More live stuff to see...

 Family of five.  The wife almost didn't sit down for it after the husband was drawn.  She got scared.  I've noticed this tends to happen a lot after the children are drawn.  In some cases I think it stems from the idea that they realize that I DO draw adults differently from the kids.

 Another couple.  Interesting thing with the guy was that his nose actually was turned slightly to the right when you looked at him head on.  Decided to go for a semi 3/4 view on the wife.  I think it worked out very well for the picture.  Shame that the photo didn't pick up on the coloring well.   Would've took a better shot, but was pressed for time.

 These ladies were great and full of character.  Makes it easier to draw them.  Gotta be careful with these necks though.  Sometimes the portrait sensibilities makes me want to make them wider than they should be.

 He won a giant stuffed dog from one of the games in the park.  The only thing I despise about this sketch was that he made me knock off the 5 O'Clock shadow and stubble.  I think doing that hurt the likeness a bit.

 This one could've so used color.  Like it, but not as much as I could have.  Head tilt is a little wrong too as I didn't trust my judgment as much as I should have.

 Quick, but good.  3/4 view sketching is finally starting to feel a bit more comfortable for me to do.  Still not perfect, but things are actually starting to go where they need to.

And then there's this one.  I like the other two as well, but I feel like I REALLY nailed the girl at the bottom. The expression, the hat, everything.

Three kids, Pompeii, and orange experimentation at the lab.

 This one kinda ended on a cute note.  The little guy wanted to take me home at first, but told him a handshake would work a bit better as obviously I can't go home with him.  *lol*  But then after that, proceeds to give me a hug.  I can't say that in this business anything of that sort happens too much so when it does it kinda warms the heart a bit.  Fun sketch too, picked up a funny vibe from the family and decided to let it get a little zany.

 Random person walking around that I drew from memory.  She was my test subject for using mineral orange as an option for medium complexions.  I must say it definitely has it's merits.

And we end it with the average cuticature.  She wanted to be on one of the water rides so I chose Escape from Pompeii.  I kinda liked how the perspective actually looked pretty decent in this picture.

Some stuff from the job...

 Quick B&W.  People seem to be really after these kinds of sketches this year, moreso than the usual.

We've got a war going on over here.  The little guy was an artist himself and had a ton of creative ideas to implement here.  Particularly, the mustache.

 Both of these guys were out of the training manual.  Used them both as an excuse to work on coloring and coming up with newer methods to doing that.

 I liked this sketch overall, but a couple things could be different about it.  He was at a fairly challenging angle so I know technically something got blown here and there, and I could've been a bit more subtle with the lines on the woman.  So hard to do sometimes when you see so much stuff in front of you.

And this is one of a co-worker of mine at the park.  I actually spent some quality time on this one in an effort to get the values right and to see just how far that peach color stick could go before I'd have to use another color with it.  Come to find out, it's VERY far to be honest with you.

I'm going to try to make a more concentrated effort to post more stuff on here, as I feel like I haven't been doing it enough lately

Yet another one from the park.

12 x 16 Acrylic on canvas.

This one was a little rushed, as the threat of rain clouds and thunder kept me from working on this one too long.  However, at the same time it really made look at forms and color as a value a lot more and to be honest I think this one turned out a LOT better for it.  The scene itself wasn't technically like this, as the coast on the other side of the piece was actually much farther away in reality, but I chose to do it this way as a means to challenge myself to be able to keep things coherent despite any changes I wanted to make.  Another thing I wanted to do was more consistent color in the piece, even if that meant only using one palette plate for the entire thing.  That ended up helping out a lot more than I anticipated it would.

I think what surprises me the most is the amount of improvement after just three of these paintings, especially if you compare it to the one I did just two weeks ago.  My sight is really improving on these and I hope it only gets better from here.

A couple new park doodles, and yet another plein air.

 The latest in my painting adventures over at the local park.  This one probably turned out the best of them so far.

And a park sketch.  Problems galore, especially in that for some reason I can't get into the right mindset with these like I was able to beforehand.  It looks fine and all, but I just feel like it could've been so much more.

Well, one good one came out of today, and a TRADITIONAL plein air

 The sketch, and the closeup of my subject.  This was probably the only really good sketch worth anything today.  Despite how quick I did it, I'm still glad I got the "feel" of it about how I wanted it.  In typical form, there's things I would change about it in another go at her, but for now I'm pleased with the likeness on it.  That to me is VERY important, and when I miss on it I literally beat myself up in my head to do better on the next.

And this is my latest painting/sketch I've done outside over at the Newport News park.  The biggest change with this one unlike the ones prior was that this was actually done with real brushes and acrylic paints, and not with Art Academy on the DS.  It's not like I've never painted traditionally before, as that's pretty much all I've ever done in my major in college, but this was the first time I've actually used today's knowledge in doing something like this.  There's some things that IMO could definitely use improvement, but I think the biggest thing I got out of this was that I really need to start painting FORMS as opposed to this object here and this object there.  I get the feeling that doing that will take this kind of stuff that much farther.

NEW STUFF, yeah I know it's been too long...

 Mermaid girl.  Little on the cutesy side, but it works for what it is.

 This kid was just funny.  Saw him open his mouth and the marker just told the rest of the story.  Only bad thing was that they only wanted a B&W sketch.  This seems to be a reoccurring trend this year.

 Tried some new color tricks with these guys.  Unfortunately, it looks a lot better in person.  These cameras cannot get the color right to save their lives unless I put it in photoshop afterward.

He was one of our visiting artists this year.  In some ways I like it and in others I felt like I could've done so much more to it.  Then again, it was fairly busy when I did this so there was a lot of "off and on" scenarios with this one.  I'll have to do this one again sometime outside of work.