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Works by Artistry Readers


Editor’s note: Readers of Painting for Photographers and Artistry Tips and Tricks are submitting paintings they created from photos based on the lessons in the book and in the ezine issues.

Tom Thomas

Dear Karen,

I enjoyed your new book and I have enclosed a painting I did using your Impressionists Portrait chapter and the Opaque Acrylic Brush you suggested.

I have read many books on Corel Painter and taken courses from many of the master painters.

Your book is well organized and easy to follow.

Your chapters on brushes and tools take the mystery out of Painter for beginners. If you have a basic knowledge of Painter, the book can really take you past a beginner’s level fast and reinforce what a lot of long-term users have forgotten.

Of all the books that I have read, Painting for Photographers is my favorite.

Sincerely, Tom Thomas


S J Galletta

Hi Karen,

I photographed this butterfly at just the right time as it was about to fly off.

I used auto paint and varied the brush size, I then used soft cloner to bring in some of the detail.

I entered it at an art show and almost won 1st place till I told the judge how I did it. It seems they had no category for digital art, but I did sell this picture at the show. I hope one day they will accept this type of work.

I enjoy your tutorials [in Artistry Tips and Tricks] and am starting to grasp the digital art concept.

S J Galletta


Linda Immel

Karen,

Thought you might like to see two paintings I did yesterday. Both paintings resulted from ideas I got from your new book [Painting for Photographers] and a couple of your individual lessons [in Artistry Tips and Tricks].

I’ve been painting in Painter for quite awhile but wasn’t getting a painterly look. I think I have achieved the painterly look in these two pieces. Both are from personal photos.

I mainly used the smear, smudge and grainy blenders, square chalk, soft pastel and soft flat oil brushes. I need to find Basset Hound feet and fix his feet. His feet were in the grass and I could not see them but I can tell you these are not Basset feet.

I really enjoyed doing these using my new approach.

Thanks for your book and your lessons.

Linda Immel


Mel Lammers

Karen,

Your book [Painting for Photographers] is reinforcing my knowledge of color, composition, and digital painting. My confidence is growing.

Bridge Over Tranquil Waters [thanks to Simon and Garfunkel for inspiration]

Mel Lammers

Source photo

First painting


Mike Miller

Hi Karen,

I tried to apply some of your ideas about painting a pastel landscape. I know I don’t have a clear central focus and haven’t met the Rule of Thirds requirement, but plowed ahead anyway, as you were the first artist to show me that digital painting from photographs could be more like painting and less like cloning. I found it exciting and mind stretching and look forward to learning more from your book. The ability to change brush variants to blenders is something I had read about before, but you walked us through it, and I found it easy to do.

I will work on composition, contrast and focal points, but I was anxious to try some of Painter 11’s tools in ways you show in your tutorials. As I look at the pastel I revised, I see I overdid the blending a bit. Should have tried to retain the texture on the charcoal paper I had selected. I think the first attempt has more energy and movement, though the foreground pastel strokes are a little distracting.

Thanks for these wonderful tutorials, both in the Painting for Photographers book and in your Artistry Tips and Tricks.

Mike Miller

Source photo

First painting

Edited painting


Painting for Photographers and Artistry Tips and Tricks readers: Submit your photos and paintings by emailing Karen Sperling.

New Gallery Show September 25, 2009

I just dropped off my art for my new group gallery show opening this Friday, September 25, 2009, in Glendale, CA.
Invitation to Gallery Godo opening reception.
I created some new, smaller, color works for this new show as part of my Magical Mystical Tours series of abstracts.
new Magical Mystical Tour.
Since my childhood in New York, I’ve had a recurring dream in which
the expansive highways leading to gigantic bridges turn into roller coasters
as I travel over them.
The Magical Mystical Tour series stems from this
idea of highways turning into roller coasters.
The new works are approximately 16″ x 12″ and the Gallery Godo show will be their debut.
I’ll also have some new 24″ x 20″ black and white images, and also a couple of the larger 40″ x 30″ works.
This promises to be a great show.
Please join us!
Highly Toxic
Gallery Godo
6749 San Fernando Rd.#C
Glendale, CA 91201
Opening Night: September 25, 2009
7 pm to midnight
Gallery Godo
Karen Sperling’s Abstracts

Tribute to America

Today, September 11, 2009, we remember the people who lost their lives in the tragedy of the World Trade Center disaster.

Although I’m now in California, I lived most of my life in New York, and I had worked in the World Trade Center for many years.

I felt not just the full tragedy of the attack on our country, but also the loss of the nearly 3,000 who perished in the disaster.

September 11, 2001, always has another meaning for me.

It was the first time that I had a painting from my photos published in a magazine.

It happened after I was invited to speak about Painter at the annual Professional Photographers of America convention in 2001.

Joan Sherwood, then managing editor of Photoelectronic Imaging (PEI), which later was folded into Professional Photographer magazine, liked my talk and invited me to do a tutorial for her magazine about my own images.

I told her I didn’t have my own images.

Up till then, I had written tutorials about other peoples’ images. The illustrations I had done for my three Painter books were just quick examples of the brushes. However, they were illustrations, I just didn’t think they “counted” for some reason.

Joan rejected my protests. “You can do it,” she said.

I thought maybe she’s right, and went about putting together my first real painting.

My first thought was to take photos and use them as references for a painting–in 2001, this idea wasn’t as commonplace as it is now–so on September 9, 2001, a beautiful, sunny Sunday, I walked around Melrose Avenue in Hollywood taking pictures.

I was shooting film and brought it in to be developed.

Date the prints were due to arrive: September 11, 2001. Yes, that’s 9/11. Incredible.

I wound up painting “Tribute to America,” in which I used red, white and blue as my color scheme and American icons like palm trees and Cadillacs as an homage to our country.

Below you see the source photos and the composite I created from them.

My message for this art was, never forget 9/11 and also, never take for granted the joys of daily life.

Photos and painting by Karen Sperling.