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maintaining feeling of dramatic sky

Enlarge DeSkies - Digital Painting / Art Prints - 2006

I am feeling a little hidden - winter hibernation perhaps - working too hard on what seems a futile website reconstruction - and thought - this piece with a pun on disguise kind of fits the bill.

It also looks a bit like my hair these days, not that anyone should care. But what I like about this piece more than the word play was that I was able to take a dramatic sky - portray it dramatically - portray it abstractly - but portray it much as I experienced it.

The painting was a success from the standpoint of problem solving - from the standpoint of wanting to live with - I can’t speak for anyone other than myself.

See Also

• DeSkies
  art prints options and availablity for above piece
• Dramatic Sky Photo Gallery by martin trachsel at pbase.com
  some photos or skies worth taking a peak at

freedom and adaptation

First Big - digital painting / art prints - Dan Beck 2003

I have resisted featuring this digital painting for a couple of reasons. First, I never felt it was that strong of a work - even though I like it enough to have framed it and enough to have it as part of the Abstract Art Gallery.

But more importantly - since its placement on the web, it has received too many hits for people looking for something quite different than what I am offering.  Oh well … and "gay" was an excellent word for happy for many years - such usage is tricky at best these days.

This piece is about change and rolling with it - a good reminder for me these days. The piece was as large a template as I could create with the program I paint with - thus the title. The first marks were done with black and opaque color - the default settings of the program -

but I chose to go with it - not caring that it was not the way I normally worked … and I think it is that kind of flowing freedom that I love about this work.

See Also

• First Big
  gallery page - enlargement - art print options
• Meditation and Satsang
  Not advocating her seminar - don’t know her - but her words were to my point from a different place
• Poetry for the Soul - Fog and Frantic Flowing Freedom
  I liked this poem - a curious freedom perhaps in not being able to see clearly?

portraying strange light in its own way

Another Lightness - digital painting / art prints - Dan Beck 2004

There are times when the mountains seem otherworldly - particularly I have been fascinated by the light that emerges on the mountains seemingly right under the overcast.

It is about perspective and distance - that creates the illusion - but than again - seeing is about seeing - not about what is scientifically there.  And in this case, it is also about an impression.

This piece captures the strangeness of light and abstractly portrays a phenomena that would be less real done a different way.

See Also

• uzilite.com
  “light obliterating every shades” according to Google - nice photos and very slick the way they are displayed - quite fun
• strange light pictures
  spirit in the lens - truth is not the issue for me - but the strange light irresistable
• Another Lightness
  gallery page - enlarge/details - art print options

abstract world viewed close -mountains from a distance

Madras Mountains - digital painting / art prints - Dan Beck 2004

We are both at a slight disadvantage with this piece. This is intended to be quite large - large enough to be on a large wall and viewed from a distance and large enough to be able to see the abstract and pleasing art style up close.

I have the advantage of having seen sections while painting it and even seeing a print with a 12.5 x 16 inch image.

However, I have not printed this large - I have deferred to other pieces which are also more interesting small - figuring they are better pieces.

But I know this to be quite cool - and perhaps someday I will get the opportunity to place the piece in a setting which will do it justice and allow for the size print it warrants.

See Also

• Madras Mountains
  See what a big original art print would cost - for the giant wall aching for some Madras Mountains
• Understanding Abstract Art
  Sometimes artist does a good job at explaining abstract art - good selection of pieces to illustrate - his own work is generally about feeling - color - texture -and no or little form

sharing the excitement of digital painting

Scribble 7 - transparent pattern Scribble 8 - gradient fill/overlap

This is a demo of how colors can overlap using this program (appleworks) and this freehand tool.

The whole idea is to give insight into the process and share some of my enthusiasm.

In actuality, when I paint I use two monitors - one holds all my tools and the other allows me to view my work more fully and without distraction. I learned the idea from my friends at Vectorpoint, who do a lot of photoshop work.

So as I look at the last example - enlarged on the right - abstract, probably as finished as it ever will be - I am thinking and seeing -

POSSIBILITY…

Looking through the blog image guide or just through the website, you can see some of the places I have taken this already.  But this is raw and was one of my first big excitements with digital painting.

See Also

• Book Excerpt - Fran Soren
  Imagining: Sparks of Creativity - except is about imagination and raw possiblity
• Images Exclusive to Blogsite
  Thumbnail guide to articles by image

series develops from the cusp of representation and abstraction

My Series 3 - digital painting / art prints - Dan Beck 2005

Yep - that’s a sun - there is no mistaking it. Even though the sun doesn’t really look like that - we know that is a sun.  In fact, it is a rather fun interpretation of one - the rays really extend here.

