Erik’s 100 Day Challenge: Say More With Less

[erikdennes]

I split the white shapes into 2 groups and brought down the value of all the white shapes above the car. Maybe they need to be a little darker.

[Ian Coltman]

Good play… I think the car is moving to the fore more now.

If you isolated all of your pure black to the shadows caused by the car and brought down the pure black behind the car by 15-20%, you will further pop it into the foreground.

This reminds me of a James Gurney video where he shows a trick for popping a vehicle with a competing background…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmc3vshhBCo

 

I’ll shut up from here on out… can’t wait to see the final piece!

 

 

[erikdennes]

Day 16

I drew a bunch of arrows pointing to the car. I put in the major color notes using a simple palette, ultramarine blue, napthol red, and raw sienna, and I also refined the values a bit.  I think I am ready to start in with oil paints now.

[erikdennes]

Day 17

Started in with oils, putting in details and defining edges. Big thank you to Erik Olson’s And Scott Robertson’s perspective lessons on ellipses. They came in really handy for those wheels.<span style=”-webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0);”> </span>

[Ian Coltman]

Hey Erik… looking great.

I’ve got some digital imaging background and I couldn’t resist sneaking back into your kitchen to quickly cut these vegetables for you.

I hope they provide some useful information on color and contrast choices as you move forward.

Cheers!

[erikdennes]

Day 17

Wow!  Thanks Ian for the work.  That was above and beyond the call of duty.  I will definitely use this info as I continue to render.

I had to do more client work today.  School lobby mural.  I spent a loooong time designing what I have so far and many iterations.  I’m fairly happy with it, but I think the “Jacob” lettering could be better. After I get the shapes worked out, I’ll refine them and then add color.

[erikdennes]

Day 18

Rembrandt study. The variety of marks he makes is just incredible. Up close many of the marks just look like scribbles, but further away  in the context of the marks around them they become very descriptive.

[erikdennes]

Day 19

Started working on the building in oils. In this zone, I wanted to focus on creating subtle temperature variations going from warmer on the left to cooler on the right.  This zone is all very similar in value, so bringing in temperature variation was a good way to create interest without competing with the strong chroma in the car.

[Debbie H]

Hi Erik. You’re doing some really interesting things. I hate to say it, but red is always going to take precedence over blue in a visual hierarchy and yes, the sign is the first thing I look at, not the car. Any way to tone it down further or even make it monochrome so the car becomes the focus? Thanks for your feedback on my feed – that was really helpful.

[Ian Coltman]

Hi Erik,

It’s obvious that you can handle the paint deftly. There are plenty of beautifully painted moments here.

This piece has unique potential to be something special, but I’m in agreement with Deborah that it’s currently suffering from a lack of primary focus.

We can look back 50 years and see how Jasper Johns made profoundly interesting paintings of the otherwise flat American Flag… at around the same time, Andy Warhol demonstrated that if you put a highly recognizable brand logo on a canvas, it will attract as much attention as the Mona Lisa in a gallery room… surely countless other illustrators and painters have paid homage to classic cars in graphically compelling ways.

Why are you trying to do all three of these things equally weighted in this muted Norman Rockwell painterly mode?

The goal of your challenge is to “say more with less”… I suggest that you can walk that walk with more compelling, uniform, and bold color relationships that more effectively identify and simplify the difference between fore, mid, and background.

There is a creative opportunity in the color and contrast of identifiable symbols such as a flag or logo. Everybody knows what the Coke label looks like on a can or a billboard sign… what does it look like fading in blinding/shimmering sunlight while I’m slightly squinting my eyes to see my beloved vehicle in perfect clarity? Could you answer that question in a way that directs attention toward the car rather than away from it?

I disagree with the notion that muting even more color out of this will lead to a more interesting or exciting painting. I’m convinced that you can still win big with this piece through uniform complementary color statements set boldly against a well saturated and higher contrast blue car. The neutral blue you currently have in play would pop better if deliberately complemented with a tonal variant of gold/orange than set by default against the Coke red.

Also, several high-contrast areas of deep black in your mid ground are causing depth confusion with your intended primary subject… you may be reading them loyally from a photo reference, but you have a more interesting design problem to solve, a license in your pocket, and a skilled hand to hold the wheel.

