digital medium « Outhouse Studios Weblog

Posts Tagged ‘digital medium’

The Practice of Digital Painting

Wednesday, August 2nd, 2006

working differently to keep things fresh

No Particular View – digital painting – Dan Beck 2006

When I started painting this morning I didn’t have any particular scene in mind – no scene burning inside me and no real concept. But as quickly as the first mark I found myself taking things differently. This is not an uncommon practice for me -

in fact, it is my practice in both senses of the word.

It is important to keep things fresh – for me, it is often something simple. In this case I started with single lines to define the piece. I used a combination of freehand color gradient drawing, lines, and fill-in’s to make the fields and mountains what they are.

It is not a complete departure from how I normally work or a complete departure from my other work. What I was able to do without a specific scene in mind, was accomplish the feeling of hills, sloped fields, and mountains that is the Salinas Valley.

For art prints of the above digital painting – please email: specialorders@outhousestudios.net for quotes and options.

Translucent Early Representational Work

Friday, July 7th, 2006

overlapping color gradients – unique to digital painting

Blue Mountains – digital painting /art prints – circa 1998

This is one of my earlier digital paintings – not sure exactly when it was done. What I like about this piece is its translucent character.

At the time, I did not have an easy way to add texture, but I had found I could overlap color gradients in such a way as to almost look like stained glass – not that stained glass really overlaps.

I still like creating work that is both abstract and representational – this one was one of the first with the digital medium. Prior to that, everything was abstract because for me there is no pressure whatsoever when creating work that is non representational. There is nothing for the work to be compared to and it is a great place to learn how to control the medium.

Screen shots of Current Digital Painting

Wednesday, July 5th, 2006

zoomed in view needed to work sections of digital art

Section of current digital painting - view 1 pixel hole in center

I started working on a new digital painting this morning. A dreary kind of overcast summer day here – perfect for that sort of thing.

While I was working on it and enlarging the piece close to 400% – I thought it might be interesting to share what that looks like – and therefore a sense of how peculiar it can be to work with this digital medium.

Creating art on a computer can be very quick in some ways. There are tools which can create gradients, complex textures, lines, curves, fills, etc. However, certain things can be quite tedious.

For the look I want in this particular piece – I must work with the piece enlarged and must go back and forth with the size of the view. Often times even working at the largest level adjusting a single pixel.

It is fun to be able to see from different angles – stepping back, stepping in – but it is also tiring – as I am taking a break to write this.

Freedom without Expectation

Thursday, June 15th, 2006

appreciating light and energy of an older digital painting

Flying Thru Sunfire – digital painting – circa 1998

What is new about an older digital painting?

I guess anything old can be looked at new. I think of myself as being pretty observant, but found myself just yesterday noticing something for the first time, which had been that way for over a year.

There is freedom in this piece which I love. I didn’t know the digital medium or program, so I didn’t have to prove anything. And when I say this, I mostly mean to myself.

For now when I do a new digital painting, I have expectations regarding my skill with the medium. I have expectations about subtlety of line and texture which I did not even know were possible when the piece above was created.

Viewing today, Flying thru Sunfire – a title which I understand just as little as then - has wonderful light and energy – and I enjoy getting lost in it.

Printing After Painting

Friday, June 9th, 2006

digital medium and image size give art print gratification

Pickin’ Start – digital painting / art prints – Dan Beck 2006

This is the most recently finished digital painting I have. It is formatted to be wide and fit a 13×19″ watercolor paper with next to no margin.

Most of my recent work has these pixel dimensions. After having done a series which was intended to be large only – I found the work to be a little unfulfilling.

Like most people I want some immediate gratification. It is unusual in itself to require a painting to be printed before being complete. But since those are the rules of the digital medium – it is definitely nicer to be able to print it directly after completing it and not have it look too small for the paper it is printed on.

The above piece – although improved at a larger size – works well at 13×19″ too. If you are interested in an original art print of this piece or any others on the blogsite, please send inquiries to specialorders@outhousestudios.net.

