Color mixing is fun!

With acrylic inks color mixing is a challenge. These inks are highly pigmented, and adding one drop of one hue to another hue can change the color significantly. In addition to that you have to be very careful just to have one drop getting out of the bottle - it happens often to me that I get more than one drop dripping out of the bottle.

But I enjoy creating all those color variations. Look how many shades of blue are in that painting on the left - dark blue, light blue, purplish blue! 

Switching over to Acrylic Inks

I must admit that I am someone who likes to change mediums after some time. In the past I painted quite a lot of pieces with acrylic inks, and now I felt like grabbing those tiny bottles of acrylic ink again. 

However I changed my working process a bit: I first applied the grey lines with alcoholbased markers and then began to fill in the colors. In the past I had often just let the colors flow and the shapes form themselves, but this time I spent some time thinking about which color to put where. 

I had fun mixing the colors and learning while doing so. I basically used three colors: Green, yellow and hazelnut. 
 

Abstract Inktense painting

I only used Inktense pencils with this abstract art piece. I tried to mix colors in two ways:

• I first applied one pencil and then the second one on top of it, both dry. Then I used a waterbrush to dissolve the pigments. It was a bit of an adventure to see how the mixture came out - depending on the strenght of application, and/or on the sequence of pigment applied. 
• I first put down one color dry on the paper, and then I touched the top of the second pencils with a damp brush and applied the dissolved pigment. 

I must say it was quite an experiment and an adventure!

 

How I connect AI Art and Traditional Art

The painting on the left was done with alcoholbased markers and inktense pencils. In order to get there, I combined AI Art and traditional art. In detail:

1. The first step was to create the image of a wooden mask as a reference image. I later on wished I had spent more time looking for an image which would serve as a good reference image (clear lines, good contrast, no shadowy parts and such). 
2. In a second step I downloaded the AI image and pasted it into my Open Office Writer.  What I did not think about was the size of the watercolor paper I wanted to use. I have A4 paper and I have A5 paper which is smaller. Open Office Writer is not very good in handling images (text processing software!), so I had to limit myself to A4 paper. The next time I will use Scribus, the free alternative to InDesign, in order to put the image to the proper size. 
3. I then had the file printed out as pdf and tried to trace the photo onto my watercolor paper. Not a very good idea. So I grabbed my tracing paper and used it for tracing the basic shapes with a fine liner. 
4. Now I could trace the result onto my watercolor paper and then continue with markers and inktense pencils. 

All in all it was a very educational and even joyful process. 

First Art piece in March 25

I'm experimenting with a new painting schedule: I am now painting in the morning at least one hour, after having sipped two mugs of tea and before eating my Müsli. I am also experimenting with time blocking, doing this one day before the actual day. This allows me to be flexible.

In the afternoon I do all kinds of digital work - scanning and processing my paintings, creatingpieces  with Artificial Art Generators, watching helpful, inspiring and motivating youtube Videos. 

Of course there are days when I cannot keep this rather rough schedule - days with doctor appointments, days when I am invited for coffee by my neighbor, days when I allow myself to spend some hours at an art shop. However in general I want to keep the aforementioned time blocks because they help me to maintain a balance between doing art traditionally and doing art the AI way.
 

The last days of February

 Today is the second last day of February. So it's time to look back at this month regarding my art activities. I actually managed to paint six pieces done with alcoholbased markers and colored pencils, and with the last piece which I scanned in today I switched to the combination of markers and inktense pencils.

I also managed to sell a digital file of one of my art pieces. The lady I sold it to had it printed on a canvas. She sent me a photo of it hanging on her wall, and I must say I am quite pleased of the way it looks. I might as well have one of my files printed on canvas for my own flat!

In February I also did a lot of AI Art pieces, focussing mainly on three AI Art Generators: Nightcafe Studio, Bing and Starry AI. 

What are my plans for March 2025?

• I plan to explore possible color combination of markers and Inktense pencils. 
  Up to now I have been selecting the pencils rather spontaneously, without doing color charts in the beginning. I will try to work on this a bit. I also plan to paint at least five pieces with markers and pencils.
• As the month of March is a month with some birthdays I want to create new cards with new images. I also want to refill my stack of stickers and address labels, using my AI art pieces. So in March 2025 I will continue to create images with AI art.

Starry AI

Sometime last year - or even the year before - I discovered Starry AI. I wrote down the webadress, but other than that I didn't do anything with it. A few days ago I found the note with the address on it, and tried it out. I must say that I am very pleased with the results I am getting. 

First of all, I have the free version. The free version has got its limits regarding the format: you can only create images in portrait format. But: you are able to get five lumens (or credits or tokens) by logging in each day. You are also able to earn lumens every three days by posting your images on instagram or X (twitter). And, as I mentioned above, the results are very, very nice!

I wanted to create an image showing a cute rat carrying a bowl with coffee beans. I first tried Nightcafe Studio, but didn't quite get what I was going for. So I used the magic prompt Nightcafe had created and applied it on Starry AI.

The image on the left more or less shows what I had in my mind. This is one of four images and the one I liked best. 

So Starry AI has become one of my favorite AI Image Generators, together with Nightcafe Studio, Bing and Mage Space.