Human/Nature Interface - New Oil Painting Mock-Ups

Contemplating a new series of 8x10 oil paintings that combine the human form with floral motifs.  As I age, I'm more and more aware of the evolution of the body back to nature.  
 

A Day at China Camp

(Above) A digital collage of various photos take at China Camp yesterday.  It's been awhile since visiting this site in San Rafael - about 23 years!  Last time was January 1996 when I did this drawing (Below).  The best way to tell time is with old artwork and photos.  Makes up for having no memory.

Young Self Anticipating Old Age

Having recently reached a new old age milestone, I think back on my younger self in the early 1960s, wondering what it would be like to be this old.  Now I know!  It's not too bad.

Playing Around with old photos and art and Alien Skin textures in Photoshop CC

Take an old 2015 rose photo, add some Alien Skin lizard skin, then add a 2012 twenty minute sketch of an art class model named Wanda and mix them all up!

Messing Around with Twin Photographs and Photo Effects

While playing with various alternative Photography techniques, I discovered a Effects dial on my Nikon D750 that takes pictures one would think are worthless.  That didn't stop me from using them in the two digital composites revealed above.  Top three:  Cole (with a cold on the couch), then a combination of that original photo with an effects shot of Cole and Wilson.  Bottom three:  Matt Taylor with his twin sons, combined with another effects shot of the threesome plus the dog.  I think I like the bottom result the best, but can no longer remember how I did it. 

Variations on a Bear Theme

Digital bears (from a pen & ink & watercolor original) on the left; Quilted bears on the right.  The polka dotted bear is my latest - created for a new creature quilt.  Can't get enough of this bear!

Reaching for the Stars

I photographed a child's hand print embedded in concrete on a sidewalk in town, and I wanted to do something with it.  This is what happened.  The pink stars, with raindrops, are from an antique tile embedded in a wall at Robson Harrington gardens.

Red and Green Christmas - Hello, is this 1949?

2nd in a series of experimental red and green digital composites for Christmas 2016.

Variations on a Foggy Rodeo Beach at Dawn Theme

For a new self-directed photography class, I elected to shoot a series of photos based on invisible forces of nature, which were to focus on the unseen forces of gravity and magnetism. So, I got up at dawn to shoot high tide at Rodeo Beach.  It was very foggy.  My favorite picture didn't even include the tide.  And when I thought about it, I realized every photo ever shot represents invisible forces of nature.  So I shifted gears and decided to do variations on a theme instead.  The theme is my dawn photo session in the fog.  The variations reflect different techniques.  Here's what I ended up with:
Top to Bottom
1 and 5:  Original printed photos, taken at Rodeo Beach, of Fort Cronkhite and of the high tide
2:  A digital patchwork of 3" square sections taken from several foggy photos
3.  The Fort Cronkhite scene printed on fabric, then quilted and machine and hand embroidered
4.  A digital composite of the Fort Cronkhite scene with a photo of my father in 1942, in the army during WWII, combined with a periodic table of the elements and a table of fundamental force particles.  My brainy father, who I miss, was a rocket scientist, chemist, lawyer, artist and photographer.  He would have understood the science.  He hated the army.
6:  A reshoot of the original foggy high tide photo with two wooden artist models playing with a red rubber ball.

Bird at the Beach

Obsessed with 3D?  Yes.  Another wool-punched fabric bird made whole in the computer, combined with layer after layer on top of a photo taken at Muir beach.

Looking Through The Window

Rainy day photo composite.

Running Into Spring

#2 in my series of "People Plus Nature,"  fine art photography features the Taylor Twins running down a hill in Discovery Park in Seattle in December, 2015, towards a pink blooming tree I photographed at Skywalker Ranch in March, 2010.

Multiple Exposure

With 1965 photo, cold wax painting and photographs of 2015 Christmas cactus apples and Pyracantha berries

Bugs in a Bottle on a Table

Not sure why I just spent almost all day drawing some new insects (cicada, digger wasp and grasshopper) just to put them in a digital bottle on a table in a fantasy room.  But I did!  The new bugs should also make their appearance in my cold wax and oil paint picture of a "Bottle Waiting for Bugs" once I transfer them into that painting in process.

Exquisite Corpse Exercise

Digital collage in 4 parts with solid background.

Variations on a Parrot Theme

Crows Flying at Sunset

Loon Button Garden

Version B with layered feather pattern.  Just playing with Photoshop.

Hearts and Birds

More pattern making, with the help from a few good books:  A Field Guide to Fabric Design by Kimberly Kight, published by C&T Publishing, Inc. over in Lafayette, CA, and Mastering the Art of Fabric Printing and Design by Laurie Wisbrun, published by Chronicle Books in SF.

Playing with Fish in Software

Bought new Textile Symmetry and Pattern Design software from Artlandia then combined it with some pen & ink drawings that were turned into glass objects using Alien Skin software and Photoshop.  Ridiculous amount of fun.