I wanted to give this a shot even though I knew it was a little advanced. I didn't have the right colors or brushes but I like my version. I may do this one again next year to see what progress I've made.

assuming I've made progress haha

I did this one on the quick just playing around. I need to work on drawing and I need smaller brushes. I am happy about getting the color like I wanted though. 

I had a really good time on this one. I have two more paintings to do for the beginning course but wanted to do something fun and christmassy. 

In a couple of weeks I'm heading to visit my dad at his memory care facility. I thought it would be fun to paint something to decorate his room. This turned out really well so I'm glad I did it. 

I never intended to show any of my paintings to anyone especially after that disaster of a painting class at the community center. I put this one out in a couple of FB groups and granted easy audience but the response has been a lot of fun. A couple of people have argued that there is no way I can be a beginner. I should show them that awful apple to prove it. haha

I'm starting to get a little more confident color mixing. I really enjoyed making these trees but I didn't get them spaced out quite right so things are a bit crowded on the right. I've seen these trees in other paintings so it was cool to see how to do them. Once I finish the beginning course, I'm going to hunt down those fan brush videos. 

I'm moving on but I think I'm going to do this one again, maybe some variation anyway.

What I thought was black was a dark umber. It was working with the other paintings but now trying to do rocks, I mean rocks are not brown. I mixed in some purple and got it to work - then I ordered some black paint.

I've been watching videos on color theory. It's far more complex than I'd like it to be but its more science than art. I'm pretty comfortable with science so I have every confidence that I'll figure it out. 

I ran across a video that it way over my head but I needed something to watch while I was on the rowing machine. He talked about how they always tell you not to use black. The one art seminar I went to they said the same thing. It was all about mixing your own black. The woman running my seminar went into how using the paint out of the tube makes you look like an amateur. It seemed like an odd thing to say to someone who has never done any painting before. I have been having a lot of fun mixing the colors and getting what I want. I don't see any reason not to start with say a green tube and then mixing a bit from there. I haven't really explored the other colors in my kit yet. I was going to get to that when I get through these beginning paintings. 

In the video the guy mixed black and yellow and ended up with green. He was illustrating why it doesn't always work to use black to darken a color. I'm unclear what sorcery is at play here but I'm going with it being akin to a hidden pigment. 

Its the day after Thanksgiving. We're just taking a low key day so I took my time with this one. 

I watched the entire video ahead of time. 

I watched the segment before I did that step.

I spent the time getting the colors like I wanted and worked up the composition. It's still rough in spots but if I keep working at it I'll get better. 

I need to rethink my setup. I wanted to start this with what I had on hand and not spend any more money on this until I decided if I was going to like it. I paid a guy $100 for this whole set of paints because he wanted to go back to oils. Eventually, I'll see what else I have but it's working for now. I do want to get a primary red so I can make orange or maybe just buy orange. 

Since I'm just using a desk to paint, there was an incident when I had yellow paint on the finger I used to steady my canvas. I looked at easels, got overwhelmed, and tabled the idea for now.

I did order a wet palette. I'm really taking my time between steps and that's working nicely but it also means that I have to remix everything since my palette keeps drying out. As much as I need the practice mixing colors, I am burning through paint at an alarming rate. 

Took a break from the march through the beginning acrylic course and painted this little tree. I'm thinking about hanging it up in my dad's room - maybe 

I thought this would be a good one to do because the color mixes don't look too complex. 

It was fun to do the toothbrush trick for the snow. I didn't have all the right tools from the video but it was fun and I think I made it work. 

AFTER I did this painting and got crazy frustrated, I went back over the color mixing video with my colorsaurous wheel in my hand and a lot more of it is making sense. 

Big Takeaway - I was not able to get a good orange, it kept coming out more Texas orange and I was going for Clemson orange. NOW I know that my red has a blue bias so no amount of yellow was going to make that happen. 

I need a new strategy. I am trying to do too much at once, getting impatient and not getting the results I want. 

I'm going to start watching the entire video before I do a painting. Then instead of trying to do a whole painting in one sitting, break it up. When I get tired things go wrong. 

I may do this one again, I can't decide if I should redo it or forge ahead. I don't want to get stuck and lose interest but at the same time I think I could do this one better.