My Inspirations

I've been painting a year. Through this time I've stumbled across people and equipment that has inspired me. Figured I'd list some links here.

Where I got all my Bob Ross art supplies which I started with. They have great customer service and have always had the lowest prices.
http://www.hofcraft.com/bob-ross-art-supplies.html

My second favorite place to get art supplies. They usually have anything you want, AND they treat their customers very well. They sent me free useful stuff along with my order. I think more companies ought to treat their customers that way.
http://www.jerrysartarama.com/

This guys absolutely awesome, and paints very quickly. He is from australia and has been around since the 70's
http://www.youtube.com/user/speedpaintingdvds?feature=watch

This guy usually has some awesome ideas for paintings that have twists on them.
http://www.youtube.com/user/LoboNWO?feature=watch

Wilson Bickford developed a line of paint brushes that are very innovative. He also offers the same firm style of paints that the Bob Ross line offers, but with the bonus of having a few extra colors. He offers up awesome ideas and is easy to follow.
http://www.youtube.com/user/wilsonbickford?feature=watch

William Alexander was the original TV artist. I like his free, less refined style and enthusiasm. Hard to understand sometimes, but awesome none the less.
http://www.youtube.com/user/AAlexanderArt?feature=watch

One more

Figured I'd try and get one more out. Honestly, I hate this painting. The sky turned out nice, the mountains turned out ok. The rest of it sucked. But it was a good learning experience and it's decent to look at.  I've learned black gesso all the way on the bottom isn't a good thing because there really is no contrast unless you go with lighter colors on the entire thing. So next time instead of filling up the entire bottom half of the canvas I'll only do the very lower half. So putting in a tree line wasn't possible. I like the concept of the river I did, but not the execution. I'll do better next time.

Final Product

Experimentification

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Final Product

Cityscape

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Final Product

Went for something a bit different today. Actually fairly pleased with it. I switched up my signature today. Gonna go with dwinans instead of dw from now on.

The Tree

Ended up over-painting this with more blue to cover up the bright white highlights I'd put on earlier. Gonna leave it like this. We'll give this concept another try at a later time.

Wood Grain

I tried the Wood grain technique today. It didn't work out at first like I'd hoped. But I found an even better way to do it. You literally can't tell the difference. It looks EXACTLY like wood. Even with imperfections. It turned out awesome. Pictures don't do it justice, you really gotta see it for yourself. After actually accenting the slat look I think it'll look even better.

Wilson Bickford

As of late I've been going ape sh$% painting. I've done 9 or 10 this month and its not even half over. I enjoy it quite a bit. I've tried a few new techniques, and have utilized a few new brushes which I've had some great results with. I'm venturing outside the standard Bob Ross way and some things I'm trying are paying off.

While paroozing the interweb tonight I ran into some videos of Wilson Bickford. This guy also does wet on wet. The exciting part? He has a whole line of signature brushes and paints. Excited about the brushes because he incorporates some ideas that I think will help me a lot in my painting. First, non rounded fan brushes. I think that'll make putting in trees quite a bit simpler. He has texture brushes which make creating grass and foilage easier. I'd like to try these out as I've hated my grass and bushes for quite a while now.  Anyways I'm pretty excited.

His paints are designed for the wet on wet technique and really the only reason I'm excited about this is because he has a couple new colors that aren't in the bob ross line. Including some new blues, purple and green.

He also makes a beveled canvas which is absolutely awesome. I'm gonna get a couple and see what we can do.

His stuff is pretty well priced to. Can't wait to try it out!

Different Color Scheme

Went for a different color scheme on this one. Used mostly yellow, red orange and brown.

2 for 1

Final Product

The Bastard Child

I consider this the bastard child of my artwork projects today. It was basically testing the idea of drawing then melting, not bad, but I wasn't a fan of this piece (of sh$%^)

Second Attempt

Got me a heat gun. It does this much faster and a lot less messy, very controlled. I have to admit the hair dryer was quite fun though. Both do the job well.