Today we finished our very own personal paintings. Mine was pretty cool. I couldn’t get over how easy it was to add in a shoulder that had been cropped out of my reference photo. I mean I love that shoulder! Look at it! It looks  like it belongs there!

This may not sound very awesome to you… (”It’s just a stupid shoulder. Why I own two of them!”) But what it means is that it theoretically should be just as easy for me to add in much cooler things to my fantasy portraits: wings, tails, horns, green skin, long hair, flowing capes, etc. I can’t wait to try this out on piece with a little more story behind it. I already have something in mind, actually. But first, I’m definitely going to finish a birthday present for my boyfriend that I started today and a mock comic book cover for my The Haunted Timeshare story for Horror class.

Check out the Painter results! My reference phot is from xStockx at deviantArt. You can see that I elongated the shot and added in a swirly, smoky background, added the shoulder, added the belly and hips, completely reworked the colors into a more oily feel, painted the lips, added some stringy hairs, and just basically had a great time painting every stroke.

It reminds me of "The Scream." Maybe it should be called "The Silence."

Thankfully, today Jane went over the subject of pricing as we worked on our projects. It seems as though everyone was right in telling me that my estimates would be grossly underpricing myself. It also seems that I should alter my plan slightly, and instead of sell the digital copy of my paintings, actually sell my customers the prints. That way I can keep them from going and printing my work a thousand times, and also it gives me control over the finished product so that I can ensure they get something of high quality instead of some crappy print.

It was an educational day, just like the other two days. And just like the other two, it was mentally exhausting. Luckily, we took off a little early today while it was still light to go have some fun. Jane,  her husband, Julie, my mom and me all loaded up and headed out into the odd but pleasant weather (the sky was painted with these fake-looking clouds that looked like they were out of a cartoon or something) to do some sight-seeing.

I didn't know the Super Mario games were filmed in Florida.

We went to see the “real” Florida. This means swamp. It’s swamp in a good way, though. There was lots of picture taking and a 2000-year-old live oak tree and we finally ended up at a surf bar called Snack Jacks or something. I wish I could elaborate, but after all this drawing and learning, my fingers and brain are too tired to go on. So I’m just going to  let the pictures do the talking.

Pretty good for an iPhone, eh? Even the bathroom at this place is surf themed.

I think this tree's really probably from Michigan and just retired here.