Painted Michael Jackson Turned Digital Art

Sometimes I like to paint...and sometimes I like to turn my paintings into digital art. That's how I was feeling today as I was going through some photos of my artwork. This one is classic Michael Jackson.

Smooth Criminal is one of my all time favorite MJ songs. MJ has appeared in several artworks I've created over the years. It's fun to revisit past works and see what I can do to make them new and unique. I really love how this one turned out. 

MJ Forever!

Green Leaves Negative Painting

Here is another negative painting I finished last weekend in watercolors. This was actually the first one I did. I wanted to keep it very simple and mostly monochromatic.

This one has mostly green watercolors, but a bit of yellow too. You could do this type of negative painting with almost any shape, but simple shapes like this are a great place to start if you've not done negative painting before. Next time, I think I'll do something a little more detailed, but I do like how this one turned out.

Moody Blue Trees Negative Painting

 I've been trying to get back into a watercolor groove since I'm returning to teaching High School Art this year and I'll be doing watercolors in my painting classes. I found some great watercolor artists on Instagram to follow, and several of them do this technique called Negative Painting. I'd never tried it before so I thought I'd give it a whirl. 

These are my Moody Blue Trees I did last weekend. I really like this technique. You paint the lightest values first, and then add subsequent layers getting darker each time. For a landscape scene like this, it would actually be lighter in the distance. But sometimes in art you just have to break the rules. I enjoyed painting in a new way. I hope my students will enjoy it too. I think it will be a good way for them to understand negative space and value--and painting a monochromatic scene. I think I'll be using this technique in the future too.

Folk Art Flowers

 I was finally able to get in the studio to finish my latest flower painting. Since I'm working on a move from teaching elementary art & technology to High School Art, I've been rather busy working on plans for that. So it was nice to take some studio days to just paint!

I'm calling this Folk Art Flowers. It's a similar style to a painting I did a couple of years ago that I just called Happy Flowers. I really enjoyed painting that one, so I thought it would be fun to paint another one in a similar style. I wanted to have a yellow rose as the focal point for this one though...and make it a little less busy in the background. This is done all in acrylics.

I'm always happy when I'm painting flowers. :)

Highland Cow

 Ok, so I may be just a wee bit obsessed with all things Scotland. It's my dream to go to Scotland one day. And I absolutely adore Highland Cows, also known as Highland Coos. So, I decided that it was high time I painted one. 

This is all done in acrylics. I hadn't painted an animal in such a long time, so I wasn't sure I'd like how my coo turned out. But I actually love it. And since I don't think I'll be getting to Scotland anytime soon, at least I have this gal to look at for awhile. 

Michael Jackson Vector Drawing

I've been wanting to try my hand at vector drawing using Google Drawing. Since I have my students use Google Drawing once in awhile, I'm always on the hunt for other things I can do with it. I got some inspiration on Instagram and thought I'd try my hand at it myself. And since Michael Jackson is always creative inspiration for me, I thought I'd use him as my muse once again.

It's really quite cool--all the things you can do in Google Drawing. I'm really trying to come up with as many different creative projects with it as I can. My first love will always be painting, but digital art will always be one of my passions too. So it's fun to play around with it. And who doesn't love Bad era Michael Jackson? I don't think it's too bad for a first try. But I think I'll be trying some other vector drawings too so that I can keep honing my skills.

Self Portrait - Tim Burton Style

I recently had my 5th and 6th grade students create self portraits. But not realistic self portraits...no, they created self portraits in the style of Tim Burton. I had not done any kind of portraits with them before and I wasn't really sure what to expect. We did some practice drawings first, to learn about proper facial proportions. I wanted to give them a chance to learn the basics and feel successful before starting on the actual project. 

The goal of the final project was to imagine what they would like like if they became a Tim Burton character. They could only use black and white colored pencils to create their projects; they also had to use correct facial proportions, and some shading here and there. They really blew me away with the self portraits they created. I hung up every one of them in the hall so that the whole school could enjoy them. We got so many compliments on them! So, I thought I'd share a few of my favorites with you. And I enjoyed this project so much that I created my own self-portrait too.

My Self Portrait

Student Work

Drawing portraits can be a real challenge at any age. So I'm really proud of the work the kids put into these drawings. They were so engaged in this project, and it was great to see. 

If you enjoy Tim Burton's style, I encourage you to create one of these too! And if you're an Art teacher, I absolutely recommend this project.

Who is Steph Curry?

I have an amazingly creative granddaughter. She is my favorite partner in art and all things crafty. She even has her own art table in my studio so that she can create whenever she's at my house. Awhile back, she asked me to create a drawing for her of Steph Curry. My response: "Who is Steph Curry?" The look on her face was priceless as she said, "Seriously, grandma?" Then she proceeded to school me on all things Steph Curry and convinced me to create this drawing for her. I was having blog issues, so I never posted it. 

This is all just simple black Sharpie. I swear, I should own stock in the company that makes Sharpies. I go through so many of them, at home and at school. At any rate, I wasn't sure if she'd like it, but she definitely did. And even though I'll probably not be drawing an athlete again any time in the near future, at least I know a little more than I did before about this particular basketball star.

Art Journal Colorful Tree

 I tend to be drawn to trees quite often in my artwork. I've painted and drawn trees many times over the years, and when possible, I like to have my students create trees too. There are just so many things you can do creatively with a tree. This one went into my art journal recently. 

I really like the contrast between the simple, black and white tree, and the rainbow colored dots surrounding it in the negative space. Just goes to show you, even the simplest things can come alive with a little color.