I'm still in Block, I just completed painting #5 the clarinet, it took me over a year to complete, to be exact on June 19th, it would have been 1 year 3 month, but I completed it today. I was so frustrated with it, and family health issues, caused delays. It would have been easy to give up, but that will never happen. And I hope you never give up as well. 🙃
Thank you for the kind words! It does get discouraging at times. Instead of giving up, we just slow down and do the best that we can. I think I've been working on Block 6 for a year, but that's okay!
im just going back in july to assignments after nearly 7 months maybe 8 of doing an assignment (health stuff - im good). i just wish block 6 was an al carte block....there was mention of it a few yrs back but i think they ditched the idea.😢
Thanks Mia. I like the simple still life of the pitcher with the apple and plum. I'd have given up on the course weeks ago but for your videos. Good luck with the rest of the course.
Thanks! I needed to hear that! I've been working on two videos, my Evolve assignment and trying to complete my black sketchbook. I've been working on art everyday, I'm just slow! 🐌 🙃
Hello. Just found your channel. Do you like the Evolve program? I'm thinking about it, but It seems intensive and I'm working full time at the moment. What are your thoughts on that? I've set some goals for this year for drawing; for example, so many hands, feet, portraits, flowers. That kind of thing. Also trying to paint almost every day.
Hi @joycesmith5786! Signing up for Evolve was one of the best things I've done. I found the foundation courses (blocks 1-4) to be very thorough and the assignments gave me plenty of practice. With Evolve you can go at your own pace. In the beginning I used to complete an assignment in one day, but later I didn't have the time, so I would work object to object for each assignment and that took less time. Since one of your goals is painting everyday, if you joined Evolve you could work on one object at a time in a painting . Drawing hands and flowers are on my to do list too!
It depends on a person's budget. You can pay in full or make monthly payments. It looks like the prices went up since I started in late 2021. Currently it's a one time payment of $2500 or $249 month.
Hi Mia, so happy to hear about your renewed energy for art!!!! I’ve miss you! =) Is that colored pencil, pastel or charcoal you’re using in this this video? Looks very easy to erase. I won’t bore you with my year’s monthly goals, but I’ll tell you what I’m doing in Jan & Feb - gesture and portraits, respectively. I might subscribe to SkillShare starting in Feb. Maybe I can find a decent class there that will motivate me to keep drawing portraits (which is not easy for me).
Thank you! I'm glad to be making videos again. I'd like to make more, but I think doing at least two videos a month helps me stay consistent. I'm using a white col-erase pencil. I experimented with a few different brands of white colored pencil and charcoal, but the col-erase and Crayola were the best, and they erase clean. I don't mind hearing about your goals! You mentioned them to me before and those are things I'm interested in as well. I'm sure you will find something that will keep you motivated. I took Juan Perdnik's portrait drawing class and things started to click after I went through the class a second time.
Block 4 is direct painting. You paint as you go long instead of using the previous approach of indirect painting (shadows, lights, buffer, blend). Block 5 is vacant shadows where you paint only the light, and the dark canvas serves as your shadow. Block 5 is part of the advanced program.
@@MiasSketchbook Thanks, Mia! I hope you've had good luck with the advanced program and did well with it! I'll look at some of your other videos about it.
Hi MIa! I noticed you didn’t have your usual intro… is that a new change for 2024? After taking a couple years off from learning new drawing skills (I mainly used drawing/painting for grief therapy), I decided to get back into it in 2024. I made a year’s ‘program’ with monthly focuses, starting with gesture drawing in Jan. I can’t remember when I’ll be focusing on portraits, but it’s in the beginning of the year, maybe Feb or Mar. So I may be drawing along with you! I’ve never done the 100 heads challenge but I may do it.
Hi, RH! I think I've had my intro for a couple years and I'm quite bored with it. I want something new, simple and shorter. I figured I would just shorten the intro for now until I get something new.
I think it's good that you developed your own program! There are so many things I want to learn but it can get overwhelming at times trying to learn them all. In my next video I was planning on talking about weekly and and monthly goals instead of yearly goals. I've been thinking about taking a gesture drawing class too. I would like to try urban sketching this year and having people in the scene has always made me nervous because people move around a lot. I shall see how that goes!
@@MiasSketchbook I know what you mean -- I also want to learn many things. I can’t see myself doing just one thing, like how some people only do portraits or only botanicals or only landscape. I’m least interested in abstract art but sometimes I feel like I’m warming up to it! My ‘program’ is a bit ambitious but it has a structure that I need/want. Only time will tell if I’m disciplined enough to complete it! 😝 Looking forward to listening to your thoughts/ideas/plans in your next video…. and wishing you a productive and creative year!
I understand, I was in the same situation when I was your age. You can always use paper and pen from school. That's what I did. It was lined paper but I was still able to draw until I was able to buy my first sketchbook. You might not be able to paint right now, but you can still practice the fundamentals with pencil or pen. Those skills will transfer over when you transition into painting. Let me know how everything goes!🤗
Proportional drawing is taught. You measure an object with a knitting needle (or pencil), and you use those measurements for drawing your still life proportionally onto the canvas.