Is that land or water below? Who knows? This, like all the pieces in this series, sit on the cusp between representation and complete abstraction.

In all of these pieces, there is a smoothness to the color and a textured background.  That quality really appealed to me when I first tried it - and therefore I continued those two aspects in the rest of the series.

The series seems to temporarily be on hold. I think that is because my success ratio was not quite up to par - but I still think there was something to it and I anticipate revving it up again.

See Also

• My Series 3
  availability of art prints for above digital painting - My Series 3
• ARTTHROB_ARTBIO
  Nice work from artist describing his work as being on the cusp between representation and abstraction

positives of simple water and complex interpretation of sand

Monterey Bayish - digital painting /art prints - Dan Beck 2003

In some ways I find this piece a tad choppy - a tad symmetrical - but then again it is also a piece with a wonderfully simple take on the water and complex take on the sand.

The patterns in the dunes, I still find fascinating and even more so when viewing an actual art print.

After completing it, I noticed a figure of a woman or girl laying in the sand - yes it is still a bit abstract - but I see her clearly in pigtails and that gave the digital painting a whole other dimension.

See Also

• Monterey Bayish
  availability of art prints for digital painting - Monterey Bayish
• Hang Gliding over The Fort Ord Dunes, California
  a little taste of the area in question
• Landscapes
  Two paintings of the dunes - from another artist

how play can lead to further exploration and studies

My Series 6 - digital painting / art prints - Dan Beck 2005

All of the “My Series” paintings are a particular size digital painting which I came up with to provide the thickness of line I wanted and also allow me to see the painting as a slide - fitting the monitor exactly.

So when I worked on this piece, I could look at it as it was coming along - filling up my monitor completely with no other distractions.

The series started out as play, but I stumbled upon something I found really interesting. Part of what I liked was the smoothness of the overlapping color gradients on top of texture. The other thing which struck me was the hint of being representational - but not enough to be considered anything more than abstract.

See Also

• My Series 6
  availability of art prints for My Series 6
• Abstract Art
  lengthy but interesting discussion of abstract and representational art
• Jackson Pollock in Action
  a lighter look at abstract, representation, and play

Its original size and when larger is just larger

Field Fitting - digital painting / art prints - Dan Beck 2006

You might notice this piece in the article directly below. I just finished it, I like it, and it seems appropriate to talk about it from a different angle - particularly since the angles themselves are a lot of what I like about it.

The size of the template is  775 x 587 pixels a strange number indeed. I came up with it by experimentation to create the width line I wanted for printing on 13×19 inch watercolor paper.

It also fit my 17” monitor perfectly when I looked at it full size using a 800 x 600 resolution. Working with a higher resolution makes the palette and painting tools too small.

All of the "My Series" abstract pieces were done this size and a number of pieces in the Figures Art Gallery.

The above piece will easily print up to 24×30" but will not improve with size beyond that - meaning it will be larger but not reveal anything new.

For art prints of the above digital painting please email specialorders@outhousestudios.net.

See Also

• Figures Art Gallery
  Gallery with numerous pieces this size and ilk
• Art From A Different Angle, Bill Geist Has Shown Us Some Unusual Takes On Artistic Expression - CBS News
  Title fits with topic - quick, fun, read, and images
• Through A Looking Glass: How An Artist Sees
  Fine title - more than I could read today - but worth citing - good points just from skimming

Figure, Fields, Pipes, Digital Landscape All Fit Together

Field Fitting - digital painting / art prints - Dan Beck 2006

I started this digital painting yesterday morning and wrote an article fueled by working on the piece and my taking a couple of screen shots while working on it extremely zoomed in.

I am really happy with the results. I have seen one man struggling with two of the large irrigation pipes a number of times here and it has been on my mental list of works for a while.

The backdrop was intended to be reminiscent of the rolling fields of Salinas, but more colorful, abstract, and transparent as far as its being computer art.

I was kind of hoping for the work to be a counter part to a digital painting from last year - Field Play - which is a very strong , but also quite different from most of my other pieces.

See Also

• Field Play
  counter part to above digital painting - same template - art print options would be the same
• SLSA: Mortlock Pictorial Collection B 53439
  Now these are LARGE irrigation pipes