A collage of three paintings: the first a mermaid with purple hair and a red flowing dress top, the second silhouettes of female mermaid figures, and the third a portrait of a blue-skinned mermaid with flowing pink hair
Drawing,  Traditional Painting

Mermaid Wanderings

Yay, watercolor paintings! These mermaid pieces are from October of last year – again trying to catch up on my 2020 art sharing. I’m happy with how flow-y the hair turned out on all three pieces. I felt extremely rusty with using watercolors, and the background of vague seaweed shadows on the first painting was…ugh.

Still, even feeling rusty, there are things I can find things I like about the first painting: the light and shadow on the tail and the jewelry pattern.

A watercolor painting of a mermaid with purple hair and a red flowing dress top
A sketchbook page showing mermaid silhousettes, painted in ink and pastel watercolor

The silhouette figures on the photo above were a lot of fun – looking at different pictures of women underwater or dancing and turning the shapes into mermaid poses – lots of practice combining various reference photos into a single figure. The watercolor was iridescent, but it’s kind of subtle. It was a nice quick sketchbook page without too much stress.

Sketchbook page of a blue-skinned mermaid with pink flowing hair and a seashell crown

And then finally, above, a sketchbook page done in brush marker and lots of Prismacolor pencils layered over one another. Another chance to practice mermaid hair. Too bad the pose makes her neck look super off :p. I was mainly focusing on hair, so I’m still happy with it! Plus another page filled in my current sketchbook means it was a success.

I’m trying hard to make art more and post more, while keeping the ‘how’ free for myself to choose everyday, wherever my fancy takes me. Last night I spent a long time on an oil pastel drawing for my mark making project. Very fun while watching the rest of the latest Critical Role episode, but it took so much longer than I planned. Ate up most of my night from 6-8pm. 🙁

Now for a new day ahead. I hope it’s a good one.

‘Til next time.

Listening to:
Current mood:

I'm an illustrator and web developer honing my skills and learning all I can about drawing, painting, and storytelling through visual art.