Working In A Series Workshop

I got to attend a really fun workshop at CQFA last meeting, led by one of our member's Sonja Jeter.  She was helping us learn about working in a series.  First we water color painted white index cards with colors representing our feelings.

We also did a blind contour drawing of a simple bird shape, filling a page.  Then we selected a few we really liked the best (those are circled).  We traced those on tracing paper.

Using the watercolored backgrounds we started combing the birds with some other elements from our answers to a short quiz she'd given us at the beginning of the workshop.

Adding three birds to the vertical thing I see all the time (a redwood tree of course!).  We added the birds by ripping them off of the tracing paper and gluesticking them down.  Then we applied watercolor on top.  I really liked how this worked.  Plus Sonja noted that this is great for trying out placement, so you don't ruin a background you particularly like!

Three birds added to the horizontal thing I see all the time (a deck railing).Taking an abstract view, which is a closeup of some of the elements of the deck railing card above.  I think this is my favorite of all of these.

An abstracted bird shaped head.

The word summing up how I was feeling along with one of the strangest birds from my blind contour drawing.