Having Some Fun with Colored Pencils

I had never heard of "burnishing" with colored pencils prior to taking a short online class with Cynthia Knox.  With two small children running around, sometimes I feel a little overwhelmed by the complete lack of time for me to do anything not related to my kids.  Taking an art class seemed way out of the realm of possibility until I stumbled upon Craftsy.  This website offers a ton of rewarding arts and crafts classes and they are constantly running sales so that for $20.00 you can get quality instruction.  It took me a while to build up the courage to take the leap into something so completely outside my comfort zone of crafting, but I thought this particular class looked...well, fun.  

​So, with my family in tow, I kept my eyes peeled for pretty flowers to photograph. I have the best of them here.  These flowers were spotted by my husband outside of a record store he enjoys browsing.   Using a grid, I transferred my favorite photograph of a water lily to a large piece of paper.  The photo almost looked unreal to me.  There was something almost illustrated about the texture of the petals that I found very appealing.  I think perhaps transferring the image with my drawing is the weakest aspect of my project, I need to bolster my skill of contour line drawing with some more practice. Also, my attempts to add water droplets to some of the petals was a little lame.  That could be improved, too. 

The wonderful thing about this Craftsy class was that it did not matter how slow I worked or how long it took me to watch a lesson.  Accessible on my phone, it was super convenient to sneak in peaks of what to do next for my drawing.  Actually, it turns out, my oldest son really likes watching craft classes with me, so that was a unexpected bonus and he made for a great snuggle buddy while I learned how to lay down layers of colored pencil to create a more realistic looking flower.  (Netflix now has old Bob Ross episodes...my son also loves those.  While I have no interest in learning to oil paint, especially not landscapes most often seen hanging in hotel lobbies, they are really fun to watch.  Did you know he had a pet squirrel in some of his episodes?  Crazy.)    

Start to finish, working in 30 minute- 1 hour intervals, it took me a little over a month to finish this drawing.  Many days it sat untouched.  But in the end I was proud of my efforts.  I definitely have room for improvement, but there is something very exciting about that, too.  I really enjoyed learning something new.  I will definitely start another color pencil creation soon.  It's challenging for me, but also very relaxing.  It is something I would like to get better at, though honestly I really did not need another genre of project.  However, improving my eye for color is helpful in all my art endeavors, especially with my ambitions to create original knitwear.  And nature inspires everyone, right?  Really, I am trying to justify this choice when perhaps there is no justification past, "I wanted to try it, isn't it neat?"