My Fiance in St Petersburg FL, US. We just parked up, for our Friday morning training on the beach. April 2008

The fairytale was I meet this wonderful man and not long into our dating he said to me he wanted to travel and live abroad for a while. “Darn it, I tought to myself” I couldn’t believe my luck that i’d met this amazing guy and now he was going to go off traveling and that would be the end of something great. So i told him to go for it and do what felt right for him, the next thing i got a text back to ask if i would go with him? So I said yes.A year later we left the Uk for a tour of the US on route 66 on Harley’s. Six years on and were still happy and in love and planing a wedding for later this year.

To begin with our traveling was just going to be for a year or two, but as time went on it became clearer that we might never come back, what with the state of the west and the 2008 disaster it really didn’t make sense to come home to troubled times. We will never say never but who knows what the future holds as long as we are happy and we can afford to carry on, it really doesn’t matter where we live. When we were living in the UK we were both fed up with doing a 9-5 job, living life on a budget, and forever working just to keep up with the bills, living paycheck to paycheck. It was time for a career change. When we began our traveling we had both saved up and my partner was already working online via the internet.

Why I do what I do?

There are two main reasons I do what I do, the first one is I want to enjoy my life as I live it. What got me into this way thinking to begin with was the traveling and the realization that we needed much less to live on when you live in a suit case. One book that inspired me to follow this way of thinking was the “4 hour work week“ by Timothy Ferris. Now I don’t work 4 hours a week, but it did make me think of different ways to create several ways to earn a living along with time saving ideas. Another Great book that inspired me was “Rich Dad, Poor Dad  and CashFlow Quadrant by Robert Kiyosaki taught me new ways about understanding money and seriously changed the way I spend money for ever. life changing books…

Other Great sites to look at are Location Independent by Lea and Jonathan Woodward’s, they started traveling a year after us and we watched them closely and took inspiration from there great articles.

Another artist who travels and has a great blog to follow is Elizabeth Briel She’s a traveling artist interested in old ways of producing paper and photography a real hands on artist.

From experience I have known many people who follow the money and forget themselves in a job, and are always working to keep up with the mortgage Payments, the Jones next door, the must have items, etc… These things always keep us in debt and we never have enough money to enjoy ourselves, and if we do it’s on borrowed money. Stuff and can also clutter up your life and bog you down.

•How many of us have bought that dress, only that we have never worn it?

•How many of us have made excuses not to travel?

•How many of us have so much stuff in our house, and are always losing things, or are always busy tidying that stuff up.

•How many hours are lost in tidying up our stuff?

•How many of us really take the time out to be you and find yourself?

Just sitting here typing these How’s out is soul destroying, and I here you say I’ve herd this all before. I know there is so much more I could add to the list, but I think you catch my drift here. It all comes down to you and your life and how you live it. And maybe full filling your dreams no matter how big or small they are.

For me I realized after time I needed and wanted less in order to have some quality time. Still I find many things that I do that clutter up my day and that will always be the case, but I never forget where I am and try to find ways to make my living life more simpler. Today I’m so inspired by the time I have and the ideas that are in my head, I struggle with the time to put them into practice LOL. This can be hard too because you can spend to much time to think about what to do next! That awful word “Procrastination” springs to mind.

Let’s face it when it comes to doing something different we are always unsure what the outcome will be? And it can be scary doing something outside your comfort zone. Believe me I know, because I felt like that in the beginning, and will do again when I move onto somewhere different, but its so worth it, it has become part of my life and I have learnt to move on adapt and what to expect, and with it has come tolerance and acceptance because we are all different and there are so many ways in which we can live our lives. Freedom is a wonderful thing that lives in a suitcase.

Can you Live in a suitcase?  We don’t know whether we would love it until we have tried it. Hence the saying “don’t knock it, until you try it” Learning to live Life differently brought many challenges and taught me to think outside the box… and with it came new possibilities to do something different, so this is why I travel.