@@MiasSketchbook thanks mia, regarding the course, I’ve been thinking of it for a long tome but I’m hesitant since I’m a dentist and my work is 6 days / Week, 8hrs / Day.. do you think it’s overwhelming and difficult to be achieved?
@@najlakhalid2754Hi. It is a good amount of work, but it's worth it. For someone that busy you could still do it. They say you can complete this course in one year if you just spend 7 hours a week. But you don't have to necessarily spend 7 hours a week. I recommend you do the course and look into the technique called object to object and also look into how to get your paints to last longer such as adding the proper amount of clove oil and or refrigerating or even freezing your oil paints between sessions
What ARE the steps Kevin gave you as you go from shape to shape. I'm in Block two and it seems nothing I'm doing is going to go anywhere. I don't want to skip ahead but I'm the kind of person who likes to know where the plane I'm on is going. I love your channel and look forward to hearing your answer. You're a hero.
Thank you so much for the kind words! It's okay to be frustrated, I know I was in Block 2. When you say shape to shape, do you mean object to object? To be honest, I can't remember exactly what Kevin said about working object to object. What I do know is that I would focus on just one object or section for the day- the the shadows, the lights, blending, and highlights, then I would start on another object the next day. The paintings in Block 4 take longer and I didn't have the time to spend all day working on them. Working object to object made the painting process more manageable and time saving.
Did you ever find a solution for making a mid-tone canvas? I have painted canvas with Burnt Umber mixed into white paint, but I'm sure you could also mix into white gesso.
I haven't had a chance to try it yet! What type of paint did you use to tint your canvas? Was it acrylic or oil? I've mixed burnt sienna acrylic paint with gesso before and it has a matte appearance once it's applied to the canvas, which is what I want. That's the technique I plan on using, but adding less gesso in order for the added color to appear mid tone and less pastel. From my experience some acrylic paints are glossy once they're dry, so Im wary about using straight acrylic paint to tone my canvas After the holidays I'll experiment and see what I can come up with!
@@MiasSketchbook Not an accomplished artist, but I have used Medium Gray acrylic by Utrecht, but I haven't painted on a canvas board larger than 11 x 14. For gesso, I mix raw umber in. The grayest raw umber I've used is Blick's.
Thanks for your great video. It will definitely help me make my decision about whether to buy the course. The video was posted a year ago. Do you still think it was a valuable course?
For me the foundation course has been valuable because I have seen great improvements with all of my artwork, not just the oil painting. I went into the program to learn how to use oil paint and I achieved that. Everything I've learned in the program can be applied to all mediums. I would definitely recommend at least taking the foundation classes.
I have heard others pronounce viviva differently from your pronunciation. But I don't know who is correct. Nice leaves. Yeah, that quick drying paper would drive me bonkers!😂
I snip pieces off each of the sheets. I then glue all the little snips onto a piece of vellum. That way I'm not slapping around super expensive wet sheets of watercolor. The vellum is nice for blending. My only wish is to know what paper they use for the color sheets. It sucks mixing a blend I like, only to have it crumble off my vellum. If my painting isn't finished I'm outta luck!
Cutting the sheets and gluing them to the vellum sounds like a great idea to keep them from sticking to each other. It also sounds like a good way to see your entire pallet at once and not have to worry about losing any of the sheets. Hopefully, you'll find out how to save your mixtures for future use!
Wow! I'm still working on assignment #9 and I have a long way to go. I probably won't finish block 6 until February. I really want to finish so I can start on Block 7, which I've really been looking forward to starting.
@@MiasSketchbook The only reason those paintings took a while to do is because you do a layer, submit for critique and then do the next layer. Sometimes they don't get back to you quickly so each painting takes roughly a week to finish. Although actual time painting is not very long.
Thanks for sharing Mia. It’s so helpful to know others get frustrated and feel like stopping too. I am having such a hard time myself. I am also in Evolve by the way, but merely in Block 3.
I know the feeling! What issues are you having in Block 3? You're almost at the finish line. We're in this together, and we can encourage one another.🤗
Block 1 and Block 4 are both part of the foundation course so the palette will be set up the same. For the advanced courses we have a few additional colors but I haven't seen anything so far in the videos that shows how to set up the palette with these additional colors. I keep my palette the same way I always have and I haven't had the need to use those new colors yet. When I paint something personal for myself, I lay out my palette differently and I use a different set of colors (Gamblin). I prefer my way of laying out the palette but for the sake of the program I organize my palette the way I was taught in Evolve, but only when I work on an Evolve assignment. If you want a visual, I can work on a short video showing my palettes.
It's almost similar to blocks 1-4. There are videos shown in the beginning of each block demonstrating the technique. After the first few assignments there won't be many videos to watch for the rest of the assignments, but you can refer back to the previous videos. Block 5 is vacant shadows, Block 6 is speed painting, Block 7 is puddling and Block 8 is master copies. HTH.
