From Black and White to WaterCOLOR
Years ago, I used to practice with watercolor painting, and then the camera and photography took over my artistic life. Lately, I have found a way to do both and indeed, I notice that lately I take photos to use for ideas in my watercolor paintings. However, my ideas don’t always come from my photography.
I was looking through some old, smallish photos of family, the black and white kind taken many years ago. I wondered if I could paint them and invent colors to the painting.
I first tried with this black and white photo of a very young looking mom. I have always loved this picture, she looks so ful of love and so happy.
The colors weren’t so hard to come up with for my watercolor painting. Obviously the grass would be green. The blanket looked like it would be white with some colors making up those triangles. I decided on red. Here is what I came up with:
Next, I decided to try a photo of my dad. One of him with his car. Dad always liked his cars, and it seemed right to find one with a classic vehicle. I knew the color on this one would be tricky. I had some help from a car expert in Petra’s nephew, Barry.
This was the result:
Yes, a pink car. Actually it was Salmon. Mom said that us little girls would say Mr. Bosley has the best car, it’s pink!
Didn’t want to leave John’s family out of my watercolor attempts at old photos. Now here I had to get quite inventive with the colors, as I was never in England and I never met his grandparents. What attracted me most about choosing this photo, was that very cheeky smile on his gran.
Well painting a portrait of someone you never knew isn’t easy, But I did have fun with this image.
Lastly, I love this very chic photo of my Aunt Lynn and my mom. It was Easter, and they were dressed up, like something out of a fashion magazine, but I did one thing different…
I left it in black and white. I didn’t colorize this one!
So this is my start into Old Photography changed to watercolors. I really hope to improve but have received wonderful responses from friends and I feel encouraged about doing more!
