in the same sketchbook (Strathmore Sketchbook 300 series, 9"x12" (that's about 23cmx30cm for you and me), using only 2 pens (PITT artist sepia fine, Pentel brush pen) and my basic set of gouaches. That's it. I can choose any subject I like as long as I stick to this goal.

Does that qualify as a SMART goal, I wonder? It's a long time since I went on corporate training courses, so let me dig up what this acronym stands for:

• Specific: yes, I think it's specific, see paragraph above
• Measurable: I can count the pages at the end
• Attainable: it's not over-ambitious, and yes, I think I can do this without spending more than half an hour every day
• Relevant: well, it's about drawing every day and developing my skills, so yes, I guess it's relevant
• Time-bound: one month

There you go, my manager would be proud of me!

And remember, the story is secondary - according to Roz Stendhal anyway, who created this whole IFJM idea. I don't have much of a story, but I'm very fond of my character, Odile, already!

Anyways, here is the link to today's fake journal!

And the colour patch of the day. I particularly like the 5 colours on the left

Dark Skies - Abstract - work in progress

I am someone who can't help jumping around - media, subject matter, style - I can't decide whether I want to draw, or paint watercolours, acrylics, use gouache, pencils, fountain pens, brush pens, bring sketchbooks on urban sketching trips, draw portraits, paint abstract, do monoprints, art journals, self portraits, ...

So it's strange how I can also develop the same idea over a long period of time: sunflowers, roses, dark skies, to name just a few of the more recent ones.

This is where this painting in progress comes in - I felt I wasn't done yet with my dark skies. But I wanted to explore something abstract in watercolours.  But of course, now I'm stuck. I really don't know where to go with this. When I start a painting, I don't see in my mind's eye how it's going to look when it's finished. It's only when I put paint on paper that the idea develops. Which makes sense to me : there is no point in having all these wonderful ideas in my head if I don't have the skill or knowhow to translate them to paint. 

So what I'm going to need to do now is use Photoshop and try out a few options for lampposts (or trees, or something else). 

But I want to hold onto the abstract feel.  

I could also crop it into a square shape and make it more abstract, less landscape. All ideas welcome!

Daffodils

There were daffodils for sale in the shops in mid-February, and they are still going strong now! Too late in the season to paint them now, probably. But I do love their shapes and the feeling of joy they bring to my heart.

MHBD's Fake Journal

Link to the full journal page.

Portrait done in gouache, from photograph, with no preliminary drawing. In hindsight, I should have done an oval and horizontal line with eyes and vertical line for nose and mouth. It would have helped achieve a better likeness. But I really like how the shadows and highlights worked out. And it was so much fun sculpting a face out of a pink blob!

M50 & M1 sketches

A few sketches while a passenger driving up on the M50 and M1. I love doing these kinds of sketches. No time and no pressure! I've only ever developed one such sketch into a full watercolour painting, but it's one of my favourites. Plus it passes the time in the car.

MHBD's Fake Journal - Still in the prologue!

Click on this link for the full story

And for those of you who don't want to click, here are the yummy colours of the day:

And another attempt at painting soda bread, this time in red watersoluble ink and watercolour:

With lampposts

I painted the lampposts using my new technique, and I'm happy to report that I didn't ruin either of my paintings!

In this one, I decided to reduce the number of lampposts, as it's a relatively small painting (about A4). I think it's my most successful sky. 

This one is about double the size, so I painted all the posts. I also darkened some of he bushes and added a few shadows on the grass. I love the sky in this one - although it probably is not very realistic. 

Am I ready to move on to something else? Not quite yet, I'm afraid.

After the Quake

I finished reading After the Quake a couple of months ago. Beautifully crafted short stories set in Japan after the Kobe earthquake. Stories not necessarily directly related to the earthquake. Stories about loneliness, fitting in, fear, hatred, and some stories plainly and simply weird. In my opinion, this is not quite Murakami at his best - for me that would be 1Q84. But still, stories that take you in and spit you out when you least expect it.

MHBD's Fake Journal

Here is the link to today's Fake Journal.


And for those of you not interested in the text, but only the pictures (although I would encourage you to read the text too):

MHBD's Fake Blog

Still at the prologue!

And here is the drawing I was planning to include, but the version I did for the Fake Journal did not work out at all. Lesson? Measure Measure Measure!

The Husband's Secret

I finished reading The Husband's Secret a couple of weeks ago. I don't read as many books as I used to. Social media distractions are to blame, I'd say. But once I started this book, I could not put it down. It's the story of perfect lives shattered by a dark secret from the past. What would you do if you found a letter your husband wrote that says "do not open until I've died"? Would you be able to resist? What would go through your head? Would you talk to him about it? Would you even hesitate for one moment? What would you do with the knowledge of what that letter says? And what would you do if your husband and your cousin, who is also your best friend, told you that they are in love, that they haven't had sex yet, and that they'd like to live in the house with you and your child? And what would you do if you thought .... ?

That's it, I'll say no more. My lips are sealed.

Lough Bray Lower - Photographs

A few shots from our outing in the Dublin Mountains last week. Who would think we have such beauty and wilderness only 20 minutes away from home? The fact that the sun was shining was pure bonus. The greyness never lifted in our area that day.

Urban Dictionary: mhbd

Urban Dictionary: mhbd:

"MHBD: An acronym, usually concocted with the sole purpose of confusing somebody. doesn't actually stand for anything."

Straight lines in watercolour

I'm working on the final details of my two dark skies watercolours. I've been experimenting with how to paint the lampposts which are part of the landscape. In my previous attempts, I actually drew them with a waterproof marker. But this time, my plan is to paint them with a fine brush, so they are better integrated in the overall look. After a few freehand failures, I found a tip in Artists and Illustrators magazine on how to hold a ruler so that you can paint a straight line without smudging watercolour over the paper. The trick is to hold the ruler steadily with one hand, but to hold it at about a 45-degree angle, and to lean the metal part of the brush against the ruler. I found that drawing from the bottom up worked better for me. Very important is to do a few trials on a paper similar to that of the painting - no point in trying it out on smooth paper if the painting is on rough paper.

Next Episode from MHBD's Fake Blog

Link here.

And a preliminary sketch

This is how we deal with tragedy in Belgium

Picture from Les Grignoux's Facebook page

Sad day for Belgium. Sad day for the world

Next Episode from MHBD's Fake Journal

Click here for the full story.

Or just enjoy the colour scheme!