Freeform Poppy Card

Couldn’t wait to try another, what I’m calling, free hand painted flower. This is where I’m painting directly on paper without drawing or sketching an image out first. I usually get into serious trouble doing this as you can’t undo watercolors. But, it’s fun to do, so I thought I’d give it a try again, especially after my first attempt gained support.

For this image, I cased the internet for poppy photos and found one to use. Clearly, if I had drawn a poppy, I think the dimensions and orientation would have been much better. But, seeing as it didn’t turn out terrible I ended up turning it into a card. I think this is a good exercise to build skills. Anyway, I picked a poppy, because these also are a fav of my husband’s (he may be my muse). Here’s the image I loosely used as a reference flower (number of petals, look of stem, posture of flower...).

I started with a piece of Arches Cold Pressed Watercolor paper and used my Schmincke watercolors. The video which begins right at a clean slate, is again attached at the end of this post, and, is in Youtube. To see a bigger version, just click on the word Youtube and expand that. I pretty much completed the painting on the video, which is sped up 4xs. However, I did add a final second coat of red orange to bolden the colors off cameras and deepened the black area. I also added white Posca pen marks.

I used the SimonSaysStamp! Love Always Kit for the sentiment and a Kaisercraft In the Attic paper pad for the background, as well as black card stock. I added black string and black enamel dots to complete the card. Will need to try this again!

The video is 9 minutes long FYI. Let me know what you think... should I ditch the free hand painting? Would you prefer to see more stamped images? Are the videos useful? Thanks for stopping by! Be sure to subscribe if you like my creative endeavors!