SKETCHBOOK ENTRIES - LITTLE SHELL IN MY COLLECTION

 

YELLOW SPOTTED SALAMANDER

 Saw this beauty in a recent Sierra magazine and had to try to paint it.  The yellow spotted salamander is the only vertebrate that uses photosynthesis = when the eggs are placed in an algal pool, the algae that causes photosynthesis gets into the eggs…and into the growing salamanders, who then can use it (in a way) to gain energy from the sun!!  Unfortunately, their yellow spots do not glow in the dark :(. So sad.  

BIRDS

 This lovely bird was painted using a photo taken by Sweetie at a trip to the Cincinnati Zoo.  It is called Lady Ross’ Turaco and that’s all I know about it…

I’m sure it’s not something I’ll see at my feeders!

This info from Wikipedia says…

BIRDS ARE JUST TOO MUCH FUN

 In the new watercolor book, Painting Birds by Sarah Stokes, she reminded me in one lesson, that starting a watercolor painting with watercolor pencils can give a painting a different look.  So I found a few photos Sweetie took in Costa Rica and began with laying down color in watercolor pencil…then blending with clean water.  Two times watercolor pencil and two times water = this.  

BEHIND BUT STILL HERE

 Just a few of the things I’ve been doing since September began…

Bought a new watercolor book by an artists who gives lessons on Domestika.com (I took a few of her classes and she’s good so thought her book would be interesting.). It’s mostly for beginners but…you always learn something every time you go through a book about watercolor.  

And a few of the birds inspired by her work in the book - the white egret is a photo Sweetie took (first version in muted greys, second with egret masked out and bg done first) - but the peacock is from her photo in the book and done my way (she only used 4 colors on her version = Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black).