Author: Steve Mitchell

Should you Adopt the Mindset of a Professional Artist?

Steve Mitchell11 Comments

Well, in my not-so-humble opinion, YES! But what exactly do I mean?

What I’m NOT talking about is quitting your current job, doing nothing but art and trying to get paid for it. I realize a lot of my YouTube audience and by extension, blog readers here, are leisure time artists just trying to enjoy themselves with art, produce some satisfactory results and perhaps improve.

So, that last one, improving, THATS what I’m talking about here and this is where a professional mindset will help you regardless of whether you aspire to reach a professional level or not. Even more specifically, lets deal with one important way to facilitate improvement and that’s problem solving.

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The Perfect Sketchbook Debuts! AGAIN!

Image Steve Mitchell1 Comment

The newest iteration of THE PERFECT SKETCHBOOK will be debuting soon. Go check out Etchr Lab’s post and the interview in which yours truly took part. I’ve been privileged to have experienced Erwin Lian’s original Sketchbooks, and I’m thrilled that Etchr has picked up the brand and design with Erwin’s oversight and blessing of course.  […]

Digital Detour. Sort Of…

Steve Mitchell3 Comments

… Its really more of a frequently enjoyed side trip as I travel along the path that defines my art journey. Digital illustration was such a huge part of my professional life for years. I spent hundreds of hours in front of a computer monitor working in Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator primarily on client art, so its still in my blood. A drawing tablet was essential to that work. The need for digital art is not as essential these days and I’m totally loving a re-focus on natural media, especially watercolor but I still love digital and all the tech associated with it. It’s a useful and versatile tool for visualization and study when applied to natural media like drawing or painting.

If you’re a digital artist too or have been one in the past, I would love to hear your war stories. And how do you mix or use digital in concert with natural media?

I’ve pulled all nighters doing client work on a Wacom tablet. I would have loved to have been able to work on a pen display like this back then.

The Huion Kamvas Pro 22 (2019)

Clouds and Notifications

Steve Mitchell5 Comments

Hey YouTube, If its Broke Why Not Fix It!

The YouTube Notification Bell (next to the subscribe bar) is, when clicked, supposed to give you a notification for every video that particular YouTube channel releases. SUPPOSED TO! If you haven’t clicked the one on my channel and you want notice of all my videos you should go ahead and click it and it may work for you. We all want more notifications on our devices don’t we? (wait don’t answer that) Problem is it’s not always working according to several reports. As a result I also post every video on my Facebook Page. Those get posted about a week later, but if you’re on Facebook much it’s another way to see and be notified of new videos. My Patrons on Patreon also get a posting there with notification of every video and get to see each video 24 hours before everyone else. If you’re interested in supporting my channel on a monthly basis for as little as $1 a month you can CLICK HERE and sign up.

Clouds and More Clouds

To kick things off, here is my latest episode on creating simple and easy clouds, PLUS, it’s part of a new playlist on clouds incase you haven’t seen all 6. The 6th one in this playlist is actually a landscape and a review of Stonehenge Aqua paper, but I spend a little time demonstrating a stormy spring sky. Enjoy, and we’ll talk to everyone in the next post.

Check out my Amazon affiliate page of recommended art supplies

And welcome new Affiliate, The Brush Guys! Use the code Minder5 at checkout for a 5% discount and you’ll also be supporting my channel through your purchase.

The Craft of Art

Steve Mitchell32 Comments

It’s interesting and a little mind blowing when you consider all the definitions and opinions of what constitutes good art. It’s also no exaggeration to say you won’t find one official standard or majority opinion. Elvis on black velvet is art to one person while “Water Lillies” by Claude Monet another. Ok, bad example, maybe there is a majority opinion on that one, but hopefully you get my point. Good art means different things to different people. An artist will likewise grapple with the concept of what makes their own work more artistic. What should an artist strive for to become a more creatively artistic artist?

