oil painting

View image in full resolution here.

In focusing on creativity as a main adventure in my day, I am facing an internal struggle with what is “true creativity” in my creative process. Technology allows me to create in new ways I couldn’t have imagined ten years ago. In this process, I want to redefine “underpainting” to include the first selected and chosen photographic image.

This takes me to my passion for the concept of “underpainting” which I tend to use even when painting with watercolours. What has got me musing, and experimenting, is the technological advances that allow me to start with an image I’ve captured in a digital photograph and then begin “overpainting” until it is rendered as an oil painting or ink sketch in further digital applications.

( I’m not a photoshop artist nor have I yet ventured in the direction of actual layering images to gain a photograph that gives me a desired finished product. I may at some point – but it has not come to that yet.)

This is my question to self: “Is the finished work (which I am pleased with) having begun with a photographic “underpainting” and resulting in an oil or ink “overpainting” while never picking up a brush or hand-mixing a colour a legitimate creative process?”

Here is another example where I am equally satisfied with the “overpainting” and the original photographic “underpainting.”

View image in full resolution here.

View image in full resolution here.

Sprout Question: How do you define legitimate creativity in your own creative processes?

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Purchase photography at http://www.redbubble.com/people/terrillwelch

Creative Potager – where imagination rules. Be inspired.

My photo shoot yesterday produced mixed results in the low and uneven afternoon light. However, sitting quietly with one of the images, during the editing process, lead me down an interesting path. After several turns, a shoreline photo is transformed into a black and white oil painting of Bennett Bay on Mayne Island.

View the full resolution of Bennett Bay Mayne Island here.

When we are prepared to be surprised and allow an image to call us forward, not just in the beginning of the creative process but all the way to the end, sometimes magic happens. I almost through this original photo image away even though I liked the composition because the mood was different than I wanted. But I just couldn’t get myself to press the delete button and I started to play with the image instead. First, I made the image black and white (as it was almost there already). Then I used a simple program to change it into an oil painting – nothing complicated, just editing tools I had at hand. With a bit more fine tuning, I now have an image that is no longer “really” a photo or ‘really” an oil painting. Setting these judgments aside – I am happy with the end results.

Sprout Question: What creative process might you try if you set your initial judgment about what is legitimate “creative work” aside?

Liberal usage granted with written permission. See “About” for details.

Purchase photography at http://www.redbubble.com/people/terrillwelch

Creative Potager – where imagination rules. Be inspired.