30 Day Watercolor Challenge.....embarrassed but posting anyway.
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I did a flower and didn't really care for it. The I got the idea that maybe I could try to copy a master, Lee White, Ha! That didn't work out very well either! I couldn't spend hours on it or it might have been a lot better but, I am posting my embarrassing work anyway. I hope I improve after 30 days!!!!
Here's Lees beautiful illustration: https://www.leewhiteillustration.com/work/copy-of-follow-the-light-1
How does he get those colors and make it glow!
Marsha Ottum Owen
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@Marsha-Kay-Ottum-Owen he uses Acrylic ink in a wet on wet technique. In his video about how to get a good glow he shows the steps. Go out an buy some acrylic ink and try it for yourself. It dries with a glaze, and gives a nice look.
These are pretty good. My suggestion is to be a little more free with you line work. Look at someone like Quenting Blake and Lee White's ink techniques. Quenting Blake referes to his ink technique as free-willing technique. It is someone the idea that the lines don't tell you much about the forms, but the color and texture does.
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@Eric-Castleman close, but this one is regular watercolor, not acrylic ink.
We are finally able to start on our "basics" series of videos and mine will be watercolor (hoping to start releasing these this summer). I'll be going over all kinds of things that affect how your image looks. The main thing is actually the paper you use. Some papers are more absorbent than others and this has a HUGE affect on the outcome.
For lots of texture and brighter colors, you need a paper that is not very absorbing. Or, you can add things to the paper to reduce the absorbency. In this case, I took regular arches cold press paper and added gum arabic to the surface before painting. Lots of small steps can make big differences in the final work.
SVS Faculty Instructor
www.leewhiteillustration.com -
@Lee-White why would different techniques be used to get a glow effect when the acrylic ink technique seems to be a sure fire way to pull it off every time? I'm guessing that it has to do with texture consistency throughout the piece, and maybe the acrylic gives a different effect than what you want in certain cases.
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@Eric-Castleman It just depends on the look you want and what paper you are working on, etc. The acrylic technique will work most of the time, but since the paper was coated with gum arabic, the paint will literally come right off the surface if you even touch it with a brush or your hand. So it's extremely delicate. So I used an airbrush technique to add the glow because of that.
SVS Faculty Instructor
www.leewhiteillustration.com -
@Lee-White Wow! So much to learn! I'll look forward to your classes. I have never heard of the gum arabic coating before. I'm actually signed up at the local CC for a water color class this fall (need to get out of the house a bitn
) I am on the intermediate level there but haven't taken the classes for a couple of uears due to grandbaby duty. I have some time now becuse my grandson and daughter moved so....I am trying to get back int the swing of things. I don't know that it will be as advanced as your techniques yet..... -
@Eric-Castleman Thanks for your input, Eric. I have never tried the acrylic inks yet. I know my line work isn't very free and or accurate. I really have to rush these because I don't have enough time everyday to do a really finished piece for this challenge as I have several other projects going. I could have spent a couple of days and done better
I really look forward to trying some more techniques and I do need to be freer, I'm sure. I feel like I do better when I am just playing around sometimes. It's also challenging to be free when doing a series of pictures for a book, for me. It takes me a long time to figure out, for instance, how to draw a cow and then to try and put it in different positions and be consistent with the other pages, etc. I am making progress though, The last little book I chose to do because I could not even fathom how to lay out the one I am doing now. I pushed through that one and now, I have accomplished laying out this second one, but not without challenges. It's not perfect but I am happy to have made it this far! I have a few more on the docket. It's hard work. I want to finish my current book this year. I might have to just do the best I can for now and then try to do better on the next one. These are pretty much for my learning and for friends and relatives at this point. I have gained so much from this forum and the comments I get, even though I feel that others are so much better than I am. Well, that was a page full! Sorry about that. Thank you so much for your input and support! -
did u Plagiarize the first 1 ?????
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@linhb yes. But I did a poor job of it
I gave credit to Lee White as the illustrator I copied. I think I included a link to his site too....so, not really plagiarizing Copying a master...
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wait so its ok if u copy others's works ??????? i have no idea just google, and oh ppl do master study :D. In my school it's strictkly forbidden. And the instructors say: if u copy the designs of the others u get nothing
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@linhb Well, it's just for practice. I'm not trying to make money with it or take credit for it so, it's not really plagiarizing. Plagiarizing, for real, is NOT okay.
plaΒ·giaΒ·rize
ΛplΔjΙΛrΔ«z/Submit
verb
take (the work or an idea of someone else) and pass it off as one's own.
synonyms: copy, infringe the copyright of, pirate, steal, poach, appropriate; More
copy from (someone) and pass it off as one's own. -
so its ok to do master "study" ? i searched google and alot of ppl do it so confuse @.@ can some instructors explain plz
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Marsha is not trying to steal anything she is not going to sell it and she has credited the original artist,plus it is right here in Lee Whites own website so she is not trying to hide it, if he was offended he could let her know.The old masters in the past ran schools were students would do nothing but copy the Masters paintings to gain experience.