 

 

 

[erikdennes]

Day 20

Let me start off by saying how much I appreciate the valuable feedback I am getting.  It really means a lot to me to get your very thoughtful comments.  They have definitely helped me to develop this piece better and gave me ideas that I probably wouldn’t have thought of on my own.

I knew as soon as I painted the flag that it stunk and was going to have to be redone, but I had painted enough yesterday and it was time to quit. I redid it and changed the shape, contrast, chroma, and value, blending it more into the background.

I opted not to go with a more bold color statement, because, while I am a big fan of the orange-blue complementary color scheme, I wasn’t getting the orange-blue vibe with this piece and I wanted to convey more of the feeling of summers in rural Kentucky.   I went with a little more realistic colors especially in the background to give it that feel.  This store sits on a bluff overlooking the Ohio river and is on an old historic road between Louisville and Cincinnati.

I asked the client if he thought the sign was too red and he said that it was part of the reason why he took the photo in the first place because in real life the sign is VERY bright. The client is always right, so I decided to leave the sign unchanged.

In yesterday’s photo, the colors in the car do look a little grayed, but they are straight ultramarine blue mixed with white.  Today’s photo I took under skylights to try and bring out the chroma of the blue more in the photo.  I worked on the details in the car and some of the reflections, and put another layer of ultramarine on to bring out the chroma even more.  The car has high chroma, high contrast, high detail.  Even though the red sign is pretty bright, I did knock it down quite a bit, but still giving that feeling that it is a really bright sign.

I like the way the car is framed by the red of the sign, the red pavement and red flag.  I also like the hue variety I was able to get within the store and still make it hold together.

Thanks again for the very well thought out comments.  Please let me know what you think of this version, if you care to.

[Ian Coltman]

Hey Erik… thanks for the open mind… I was on a bit of a bender last night, so apologies if my crit came off as salty.

I understand your inclination to fall in line with your client’s desires… but perhaps there is a way to make the sign read even more dramatically as red without competing with the scale and color of your car. Ultimately, this may be the difference between getting photocopy commissions or art commissions.

I notice and appreciate your introduction of graduated warm to cool relationships. These can effectively homogenize the scale of some of your competing elements. The red of the sign is starting to recede as warmer colors are introduced around the periphery. I still think that the way the red color inhabits the proportions of the sign puts it in direct competition with the car – it seems to be partially a scale issue.

So breaking the red shape up through interference is a viable strategy that I think you should double-down on heavily.

Below are a few additional ideas for you…

-Introduction of a cooler shaded area under the eaves with shapes designed to direct the eye to the car.

-Heavier use of gradient to diffuse proportion of competing elements

-Reduction of heavy background tone to create greater breathing room

-Introduction of directional blurring to soften competing elements and direct the eye towards the car

-More emphatic use of color to match spirit of the vehicle

As you might guess, I prefer the top right solution… but I encourage you to consider aspects of all of the options presented here as your strategy evolves.

Interested to see the next iteration!

[erikdennes]

Day 21

Ian – The red trees with the more neutral pavement is starting to grow on me.  Thanks again for the very thoughtful comments and the new images.  I will take everything into consideration as I move forward.

Didn’t have time for much drawing today.  Worked on Bill Perkin’s costume figure course. Did a 30 minute warm up of Missouri Gov. Mike Parson as a baboon after his horrible comments about kids getting corona virus.  My heart goes out to all of the educators in Florida, Missouri and elsewhere where the government is trying to force them to reopen with unsafe conditions.  The decision is hard enough to make without people threatening to pull your funding.  Did 4 or 5 10 minute sketches.  Here is a sample.

[erikdennes]

Day 22

Worked on client work today.  This is a black and white drawing for a mural to be painted in one of our high schools.  I started this a few months ago, and then the corona virus hit.  The wall is by the social studies class rooms and the social studies department head wanted “a visual history of marches on Washington.”  The wall is about 10′ x 40′ so it is absolutely huge.  Some of my design goals were to have most of the “action” in the bottom part of the mural to minimize time spent on a ladder; have mostly areas of pretty flat color with little blending to facilitate painting on cement block (uuuuuugggghhhh!!); have the area of interest (outlined in the rectangle) be on the right side because natural light comes in from a window on the opposite side of the hall there and this little section is somewhat separated from the other part by a small gap; be able to complete the painting in about a week or two.

[erikdennes]

Day 23

Sketching on toned paper with a dip pen, markers and white conte.

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