Practice Makes Perfect

Practice Practice Practice

I'm not a musician but I was a dancer growing up

and if there's anything I know about, it's practice.

Painting is no different.  Many of my artists friends say you have to put miles on your brush.

So I will be practicing on these subjects for a while until I get comfortable.

That oughtta only take a year or two.  

If you've been following my blog recently you know I'm trying to improve my drawing

and learn to paint animals.

I have a lot of animals here on the farm and I want to get better at painting them.

I'm currently working on cats and dogs.

My cats and a dearly departed dog, Bailey.

My husband really misses him cause he was kind of a crazy lovable guy.

Today I watched several segments of an online pet painting class I've been taking,

and then had to pick up my brush.

I don't have a face frontal picture of Bailey,

so I'm using that as  my excuse as to why it is so hard. 

Also he's a black and white dog,

 but you know there's all kinds of colors hiding in the black and white.    

Another difficult feat.

This was when I thought I was finished.

But what happens a lot of times, is you take the picture

and then you see the problems.

I kept thinking he looked like a weasel instead of a dog.

Then I saw the problem with the nose.

So I had to make a "slight correction".

You can see I straightened out his nose a little bit.  When I did that I had to add a little more black to the middle.  I tweaked a little on the neck also.  

 It's hard to make yourself put your brush away.     

So, here is today's version of a "slightly corrected" Bailey.

I can't show you any more of him,

because that part of the painting is horrible,

but I'm fairly happy with this part.

Rest in peace friend Bailey.