The pesky Lionfish
So, being that this is my first post, I thought I would do something easy to get the lay of the land so to speak. I thought for my first post, I would explain how and why I painted one of my favorite watercolors. I suppose I should start at the beginning on how I got started on it and why I painted it.
It started when a friend of mine was looking to enter a contest. He lives in Belize and there was a local lobster shack that was having a logo contest. Enter your logo and if you win, you get free lobster for a year. So, being the amazing buddy that I am, I got to work right off. We talked on chat about different ideas and well this is what came of it.
This clearly is a rough sketch. Through the sketch, though, came the digital.
The problem, though, became time. I just simply didn't have enough time to complete it. By the time I got back to my friend on the next phase, the contest was over. But, inspiration came from the next conversation. See, as he was relaying how I failed him, we got to talking about the area he was in and how the lion fish were just tearing into the local fish and decimating the reefs.
I always knew lion fish were aggressive, I had seen movies, but I never realized how bad they were for the reefs. This is the link to the Wiki about it https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pterois. Anyway, I thought what a great way to bring awareness to this invasive species and bring some beauty into the world at the same time.
So like always, I got to researching. I went onto the search engines, and started looking at anatomy. I like to get a good idea of the bone structure and how an animal moves before I start to sketch. I don't like to copy a picture, we have copy machines for that. I like to sense of the personality and emotions of my subject before the medium. So like if the subject is aggressive then you would want an aggressive pose. I decided to do one with the full display on show. Once I had done that, I started with the watercolor sketch.
Now, I should have probably planned it better. I should have used more pencil and sketched it out better, skipping the watercolor sketch. But, since I am still learning, mistakes will happen.
I had tried to fill in the background with pink so I would have a uniform platform to work with but it wasn't going the direction I wanted. Plus when I started putting detail into the fin rays some of the black strayed and I needed to cover it.
So, after realizing that I had kind of messed up my painting, I decided to use black as the background to cover over my mistakes in the watercolor sketch and to give contrast to the foreground.
Next, I added detail onto the fins finished up the head and completed the background.
By now, most of the painting is done, I just need to draw the eye into the middle, and I did that by filling in the remaining outside areas and balancing the left and right sides.
aaaaaaannnd done.
I think the piece turned out really well. It catches the eyes of those who visit me and I get to tell them about how the lion fish is killing the reefs. I never did get to finish that logo, although he talked me into parting with another piece. That is a story for another time though.
Thank you for reading my rant. Suggestions are always welcome, and being that this is my first post, I am sure I have much to improve upon.
I really enjoy these kinds of posts... I love watching the artistic process unfold... You're very talented! I wish I had your skills :) I'll follow you and look forward to more posts! Cheers from Salt Lake City
It is always scary to put yourself out to the world. Keep working on your art, the only failure is quitting. Thank you for your encouragement, and keep with your passions .
Amazing art, love it.
Thank you
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welcome @Artbyneilputnam to Steemit! Glad to see you. I hope you enjoy your time here, its a great community :) Nice post, i will follow your account, please follow me at @mekong
Thank you ill check out your stuff.
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Welcome to steemit !! Followed. Follow me back 😘
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