Favorites Friday

Favorite's Friday

Hello Zombi-corns, lets see the favorite's of the week.

So so sorry for the huge delay in this but I will be talking about my absolute favorite watercolor paper in this post as well as why you should be buying high quality material for your art.

 

So probably my most favorite medium is watercolor, I love it's raw look and feel and is very relaxing to use. Some of you may've noticed in some of my most recent watercolor paintings that the paper was wrinkling or warped in spots. That is because it was cheap light weight paper. I believe it was a canson roll of watercolor paper, it was about $30. Now if you're doing large multimedia pieces I think this paper would be good, or if your using it for mostly dry mediums. But if your going to be doing wet on wet painting then this is not for you.

 You can see the warping in these in progress shots. The paper is completely dry in these.      

 

Probably the biggest problem with this was stretching it to get it to lay flat, this is where most of the warping took place. Also if you blended too much on a wet area the paper would start to disintegrate.

But I finally got a paycheck that I could use for art supplies and I got a three pack of Arches 300 lb cold press watercolor paper from dickblick.com.

This paper is my absolute favorite let's go over some pros and cons of it.

Pros:

Paint can grip onto it.

 



 



 

 It has a deckled edge.

 

 

 

It (virtually) doesn't warp.

 

Colors stay vibrant through drying. And blacks stay rich and are not chalky.

 

 

 

 

Cons:

Cost,

three sheets from dickblick was around $50, and shipping. You can find a 5 pack on Amazon but there is a small about of uncertainty when buying from them, coming from experience when I've ordered items from their and gotten the wrong item or it never showed up. 

 

Bowing

While it wont warp or crease like the lighter weight paper it will bow off the surface if you are wetting a large area. Because of it's stiffness though it's not much of a deterrant for me.

 

Griping paint

If you are an abstract painter or are wanting a lot of running paint and drips then this may not be for you., The reason I like this paper is because I can wet a small area and the water wont run down the page because of the paper's absorbency but some people may not like that.

 

Deckled Edges.

The deckled edge is great for presentation and gives it a high quality finesse but if you are doing an open composition and are blending out of the page the deckled edge can cause the paint to bloom if you are not careful, usually if I have this happen I can blend it out.

 

 

So there is a few facts for anyone wanting to experiment with this, I will also show how I plan on mounting these for an upcoming student show in the next coming weeks.

 

Now why to buy the higher quality stuff than buying budget friendly. Well it's simply because it will enhance your artwork as well as enhance it to other people. Most of my teachers grade very critically on materials and presentation, though they do all understand that we are all poor college kids.

But just like trying to budget to buy healthier options at the grocery store, you need to budget yourself to be able to buy the right supplies especially if this is what field you will be going into in life. Also you will usually find that higher quality art supplies respond and work better than cheaper materials.

 

Well that's it for this week, I will try and be more attentive to the blog, this week is spring break and I am planning on doing a lot of art things; painting, speed drying paintings, and framing pieces for a show. I will let you all know how it goes I hope you have a good weekend and spring break!

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You can also follow my pinterest page to see all the magnificent things I find from healthy recipes to art to wedding planning.

 



Favorite's Friday

Favorite's Friday

Hello Zombi-corns, let's see what amazing things helped me get through the week.

So sorry for missing Monday, I tried writing the post on my phone and that didn't pan out.

But for my first favorite!

This wonderful face brush. If you wear makeup everyday or just really like to wash your face I would definitely recommend getting something like this. Probably the most popular brand is the Clarisonic Mio. Which eventually I would like to invest in one of those because they have a lot of different brush heads that you can get for it.

 

This brush is extremely simply, it has a power button and then a speed button, it also has three speeds. But this definitely helps get your face clean, and I personally think this has helped with my acne.

Another favorite would have to be this color depositing shampoo. Watercolors by Tressa in the color Fluid Fire.

 

I had my hair colored dark red about a month ago and have been using this when I wash my hair and I would have to say this has really helped the color not fade. Now I've also changed to only washing my hair once a week and only in cold water because red is probably the hardest to maintain. So what is this? This is a color depositing shampoo designed to replace the color you lose in the shower when washing your hair, it is not dye. It doesn't smell bad and it works pretty well, but I mix this with my regular shampoo since I have a lot of hair, and because I like a good lather. Also if you are thinking of getting this be prepared to wash your shower often. This can stain if you let it dry on your tub or shower. There is also another brand I've heard of and kind of want to try which is Overtone. Overtone is a color depositing conditioner though, but they also have treatments to go along with the regular conditioner. They also have a wider color range for anyone with unicorn hair out there. If I get the Overtone I will probably get their darkest red shade and a dark purple shade to mix to give my hair more of a marsala color.

 

And a forever favorite is coffee, and lots of it. I also rediscovered my love for amaretto creamer!

Well that's it for this week, I hope you had a good week and have an amazing weekend, I'll see you all on Monday!

 

 

You can follow my facebook to get updates on the new blogs.

You can also follow my pinterest page to see all the magnificent things I find from healthy recipes to art to wedding planning.

