On the E.D.G.E.

Welcome to the Journey of My EDGE Project

Research and Reference Pictures

My three main pictures I used for reference and inspiration were these ones.

This picture was my original inspiration of trying to get the temple and the red hill together in one photo.

Though I used many pictures and took many many more, as minor references and inspirations as I worked to try to get the layout of the picture.

I found this spot in a neighborhood, where I almost had the perfect view of how I wanted my picture to look. (Minus the houses in the way.)

Layout and Practice

This is the original rough layout of the picture

My original plan was to sketch the whole picture out in gray-scale before I put anything onto the canvas. This plan backfired on my at first because I did not have a piece of paper big enough for me to match the canvas size wise. I did some general sketching and reference picture taking while I waited for my canvas in the mail. I wanted to see what I was working with before I made any hard plans.

Got my canvas in the mail!
I was a little surprised at the size.

I took some time to practice using watercolor paint on canvas and layering acrylic paint on top, by making a small picture for my dad for his birthday. (He likes boats)

Sketch, Adjust and More Practice

I had never drawn the temple before and wanted to practice and get used to the proportions before I tried to put it on the canvas. I drew out the basic outlines and features of it in my sketchbook.

This picture took up way more time than I thought it would and set my timeline back more than I would like to admit. I had a difficult time getting the angles to match up, and let un-perfectly straight lines bother me.

I drew out the general shape of the read hill and the mountain behind it then saved some time by transferring the temple that I already drew, straight to the paper.

Traced the out line from my sketchbook to my larger paper

Dry-erase markers saved the day!

Size and proportion comparison.

When comparing my paper to the canvas that the amount of temple to hill ratio was not what I wanted. After some flailing and stress, I realized that I could sketch the size outlines on the plastic wrapper of the canvas. This way I could play around with positioning and figure out just what size I needed the temple to be.

I realized that I basically needed to fill the whole page of a paper the size of my original sketch. Luckily I had an extra paper the exact size I needed. I measured the boundaries of the size that I wanted and started to draw the temple one more time.

Because I had to draw it smaller once before, drawing the bigger outlines was much easier the second time around.

I didn't have quite enough room to have the angel fit on the same page. With some MacGyvering I was able to just tape a spare bit of paper on and voila I was ready to trace it onto the canvas.

Final Stretch For The Stretched Canvas

I wish the quality was better. I have the hill and mountain out line sketched out in the background.

With everything outlined and my reference pictures close by for color comparison, I was ready to paint!

Started with the sky and moved down the canvas one layer of water color at a time.

Now to add some details!

Painting the temple was Scary!

I am really happy with how it turned out though! I used a combination of cheaper acrylic paints, the kind you might use on a wood craft thing, and nicer "painting paint". The combination worked really well, I was able to stretch out the effects of the nice paint with out using a ton of it.

My husband didn't get to use our table for a whole week! ;)

After I finished the temple I needed to add close up detail and fill in lots of empty space. I used acrylic paint for the trees because of the opaque properties of it. I will say this, throughout this project I have changed my understanding of paint: on good days it will cooperate, on bad days it will be as evil as it can, so make sure it’s a good day before you crack open the paint.

ALL DONE

Here you see the smile of a tired but satisfied SUU student, with her finished EDGE project.