A dear friend of mine set up a paint night. We would get together, have a drink and follow along with a painting tutorial. Much like the parties people pay to go out to, except with a better budget. I was super happy that we were able to do it, but it had been so long since I’d actually just painted for the fun of making a picture I was a bit worried.

I figured having a drink would help that, grabbed my paint brushes and a couple of other bits that might come in handy and headed over.

It’s probably for the best that we didn’t have an actual, live instructor. We were all over the place. Starting, stopping, rewinding. There were questions about what they said and what it meant… but we were all just rolling with it. Our quick tutorial (less than an hour) took us more than two hours to get through!

We all just forged our way forward.

The subject was some sort of eldritch horror rising up from the depths. The starting point was creating the depths… and then we were off and painting! It was a lot of fun, and it helped me to remember that’s what it is supposed to be. Making a painting doesn’t need to be some kind of exercise in perfection. It should be about the process of creation. We all did that. *I* did that, and had a great time with it.

I am definitely out of practice. I should spend more time with my brushes and get some canvases covered. I struggled with my control and my color theory has spent too much time in the world of digital with the ‘undo’ button handy. When I finished I can’t say I was super happy with what I had created, but I was also not disappointed. I was definitely not the best picture that night. I have some crazy talented friends!

I plan to paint more now, and I absolutely hope we all get together again to do another one! Here’s the final result of what I painted: