Lucas’s 100 day challenge : all things portraiture :)

[Lucas a.k.a “Roams”]

Day 7:

Started painting this skull today. been at it for a bout 3 hours now. using only white,black and blue outdoor acrylic wall paint, because its cheap as 😉 maaaan i havent painted for a while i forgot how fun it is but also time consuming xD

anyway heres a progress shot. will be at this for a few days i think

[Lucero]

I love your attitude, Lucas, and great work – you hit it hard today!

[Josseline Jeria]

oh this is going to be so cool! I can’t wait to see how it all pulls together. Painting is my first and true love, but yeah it takes a lot of time. The cleanup is the worst for oils. I usually use 8 brushes or so, and I have in the past worked on more than a painting at a time, so I’ve ended up with 16 brushes and a builtup palette to clean. I don’t wash my brushes and palette between sessions for the same paintings though. I keep them in a separate compartment in my freezer. Helps save a lot of time, and saves the brushes from being worn down prematurely. How do you go about cleaning brushes using the household acrylic paint?

[Lucas a.k.a “Roams”]

thanks lucero 🙂 i ended up putting another 2 hours or so into it.

yeah i bet the cleanup is annoying with oils but the blending must be soooo good cuz they take ages to dry. ill give them a go sometime for sure. ive actually found that the wall paint works pretty well to paint with its got a nice flowy consisteny, but blending is still pretty tough to get really smooth. and for clean up i literally just run em under the tap and squeeze the paint out of them, thats the nice thing about acrylics.

[Josseline Jeria]

I’m actually not much of a blender, I try to do it as least as possible, but I’m not skilled enough yet with my brushwork so I do it more than what I’d like. I like the bolder brushwork style of paintings in general. My “studio” is half of a tiny room, which has large windows and gets a lot of light and warmth throughout the day, so my paints actually dry relatively quickly for oil, usually dry to touch by the next day up to 3 days at best. Oh that sounds soo good. I have a couple small tubes of acrylics, I may bust them out sometime this year. Hard to because I love oils SO much.

Do you work in solid blocks of time? like 3 hours plus or do you break your painting session up?

[Lucas a.k.a “Roams”]

ah ok yeah u like the more expressive kind of painting, i like looking at it but personally i love to try get smooth blends . yeah im lucky i got a pretty decent space in the house im living in atm. the last place i lived my studio was in a shed with no windows, my easel was a big sheet of plywood leaned against the wall with screws drilled into it to hold my canvases XD and i had a little fold out camping table to put my paints and brushes on haha. yeah even if acrylics stayed wet for a day i would be pretty happy with that but they literally dry within a couple minutes so u gotta be really quick to get a nice even blend. there is mediums that help that u can add to acrylics but it still dries way faster than oils.

amm depends atm im not working so i got heeeaaaps of time on my hands. like for me starting is the hardest part which im finding easier now than i used to but once i get going i forget about time tbh. usually listen to music or podcasts while im working and just yeah kind of drift away xD the longest session ive done was 7 hours on the kookabuura in my profile pic but that was intense my eyes started to go really loopy hahaha. i think about 3-5 hours and then a break is where its at

[Josseline Jeria]

Getting smooth blends is tough! So I admire those who do it well. You seem to have a knack for it. We do whatever we can to do our arting right 🙂 I bought this small table easel to start with. When I wanted to paint bigger, I used a big kitchen cupboard shelf and put that on it. I’m suprised that little thing held up! Yeah acrylics are challenging for that. You must try oils sometime soon!

Yeah I’ve got a lot more time at the moment too which has been great! yeah I am similiar with the 3-5 time frame. I take  a few 5 mins breaks when I need them, usually just to sit down. Podcasts are great for painting. Any particular ones you listen to?

That Kookaburra painting is so sweet. Do you happen to be Australian?

[Lucas a.k.a “Roams”]

Thank you 🙂 amm i usually listen to either joe rogan, draftsmen or andrew tischlers podcast on youtube, most of the time its music though. yeah i just find i get really sloppy after about 5 hours so then its time to take a break and rest the brain for a while.

No im actually born in germany, grew up in ireland and moved to australia 4 years ago. but im fascinated by the wildlife here absolutely love it. i traveled the entire east coast of australia, been through the desert to alice springs, and then decided to study art. hopefully now when this madness is all over ill be able to go to an art school and hopefully be able to make a living from it. that would be awesome, well see

[PaulDidier]

This is nice! Really solid sense of form. You don’t seem hesitant and have confidence in the your rendering that’s good to see. I also like doing monochromatic studies using white, black and blue paint. Looking forward to seeing how this comes out.

[Josseline Jeria]

Nice podcasts. If you ever want to listen to other art podcasts, I highly recommend the following: 3 point perspective – an illustration podcast. The three guys that do it are so lovely, so much fun, it feels like getting together with friends when I listen to them. They are very business oriented and driven, provide SO much practical advice. One of my faves. Johh Dalton – gently does it and Lo-Fi – sight and sound podcasts. They interview contemporary artists, mostly in the fine art world. John’s most recent one has Cesar Santos.

What an interesting life travels you’ve had so far! You’re talking to a born and raised Australian here 🙂 The east coast is spectacular. I haven’t been to Alice Springs, the far far north and west. After the travel bans lift I’d like to travel to one of them sometime this year if possible.

You are very hard working and driven, so I have no doubt you’ll be able to make a career out of this. Depends what kind of art education and direction you’d want to take, but since you’re doing studies here on NMA I think studying at an atelier would be great. That is my goal. I can’t afford to do many days, but I’d like to do two full days once the bans have been lifted. There is an excellent atelier in Sydney: Julian Ashton art school – The Rocks. I did two painting workshops there beginning of this year – Still life and portrait sketch. They were fantastic. Love the instructors. Speaking of which, given your love of smooth blends, you should check out the instagram account @james_tucker_art He’s one of the instructors there. He studied and taught at the Florence academy of art. Have a look at his still life work – I think you’d like how smooth they are.

[Lucas a.k.a “Roams”]

awesome yeah ill check them out for sure 🙂 yeah im not exactly certain on what direction i want to take yet but ill figure that out. but thanks for the confidence boost 🙂 yeah i was thinking about an atelier alright i just really wanna get out there and meet other artists too and just get a doorway into that world. and see where it leads

ah the scenery in australia is absolutely insane the east coast trip was the best time ive ever had. living in a little van that i painted some graffiti and stuff on and just waking up somewhere new everyday it was a beautiful time, and i hope to do it again sometime. if u go to alice springs go and see the west macdonalds, if u got a 4wd or if u can afford to rent one for a day check out palm valley its amazing definitely worth it.

yeah i cant wait till this shit is over i mean its gotta be done,its not a joke whats goin on atm but it really sucks 🙁

im in tassie atm but hoping to move back to melbourne after the bans. hopefully ill find something there

 

[Lucas a.k.a “Roams”]

thanks paul 🙂 yeah using limited colours is really fun

[Lucas a.k.a “Roams”]

Day 8:

refined the skull a little more. still work to be done on it but its takin shape now.

had to paint over the entire left section of ribs i had drawn it wrong so tried to correct my mistake. really struggling with the forms of the spine though spent 3 hours already on it this morning just trying to block it in but its really overwhelming tbh xD

i think ill leave it sit there for today and mayb draw a spine or something and do some research on it.

[Peihong Jiang]

Nice painting! I really like it. Is this on a toned paper? because the whites you saved has a warm temperature to it.

[Lucas a.k.a “Roams”]

hey peihong, thank you 🙂 no its on canvas which i primed with some really watered down burnt sienna

[Author]

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