I am a working girl, I work full time in a pet shop and then come home and work full time at my painting career. When I come home I know I have my allotted paint time ahead of me but I'm not in the mood. Times like these benefit the most during the preparation stage. Through the years I have put together several 3 ring notebooks with sorted clippings of magazine ads, internet pictures and pictures from anything I felt would help me reference ideas from. I'll sit in front of the TV and flip through and pull out what seems to interest me at the moment. Several pages later I'll amass the pile of selected favorites on the floor and mentally compile a few elements that seems to spark my attention. Alittle more eager now, I'll assemble these pices, add a few more, replace some others untill I get closer to what is driving me at the timel Could be a certain pose I had in mind, colors I wanted to try, or elements I wanted to paint within the picture. This particular painting I wanted to paint was a more realistic reef silouetted around my mermaid. I had printed some pictures of natural reefs, fish, corals, underwater formation etc. i had 3 8x10's of a blue reef that had the same lighting. I had those on the side and few more of coral and fish. I was alot more interested now.I put those on the side and pulled out my binder of pretty faces and poses. I pick these reference photos from magazine and internet ads. I look up ads from fashion photoas, hair products, celebrity news or a certain model that I had though looked like the merms I want to paint. (Jessica Alba is one of my current favorites.)

Now I gleen through these photos with the ieda of where I want to got with this painting. Is she doing something? just wimming, lounging or caught in a private moment? This painting I wanted to the the realistic reef and mke it like a fantasy garden. I wasn't sure at this point exactly how or what it will turn out later because when I start to paint, the painting process itself seems to have its' own journey in mind. This is especially true when something disasterous happens like I drop a fully loaded paint brush on the painting or a certain color looks like crap when it dries. The painting takes a whole left turn when things like these occur. So with tat in mind, I choose general ideas and don't become fixated on them. Go with the flow but don't get lost. Keep in mind general design and watercolor technicues. I will hold your painting together. Books on these design and watercolor techniques are available for free at your local library for all you starving artists out there, or on Ebay or Amazon for those who have the money to own them. To those that are new to art, I can't say enough about how important it is to explore techniques and design skills by practice, practice, PRACTICE. Your not going to improve your skills any way else. It becomes second nature then when planning your painting. I have my reef pictures, lighting loose design of an oval garden reef surrounding my main character. I figure I want to paint a girl sitting, playing with flowers in her hair. 3/4 face, a sitting pose and smooth hair and several other ideas I don't even use. I'll actually finally begin drawing at this point. Now I'm in the mood.

OK So I'm just learning this Blog thing. I'm setting it up as I go along. Everything seems to take so long on a computer and I'm terribly easily distracted so bear with me on these postings.

I have a love of the water that is abnormal! I am a person that is truly ruled by thier emotions and I thinks water perfectly reflects (ha ha pun not intended) the stuff emotions are made of. I could write all day on emotions, being a tempermental artist. I won't bore you with that today... although I REALLY think insects have emotions.. yes you heard that first right here. I'm sure they will prove it one day and don't ask me how I know for sure but they just do. I'm not sure trees do though. Somebody help me out with this.

Oh yeah, memaids. The essence of fluid motion. I really love to paint circles and flowing type lines into my watercolor paintings and ACEO's. I try to incorporate this into my paintings. I try to paint my backgrounds wet on wet but can be rather frustrating at time. I like to emphasize thier hair. I layer thier hair in several line images so it looks full and sensual Flowing in the current. Sometimes even blending in with the current.

I do love the water and spend and awful lot of time in it. I scuba alot along with Kayaking, swimming and just horsing around in the water. Doesn't matter much where, bathtub, local streams, ponds, Great Lakes, Love to go to the Keys. I have seen the remains of the lost continent of Atlantis. It must have been spectacular at one time. I've never looked for a mermaid, just know that they are there. And why not? There are fairies and all sorts of gnommy little creatures so why not mermaids? I'll keep you posted just in case I happen along one or two.

Joanne

I have found numerous ideas on what and what not to do when creating my watercolor ACEO's. First is the type of paint to use. I use only Winsor and Newton professional grade watercolor paints. I paint very detailed mermaids and fairy's. Student grade paints would be clumpy and very hard to control in this tiny arena. The subjects are somewhat pinup material and the shading is very detailed and smooth. I begin with cold press Arches #140 paper. To get the paint to "float" on the surface for awhile while I finish the blending of the skin and skin tones. What this means is that I flood the desired area with clean water, pushing the bubble of water into the corners and up to the line with a brush and then dip the brush into a watered down version of the color and "push the color" around with my brush untill either it dries up which is usually the case or I like the coverage and let it dry completely. I repeat this process several times for face and hands to get the glazes. It is important not to disturb the color underneath when applying a new top glaze. Especially with the above mentioned colors.

I now use different colors to mix flesh tones. I use completely staining colors now for a new affect. These colors are new gamboge, alizarion crimson and winsor blue. I use these in a very VERY watered down tint and glaze each tone of face and hands over and over. Remember when using staining colors that once put down you CANNOT get them nicely off of the paper. So miserly is the word here. Farther down was my previously preferred colors for face tints.

 I do not rinse the finish off of the paper. I did try to soak the paper and then "stretch" it with masking tape on a stryrafoam base but the color would quickly sink into the paper no matter how dry it was. I did try to use cardstock but this was unsuitable. So to begin, to keep a neat overall appearance to the ACEO, I do is tape around the 2.5 x 3.5 area to be painted and tape the card to a light piece of styrafoam, about 5" x 6". This helps keep the painting lightwight so I can hold it or turn it as necessary. I also invested in a good magnifying glass that magnifies x10. the styrafoam backing helps to keep the painting weight light for I am constantly scrutinizing my work up close and holding onto the brush with one hand and the painting in the other. If it was heavy, I would tire out from holding the drawing.