 

Favorite's Friday

Favorite's Friday

Hello Zombie-corns let's take a look at the things that helped me get through the week.

First off so sorry about missing last week's posts life has been really extremely busy. But I did have some things that helped me get through it.

 

First thing was coffee, lot's of coffee. I was basically perpetually tired all last week because my body has not gotten back into routine of getting up at 6AM and not stop moving till around 4PM everyday yet. The universe's way of telling me "Welcome to adult hood."

 

 

Another really big thing that helped me out was my fraternity brother's and my big. We just went through initiating 14 member candidates, and I got two of my own little's. I'm super excited for all of them and to help my own little's through the process of learning about the fraternity and what we're all about. Because of privacy I wont post any pictures of their faces. But here's a picture from our winter formal of us in front of a giant Christmas ornament!

 

 If you did not know, I am a member of the Gamma Theta chapter of Kappa Kappa Psi here at my university. Kappa Kappa Psi is the national honorary fraternity for college band members and was established in 1919 at what is now Oklahoma State University. I have been a member for a year now and I cannot tell you how much it has helped me in my college career. Having that support system and being a part of national organization is amazing, as well as it servicing college bands makes it even better. Everybody always get's confused when I say I'm in a fraternity and am a "brother", but my fraternity is co-ed so everybody is a brother. It's sister sorority Tau Beta Sigma is the same so all members are sisters.

Also something that helped me get through the week as well as helped me get in the zone for my painting class was a new radio station I made on Spotify.


This is the band that I started the artist radio off of. It's a very ambient pop kind of sound to it, not sure how to describe it you'll just have to look up for yourself.
Speaking of painting class here is a WIP shot of a watercolor I'm working on. Still not sure about the background yet, we'll see.
Well that's it for now, I hope you enjoy your weekend and liked this post!

You can follow my facebook to get updates on the new blogs.

You can also follow my pinterest page to see all the magnificent things I find from healthy recipes to art to wedding planning.

 

Favorite's Friday

  

Favorite's Friday

Hello Zombi-corns, let's look at the things that helped me make it through the week.

Happy New Year, I recently bought some art supplies and beauty supplies with my Christmas money and I am so excited to share with you.

First off the art supplies, all from Hobby Lobby.

 

   First off and what I'm most excited for these three oval mop round brushes in sizes 3/4", 1/2", and 6, and all from one of my favorite brands, Masters Touch. The smallest brush I purchased was a replacement for one that I used constantly in my Painting class this semester, and I was absolutely thrilled to find bigger sizes. These are perfect for oil painting and skin, or extremely smooth blending. If you do use these with oil paint I would say that you need to use a specific brush cleaner such as the one pictured above in the bottom right corner. These brushes are incredibly soft and will start to shed very easily with heavy paints if not cared for properly.

 

 These are new to me and I mostly bought these for the holder to use with charcoal. These are pastel sticks from Master's Touch. I have been experimenting with them. Here is something I did with them for example.

 These are very comparable to graphite I think but denser and less messy. The density makes them a little harder to blend but overall good for sketching I think. They do not get as dark as charcoal though, when I tried to layer them they only stayed a dense gray and would almost scratch the layer under it off.

This is a Hake Brush, I've never used one but seen people use it. This is going to be used for drafting, which means I will use it with charcoal or any drawing medium that I may get eraser shreds on and don't want to smudge. You can get a larger version of this and is actually for drafting called a dusting/drafting brush. I liked this for the better control.

This little guy is an essential for anyone doing charcoal or large drawings and want to blend/smudge without riddling their pieces with fingerprints. I have used this before, I will probably cut this into smaller pieces for my tool box. I prefer to use this for smudging charcoal because after a while the charcoal and friction of the paper will irritate my hands. You can get large pieces of this online, it may be marketed as something for car cleaning but it is the same material. I'll also be experimenting with other types of leather for drawing.

   And lastly, a new travel sketchbook that exhibits my insatiable wanderlust and a canvas pad for oil studies. I was going to try and test the canvas pad with oils and my new oval mop brushes but I didn't want to bring in my oil paints, partly because the weather got bad and they are in my car and because it stinks up my house and my mom doesn't like it. I will test these out when I get back to my dorm tho, I will probably pull the sheets out and tape it to my drawing board like I would any other paper.

 

Now I didn't show a detail shot about the brush shampoo because I have talked about it before, if you want to look into this wonderful brush shampoo that I highly recommend you can go here and read about it.

 

Now for the ULTA haul, this is all cruelty free as well.

 

So from the left I have a staple, it is the Organix Argan Oil of Morocco shampoo, skinfix Hydrating Moisturizer, and Freemens Golden Grain Brightening Mask. On the top from top to bottom I have NYX retractable lip liner in Nude Pink MPL06, Palladio lip liner in Black Berry, and NYX brow pencil.

Now some of these products are not certified by the leaping bunny but they all say "not tested on animals" except the black berry lip liner.

Here are swatches of the lip liners and eyebrow pencil as well as the NYX Soft Matte Lip Creams I wanted to match with the lip liners.

 This lip cream is Cannes and is one of my favorites and most used.