Digital Painting and Development

Tuesday, March 21st, 2006

Digital Medium: Texture, Collage, Technique Develop

Tractor Sunset – Gallery Page -Digital Painting Fall 2003

Sunset Seen - Gallery Page – Digital Painting Fall 2005

I was noticing the top painting the other day and focusing on the texture in the fields. It reminds me of torn paper or a collage with tissue. I think this is most obvious looking at the largest view.

I like the naive quality to this piece. The way the streaming sunlight is represented, the simple figure on the tractor and the colorful, collage-like sky.

The bottom piece, Sunset Seen, was painted looking from almost the same spot a slightly different direction – two years later. I am putting these together like this because it demonstrates how much technique I have been able to develop in the last couple of years.

Much of what keeps this exciting to me is that there is so much room for growth with the medium. Actually, it is so open ended as far as possiblity that I find myself making additional rules to have the sufficient limits for this medium to work.

In any event, I am not sure that the bottom piece is a better painting, but I do think – looking at the sky, the mountains, the irrigation and numerous other details; it is obvious how much more sophisticated my use of the medium has become. It also is better viewed large.

Digital Painting: Discussing a Piece

Tuesday, February 21st, 2006

Digital Medium, Gradients, Washes, Texture, Material

Afternoon Overlap – Digital Painting – 2005 – Landscape Art Gallery

This particular piece was successful because of the feeling it invokes – well at least in me. The overlapping of color is quite characteristic of the type of thing one can do using the digital medium. Not to say with washes, one can’t do similar things on canvas or directly on paper- but the gradients and transparencies overlap nicely using the computer.

This is actually one of the things I particularly like about using this medium. I have discussed the overlapping gradients at another time in this blog and will undoubtedly continue to do so.

It is one of the backbones of my painting technique and this particular piece shows it off.

The other thing I like in particular about this piece is how warm the texture makes it all feel. It is almost like the hills are made of material. And that is indeed how this particular view of the different colored lettuces growing on the overlapping fields made me feel. The mountains from this particular vantage point were all you could see behind the hills.

Though my approach is once again not all that literal – it does manage to capture what I experienced and create an image which I feel is also pleasing in itself.

Digital Meanings

Tuesday, February 7th, 2006

Part 2 of Digital Confusion and Song Celebration

Bottles In the Kitchen – 1 more manipulation to photo

This is part 2 of a series which starts below or at this link. There are two subjects – first the different kinds of meaning around the digital medium and second, since I am focused on a particular image – the song which it relates to.

The above photo has 2 manipulations done to it to create the look of a painting. In this case it was simple and took very little time and voila – painting or is it? The second filter is a crosshatch. I actually think the image is kind of interesting – despite what I know to be done mostly by the computer.

I try to have the attitude of being open to anything which allows people to be more creative – the auto bass line of a keyboard – or the instant painting effects of photoshop.

But as an artist I don’t want people to think that my work – not what you see above – is generated by the computer. The computer provides gradients and textures for me to work with and some tools – such as cutting and pasting, resizing, moving, tinting etc, when I choose to use them.

But in the digital paintings I do – I start from a clean canvas – and the color and form is my adding – the computer program and the archival inks provide the new medium.

Outhouse Studios Weblog

Posts Tagged ‘digital medium’

The Practice of Digital Painting

working differently to keep things fresh

See Also

Translucent Early Representational Work

overlapping color gradients – unique to digital painting

See Also

Screen shots of Current Digital Painting

zoomed in view needed to work sections of digital art

See Also

Freedom without Expectation

appreciating light and energy of an older digital painting

See Also

Printing After Painting

digital medium and image size give art print gratification

See Also

Digital Painting and Development

Digital Medium: Texture, Collage, Technique Develop

See Also

Digital Painting: Discussing a Piece

Digital Medium, Gradients, Washes, Texture, Material

See Also

Digital Meanings

Part 2 of Digital Confusion and Song Celebration

See Also

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