WARNING: what I’m about to express now is opinion. Furthermore its MY opinion and will not be shared by all. GASP! I know right. But you think about it and decide for yourself.

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I’m Teaching a Class! YAY!

Steve Mitchell13 Comments

I’ve some exciting news to share! For those of you local to me, I’ll be teaching a 6-week watercolor landscape class in Greenville, SC at the Greenville Center for Creative Arts. Enrollment will kick off this Friday night, May 3rd, from 6-9pm at an OPEN HOUSE where you can come and meet me, watch a demo, sign up for the class and get a 10% discount. My classes will start June 6th and be every Thursday evening from 6-9pm. If you’re interested you might want to jump on this one. Class enrollment is limited to just 12. So come see me at the Open House this Friday night or go to https://artcentergreenville.org starting this weekend to sign up for the class. 

The Blog is Back

Steve Mitchell7 Comments

Well… hopefully anyway! This blog has admittedly been lowest on my list of priorities. Bringing you informative, instructive and entertaining video content on YouTube is what its all about for me, but I think its about time I rebooted this puppy and tried to reintegrate everything. This blog gives me the opportunity to opine on other subjects, answer questions in a quick, easily shared format or just make you aware of other happenings of interest in the art world. So that’s the goal.

NOTE: If its been over a year since you signed up to follow this blog you might want to look in the sidebar to the right to make sure you’re subscribed. If you are it will say so. If you’re not, there will be a form to submit your email again. I’ve change platforms due to site technical issues and the original list of subscribers was lost. If you received notice of this blog post in an email you’ll also know that you’re subscribed.

Lets do this!

Loose vs. Tight, Aren’t We Missing the Point?

Steve Mitchell1 Comment

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The Devil is in the Intangibles

There is a larger issue artists of all stripes should spend more time contemplating. Loose and impressionistic, like tight and controlled handling of any art subject, involves numerous choices in the process, at the beginning and all along the way. In and of themselves, loose painting or tightly rendered detail are not artistic, regardless of what art snobs might say. Its how deftly you wield those styles that matter, right? Right! Sound a little obvious to you? Well it should, but its odd how little I see that aspect discussed. Loose painting is not more artistic simply because its loose. Its artistic because the loose passages were employed skillfully, maximizing the medium’s strengths and showcasing the beauty of color combinations, flow, center of interest, composition and a host of other elements that came together in a dynamic and pleasing way, albeit loose way. The same goes for tightly controlled, realistic rendering and detail. A piece is not strong because it is accurately rendered to the minutest detail. All the detail in the world, all the realism in the world can’t make a piece of art more artistic. Its the intangibles that matter: design, composition, light, value, leading eye elements or any of the other elements that also make a loose painting great.

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Strathmore Artist Workshops

Steve Mitchell

If you follow my YouTube channel, you may have noticed that I’ve been uploading Strathmore Workshop videos over the last couple weeks. These were 4 videos done for their web site last spring (2016) and aired during each week of May. This year, as per agreement with Strathmore, the video rights revert back to me. So I thought I would also post all 4 workshop videos right here (as soon as each is uploaded) along with the downloadable photo reference I mentioned in the videos. Thanks for looking and post any questions you might have here or on in the YouTube comments section of each video.

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Art Critiques and Getting the Most from Input.

Steve Mitchell

We all want to improve as artists don’t we? Growing as an artist is the key to more enjoyment and satisfaction as we tread this adventurous but sometimes frustrating path. Practice is a given, but what happens when we get stuck and don’t know how to improve. The brave artist seeks appropriate, constructive input and critique. Its a tougher challenge, though, than we sometimes realize. Asking someone to tell us what is wrong with our art, which is so often a personal expression of ourselves, is also risky, baring our soul to the cold frigid winds of potential rejection. So if its done, it ought to be done right. There is good input and bad input. How do you tell the difference? Here are some pointers from my experience.

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