 This lip cream is Copenhagen and is slightly more red than this lip liner but I think it will work.

 

If you've never used NYX Soft Matte Lip Creams and like long lasting matte lipstick then I would highly recommend these, they are very pigmented and have amazing wear *once dry. I would buy them in store instead of online though because I've noticed most websites have a color difference in their pictures.

Also I have a few resolutions.

1. One good deed a day.

2. Smile

3. Create more art outside of class.

And obviously don't be a little piggy as much.

Did you make any New Year's Resolutions?

That's pretty much it for now, did you buy some fun things with Christmas money, do you want any more in depth reviews of any of these products? Feel free to ask in the comments below. Also before I leave here is a piece I have been working on recently.

 

Sorry for the weird orange tint.

 

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You can also follow my pinterest page to see all the magnificent things I find from healthy recipes to art to wedding planning.

 



 



 

(late) Favorites Friday

Favorites Friday

Hey Zombi-corns, WOW am I a terrible blogger, but I just finished finals and am home for break so I will try and make interesting posts into the new year.

So my first favorite has been for awhile and it is an art supply.

It's The Masters Brush Cleaner and Preserver. This has come in very handy for oil painting, now you can go with a cheaper solution which would be to use baby oil and simply green but for some reason using that combination was making my softer brushes shed. But this instantly made the shedding stop and I have always enjoyed using this for them. You can also get a liquid version of this if you don't like using the solid version.

 

Another favorite which was a great pick me up from my stupid finals was this eye shadow palette I purchased from BH Cosmetics. This was kind of a Christmas present to myself because I purchased it from their Cyber Monday sale along with a present for my mom.

 

Sorry for the terrible glare but I took these pictures late at night. Here are some swatches in order of row.

 

These shadows have no names but I can not wait to experiment with these, especially with some formal events coming up, i'll also post some pictures of those.

Most of these are satin or shimmer finish and have pretty good color payoff but the few matte colors are a little powdery and not as opaque, but definitaly buildable.

 

 

   You can follow my facebook to get updates on the new blogs.

You can also follow my pinterest page to see all the magnificent things I find from healthy recipes to art to wedding planning.

 

 

 

Favorites Friday

Favorite's Friday!

Hello ZombieUnicorns, it's the end of another week, take a look at all the magical things that helped me get through it.

So I have concluded that I am a super busy college student that keeps forgetting to post before the afternoon lull hits me. But I'm back and we'll just have to see how the posts go in the future, Monday's I will start to type on Sundays so I am ahead of schedule.

 

So the first favorite and probably my biggest is IT'S FINALLY OCTOBER! It's the most magical time of the year, literally in my opinion, especially since it's following a blood moon.

 

I've always loved horror movies, mythological beasts of old, and the festivities of the month, and that the holiday is pretty well suited for all ages. I will keep you updated on any decorating and if I get a chance to make a costume this year.

 

 

Another favorite is this little guy who joined the family on my desk.

Unfortunately he cant actually sit on his majestic beast, but they both are bobble heads and were about $20 I believe. When I saw all the ads about the new Star Wars merch coming out I couldn't help myself on my next visit to the Wallie World to pick this guy up.

 

Also another favorite from the week is the location I looked at for my wedding, and I will probably book for.

This is just the bridal suite upstairs, but the building is beautiful. It's over 100 years old, has a beautiful rotunda on the bottom floor and is the best deal I have found, and it's the best location for our families.

And speaking of weddings, my last favorite is one that I've had for two years today and am about to have for the rest of our lives; my fiancé.

 

That's about it for this week, I will see you all on Monday with a new motivational quote and don't forget to paint the roses red.

 

   You can follow my facebook to get updates on the new blogs.

You can also follow my pinterest page to see all the magnificent things I find from healthy recipes to art to wedding planning.

Favorites Friday

Favorites Friday

Hello ZombieUnicorns, come see all the things that helped me get through the week.

This week was pretty hectic but I did find some new favorites, one of them being this beautiful lip color.

 

This is Maybelline's Color Blur by lip studio, in 15 Berry Misbehaved. I have worn this almost everyday, it's like a more pink toned raspberry color, and have received plenty of compliments about it. The color payoff is amazing, it does transfer but it's not so substantial where you have to retouch after every sip from a straw.

Here's what it looks like on my pale lips. This is one of the only lip sticks I have worn that doesn't come completely off when I drink from a water bottle, it's even held up against some foods. I would compare this to the NYX soft matte lip creams. Both are flute friendly so I will definitely wear this for concerts and performances.

My other favorite for the week is my supportive band family and my Kappa Kappa Psi brothers. I've had a bunch of great ideas for homecoming and recruitment and most of the band is doing pretty well, especially with adding new people into an already written drill.

Hopefully this mood stays for the rest of marching season, and that the new staff don't make it worse, or any less enjoyable.

 

I hope you had a great week, and have a great weekend, I'll see you on Monday with a new quote to start the week off and don't forget to paint the roses red.

 

  You can follow my facebook to get updates on the new blogs.

You can also follow my pinterest page to see all the magnificent things I find from healthy recipes to art to wedding planning.