Balcony in Bloom

Teacher Painting

"Balcony in Bloom" 10 x 13" Oil on Canvas by Richard Robinson.

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For rectangles seen at an angle, the true centre is not halfway between the sides. It is found at the intersections of its diagonals.

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The lines we would expect to be horizontal actually converge to points on the horizon, which is always our eye level. (Click image to enlarge).

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Original image.

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The centre line of each part of the window is different.

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Saturation raised by 50% and shadows lightened a little.

Student Painting

"Blooming Balcony" 10x13" Watercolour on 300gsm Arches Paper by Ana Murza

Wow this is fantastic Ana! Beautifully done. Great colour and drawing and I especially love the fading out of the foliage at the top and the long soft shadow cast under the balcony. Congratulations on a painting well done - there's nothing I'd change.

Student Painting

"Balcony in Bloom" 33x25cm Oil on Canvas by Jan Duarte

"For some reason I thought it would be a good idea to finish using up some old student grade paints I had laying around and after trying out artist quality paints, I realized I had made this exercise 10 times harder. I'm quite happy with the texture I achieved at the bottom but I'm aware that my brushwork needs many more years of practice to avoid muddiness, just haven't quite learned how much oil to use with my stiff paints." - Jan Hi Jan you've done a great job of your drawing, brushwork and your colour work despite using student grade paints. I really like the way you've massed the wall creepers and lightened them off to the right to add some depth. A few things I would like to see done better: 1. The shadow under the roof could be softened and the right pole connected better to the wall by rounding it there and shadowing it. 2. You could have used more flowers to add more strong colour. 3. The texture at the bottom needs more work to add interest there. You can still add this once it's dry. Go crazy with it! You've really got to to cut loose to get interesting texture. Some faint hint of blockwork to the sides might be nice too. Overall a great result with a little more work to take it to the next level. Nicely done!

Student Painting

"Waiting for you.." Oil on Canvas by Cristina Mihailescu

Nice to see you coming up with something slightly different here Cristina - the painting is now much more about the bright yellow wall and the scattering of falling leaves as if the scene itself is being dissolved from the ground up, or a sprinkling of fairy dust. As a design this works really well. Architecturally, your flattening of the horizontals has made the balcony seem more frontal whereas the window and roof appear to be at a different angle. The central roof pole meets the wall is off centre too, so there are quite a few issues with the drawing, but apart from that it still looks beautiful. Good job.

Student Painting

"Provencal boutique with balcony" 30x40cm Oil on Canvas by Jessica Futerman

Lovely painting, Jessica, brimming with life and colour. Great to see you employing a range of contrasting brushwork from dainty to bravura, needle to broom. The green and red make a nice counterbalance. Nice too, to be able to walk into the shop and explore a little. There are just two things I might look at changing if this were mine: 1. Break the hard line of the balcony across the middle of the canvas by allowing more wall on the right and solidifying some of the drapping foliage. This would give the eye easier paths to follow from top to bottom. 2. Consider the quality of the light more. I would expect to see soft shadowing beneath the balcony and window ledge and possible soft or cast shadows on the main green sign from the plants overhanging it. Beautiful!

Student Painting

"Blooming Balcony" 25x30cm Oil on Canvas by Marisa Comana Pessina

A beautiful job of the texture and colour in this painting Marisa. I can see you've really worked on that texture and had a good time with it. The drawing is a little different from the photo - it seems like your viewpoint is higher up but it doesn't look bad despite that. The only thing I'd change in this painting would be to just darken the line of the floor of the balcony which seems to have been lost a little, oh and a few darker accents in the shadows of the foliage on the railing too. Great work!