In your college of course you should not copy another persons design in your exams or work, but if you were at home doing some drawing for yourself it would be ok. You cannot copy images of google and sell because of copyright law,but you could use the images for pratice. Hope this helps. -
@Marsha-Kay-Ottum-Owen Good for you doing the 30 day watercolour challenge I would love to do this but unfortunately it would take me 30 days to do one
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Copying masters openly and not trying to sell it is a fine way to learn. Cheers!:)
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@linhb Copying other artist's work is one of the most powerful learning experiences there is. Obviously you should never claim that they are yours or publish them in any form unless you explicitly mention the original artist and the fact that it is a copy for training purposes. The practice of copying other artists' work is widely encouraged - in my art school we had nearly weekly assignments around doing copies or derivative work (aka, "in the style of x"). Jake Parker dedicated a very extensive post to this topic, suggesting to make hundreds of copies as a way of improving your work and developing your own style.
In old atelier schools, copying masters was all that was done for a couple of years at least. The Louvre museum used to have a dedicated day for students to come in so that they could set up easels in front of famous masterpieces to copy them.
I have done hundreds of copies myself - from simple sketches to full-fledged paintings. Every single one has taught me something invaluable that I could apply to my work.
Nowadays, I try to do at least 10 sketched copies a week - more if I can find the time. I never post them or publish them and I have a separate sketchbook for them - this activity is perfectly legitimate and I doubt you will find any established artist who has not invested a lot of time copying other artists.
To parallel with music, you cannot learn to compose your own music unless you spend years studying and playing the music that others have composed... -
@linhb I hate to say it, but I think your instructors are doing you a great disservice by not wanting you to copy other peoples work to learn from them. You are NOT copying them to take credit for their work. You are learning technique. And by copying people who are better than you, you get a direct link into how they mix colors, how they treat edges, how they draw, how they compose.
Here's an analogy to consider: If you wanted to be a great classical musician, don't you think it would be weird not to study Mozart and Beethoven? If you wanted to be a black belt in karate, don't you think it would be strange not to study Bruce Lee and the other masters of the art? Only in visual arts do people say you should only do what YOU want to do and not learn from the masters. Its sort of bizarre and really holds people back from their true potential.
In the past, artists took on many apprentices and those apprentices would do study after study of the master until they were ready to break out on their own. It was a great system and the best part is that it worked quite well. Much better than now where colleges send confused students off on their own without any idea of what they are doing and tell them to come up with something great from scratch with no history and understanding of what came before it. Going back to the music analogy, can you imagine if you couldn't play the piano yet, but a teacher wanted you to compose your own song? That is exactly what artists are being asked to do.
Now, with enough copies under your belt and sufficient technique training you SHOULD go out on your own and figure out how you want your work to look. The copies are just part of the process and shouldn't be confused wth being the end. Stand on the shoulders of people better than you and your skill will accelerate at a much faster level than you ever thought possible.
In short, your instructors are dead wrong here. This isn't an opinion, this is fact. Copying masters has worked for hundreds of years and in all different art forms. You should take a good hard look at the school philosophy. If your teachers want to discuss this, give them my email address at lee@svslearn.com
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First of all thank you guys and mr.White all for spent time to explain, it mean alot to me , and i mean it. Everything make sense. well... when we do a project always have to have real life refs and stylize refs, stylize refs for whatever style we want. for example if we do a anthropomorphic project we can have zootopia,kung-fu panda as refs for styles. So basically we still learning styles from the masters we like
Second of all, my instructors said : " dont copy them, you will get nothing". now after read explainations of Mr.White and u guys i understand the acctual meaning of that sentence. They mean: dont copy them and hand it to me :D, copy masters just baby steps and the students should do it on their own or smth like thatTo sum up, im so shame
:-< and Marsha Owen plz take my apology. I always observe master's works and ask myself why they draw like this why they push this thing in here and that thing way over there...(try to understand). i have my own process for doing designs: planning, observe, understand and execution. sometimes i have hard time to understand....Maybe i should copy master's works after observe them so i can understand more -
@linhb You don't need to aplologize to me! I was never offended. I thought that you might not understand the real meaning of plagiarizing and so I tried to explain it. It's always good to ask questions! I'm glad you were able to understand with the help of Lee White and the others on this forum. Have a wonderful day!
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haha copy kind of fun tho
btw i cant figure it out why a robot needs a blanket tho
wanna buy little bot and sparrow book to find out the reason behind that tho so curious
