What the rose looks like now~comissioned art piece.

My brother special requested that I paint him a pink rose for a special friend by April 24th. He wanted it to be partially open and to show part of the stem with an abstract background. I thought it would be fun for him if I post my progress. This way he and she can check out the rose, give me feedback, and know exactly where I am with it. Also, I thought it would be fun for the rest of you to see how an artist goes about the development of an art piece, in this case me as an artist. It is a little risky, because, of course,  it takes awhile before what you are working on looks nice. I can whip out an abstract piece out of my head fairly easily without much planning, but these types of pieces take considerable planning. Here you will see the steps involved.

Step 1: Get a reference point. I found about 20-30 roses that I liked  from the internet. I narrowed it done to five, then  finally settled on this one. I wanted a sweet, tender image.

Special note: I can’t paint realistic pictures from my head. I need a reference point. I may not make it exactly like this, afterall I want the picture to be my own, but it serves as a basis and reference point for how each of the petals are put together, the color variations, etc., so I can be more realistic in my painting. Whoops, I accidentally deleted the original image, but you can see it below in the next step with a  different background.

Step 2: Plan the image, design it, make it my own. I put it on photoshop, changed it a tad, cut it out and put it on my own background.

Step 3: Then I resized it to match my watercolor paper 11 by 14 inches.

Step 4: Drawing the image (not my favorite part).

 Step 5: First coat of paint to get an overall feel for the painting.

I’m not too happy with it just, yet.

I need to add more details, try to make it more luminescent, etc; Balance the color out better as the right side is too reddish compared to the left.

Step 6: Adding some of the finer details like texture, more shading, highlights, contrast, luminosity, etc

March 12, 2010

My brother and the special friend are planning on checking it out tonight, Friday, March 12, 2010. This is what I have so far. Hopefully, you all agree it is getting better and better. After talking to my brother on the phone Wednesday night, he is suggesting some ideas like making the background look like ocean water and adding a heart that says God loves you with God’s hands holding it.

What I thought I would do is is experiment with some of these ideas on photohop first to see how they would look and also to figure out spacing, etc. If it works on photoshop, composition wise, then the next step would be problem-solving how to get it on there, since most of it is already painted. I have some ideas, though, like painting it separately, cutting it out and pasting it on there.

~ I experimented with several different water backgrounds, such as different images of the ocean and water at my brother’s request, but we decided not to go with any of them and stick to the original background.~

 I also need to maybe tweak the rose a little bit, add a few more details, lighten the background, balance the colors more, etc. The rose has tissue paper texture as well.

Step 7:  The rose is complete, pending approval. I tried to make the colors a little more balanced in the final rose. I added more paint practically all over the rose and softened and lightened up the background. Also added some contrast. I made the front petal bend back more and reworked some of the shadows and highlights. I also fixed up the leaves some. My brother and his friend decided they liked it better as it was than by adding all the extra hearts, “I love you’s,”  and water backgrounds. So here is the final rose.

For comparison’s sake here are the working versions and the completed version side by side so you can see the differences between them.

..a rose, such a refreshing image! Spring is on the way! I am excited about Spring!

The rose is now finished! Ta da!