audrynicklin - Tumblr blog

[audrynicklin]

I visited Stones River Battlefield in Murfreesboro Tennessee and spent some time painting while contemplating the battle that had taken place. It was strange to be in such a peaceful place that had previously seen such tragedy.

I free handed the cannon using a 0.5 micron pen before painting everything else in with watercolor. A little white gouache was used to add some highlights.

Painting is roughly 3x4 inches

[audrynicklin]

We happened to drive along the Blue Ridge Parkway during the height of Rhododendron season. This was painted at Craggy Bald near Craggy Gardens. I really struggled to get any contrast in this painting. It wasn’t until I slapped on some yellow ochre onto the branches that the foreground finally pulled away from the background a little better. I might try to paint another version of this some time to see if I can better achieve contrast when using lots of green. June 10, 2017/ Painting No.26

[audrynicklin]

While eating breakfast in a cabin in Maggie Valley, NC, there was a perfect scene in front of me. I hurried to capture it before we left for the day. I had a tough time getting all the blues in the mountains to be distinctly different because gouache looks so different wet than it does dry. The picture was taken from the same view, but at a different point in the day. Colors used: Phthalocyanine Blue, Prussian Blue, Cadmium Yellow, Permanent White June 10, 2017/ Painting No.25

[audrynicklin]

I started to paint this scene while it was still light out, but using my memory of the lighting from the previous night. I finished painting just as the fireflies started to light up in front of me. The photograph was taken the next morning. Colores used: Phthalocyanine Blue, Cadmium Red, Cadmium Yellow Light, and Permanent White June 6, 2017/ Painting No.24

[audrynicklin]

I dragged my paints out with me on vacation and I was determined to use them. While at my husband’s parents’ farm, I sat down and painted some of the hemlock and ironweed that was growing in the pasture. I thought it looked neat, but I suppose that is an outsider’s perspective. Everyone else saw the plants as weeds. June 6, 2017/ Painting No.23

[audrynicklin]

It’s been nearly a year since I’ve touched my gouache paintings. I made a stupendously ugly painting around July of 2016 and lost all confidence in my ability to use the medium. It wasn’t until just this last week that I decided it didn’t matter if it was ugly, I was going to paint again. I even decided to be all loosey goosey and not tape the edges. Of course the painting turned out pretty good... but has ugly edges. Go figure. This was painted at Butano State Park. I was too intimidated to paint a landscape, so I focused on a backlit pine bough.

Colors used: Phthalocyanine Blue, Cadmium Yellow, Yellow Ochre, and Permanent White

May 21, 2017/ Painting No.22

[audrynicklin]

This is the first year I’ve been a part of Inktober. I decided to have Yeti and his family and friends experience each of this year’s prompts. 

[audrynicklin]

This was drawn as a wedding gift for a friend. He is a huge Mass Effect fan and while they were dating, his (now) wife agreed to play the whole series. He told us a story about her driving the Mako just like a member of the Cult of the V8. There was no danger too great: lava, millions of space pirates… She charged at all of them with equal ferocity, a faint “Witness Me” playing at her lips.

11x14 on bristol board with various Faber-Castell Pitt pens.

[audrynicklin]

I hadn’t been well when I painted, so I missed out on the main hike. Mum had hurt her ankle, so the both of us hung out at Big Bear Lake while we waited for the rest of the group. 

There were damsel flies everywhere. If you look carefully, you might be able to spot the two I added to the painting.

July 5, 2016/ Painting No.21

[audrynicklin]

After the snafu I had painting my last entry for the James Gurney Weed Painting Challenge, I went out and tried again. This time I took out the giant tree and put more detail into the weeds in the foreground. I mostly painted Dallisgrass.

June 23, 2016/ Painting No.20

[audrynicklin]

I originally worked on this painting for James Gurney’s weed challenge. Right as I was about to submit, I read the big “no trees” clause. Whoops. I ended up painting another submission a few days later. 

The weeds I had focused on for the painting were wild fennel in the background (they have yellow flowers), blackberry in the shade of the tree, wild oats (yellow), and rip gut brome (green) seen in front of the tree.

June 19, 2016/ Painting No.19

[audrynicklin]

It’s funny how the camera can’t really catch all the colors that can be seen with the naked eye. There was a rock that the waves kept crashing against while we were at Bean Hollow. We also saw little crabs everywhere. If you look carefully, there are two crabs hiding in this painting.

May 22, 2016/ Painting No.18

[audrynicklin]

On our way to the beach, we saw people pulled over on the side of the highway, pointing. There were three whales near the coast feeding on fish. WE plopped ourselves down and I started to paint. We never did get to the beach...

May 14, 2016/ Painting No.17

[audrynicklin]

Just got through playing the Mass Effect series and was inspired to paint my Shepard. I haven’t tried painting a realistic face before, so I can see where I need to improve. All in all, not a bad first try. 

I would like to mention that the style of the hair was inspired by the image of Uranus by Trung Nguyen found at http://lightgreyartlab.com/cosmos I like that it has an etched quality about it.

April 15, 2016/ Painting No.16

[audrynicklin]

We stopped by the Alabama Hills on our way to Death Valley. It was drizzling, so I sat in the car to paint this. The boys got wet while climbing all over the rocks. I got wet because I spilled most of my paint water onto my lap. I ended up finishing this in the hotel room after it got to dark to continue on location.

April 8, 2016/ Painting No.15

[audrynicklin]

I did some plein air painting while on our recent roadtrip. This is at Sequoia National Park. The General Sherman tree was right behind me, but I thought that this was a better composition. As an experiment, I painted all the tree trunks purple before putting in the highlights and midtones. I think it came out pretty good.

April 7, 2016/ Painting No.14

[audrynicklin]

I haven’t painted far from home before, so it was challenging to take my equipment to a place where I couldn’t just run back to get a thing I forgot. The painting was done by The Dolphin Restaurant at the end of the Santa Cruz wharf. I did end up running out of light and had to finish at home.

April 2, 2016/ Painting No. 13