Me trying Alligator jambalaya in Daytonna FL, US  bike week 2008 “tastes like tough chicken”

The second reason is I love art and being creative, it’s in my soul, I am my art and without it I’d be lost. And living in the UK and doing something love and the stress of earning a living from it, took way all the fun, as well as make it more difficult to survive. I needed more time. At the moment one side of my job is to design tattoos for individuals and I love it, you guys really inspire me no end and no job is never the same and it’s incredibly satisfying makings your visions come to life. I have also learnt to be more adaptable as an artist besides living an adaptable life. Along with that I paint fantasy art and make my visions come to life.

I want to share with you more about working and traveling and hopefully inspire you, and show you more ways, to do more of what you love. whether you want to work for yourself from home or travel.

My next post will be: Traveling and work? A total rethink of how do business while traveling.

In this post I will talk about working online and How to make a start.

I have been traveling since October 2006, we started off in the US traveling east to west along the route 66 traveling on Harley’s, stopping in hotels catching up with work along the way. After our first two years of traveling, having fun living life on our terms, it became clearer that we did not want to come back home to the UK. Until December 2010 we spent 3 months a year in the US. We have lived on the road, in San Diego, Chicago, Orlando and St Petersburg. Besides Living in the US we have lived in Thailand, Philippines, and New Zealand. We have traveled to Vietnam, Hawaii, and India.

In the early days I really didn’t know how to earn a living while traveling, let alone go about it, or what I really wanted to do. All I knew was that art was in my soul and somehow I had to make it work, and find my path. To mix things up a little more, I also had to deal with living life completely differently, swapping our house for a suitcase, and leaving our family and friends behind, to having just the two of us. They say Traveling can either break you or make you, fortunately for us it made us stronger and I’m lucky to have my best friend and rock with me. Thanks to the internet it allows us to stay in touch with family and friends besides earning, enabling us to live life how we do.

Five and a half years on and today I live in Bangkok Thailand and have been now for the last 2years. Why? I here you say, well there are a few reasons for this.
• One being is the opportunity to live in another country learning about another culture, so much is learned by watching and stepping into another life seeing how people interact with each other. It’s humbling and allows you to think outside the box and broadens the mind.
• Two Thailand is a beautiful place, and the people are generally very happy.
• Three it’s very cheap and we can afford a good quality life here compared to the west. It’s no secret Asia is booming!
• Four which is the big one is TIME! It allows me the time to build on my business and really think about where I want to go in business and what I want to achieve. Time is the important key, far too many of us don’t have enough time to spend on the things we love, or don’t know where to start cause we are so wrapped up in life and we often don’t see ourselves. You are the most important person in your life so finding time is so important. Time is the only thing we have to experience life! So make it count! I could so write some more on this and give you the benefits, but I will create another blog for especially about you and your time

I recon the next question on your lips will be how do you stay there for 3 years? For me it’s going to college for 4 hours a week. I go to a Thai language school where i am learning to speak, read and write Thai. What better way to connect to the country and it’s people than to learn and speak there language. I’m not fluent yet and it’s not the easiest of languages but the more I learn the better it gets. In Bangkok many Thai’s speak English so you don’t get to practice much, plus I have a western partner so I learn a little slower, but the main thing is the experience As I write this post I’m holidaying in Hanoi Vietnam and its so frustrating that I can’t speak their language. lol

More to come about traveling and working as an artist for a living. Here’s a list of some of the topics that will show up in future blogs

• The best way to start and earn a living online.
• In the beginning and how I found it making a living? and what were my problems.
• Traveling and work? A total rethink of how do business while traveling.
• How to be a traveling artist and earn a living.
• Tools of my trade – must have items.
• Where do you buy your art supplies.
• Whats different being an traveling artist the good and the bad.
• Advertising and promotion.
• Meeting other artists.
• Social media sites
• Time how important is it to you and do we have enough?
• Living in a suitcase and what its like.
• Living with less verses more.
• Investing money and creating a security blanket.
• Opportunities!! the world opens up!! You only live once!
• Living outside the box and looking outwards?
• Whats important to you?
• I wonder what the next 10 years will be like?
• Looking into the future? Where would I like to be and why?

Her Goddess name is within you and speaks to you.

“Ocean Heart“ is about honoring our quiet time and simply being you, taking time to be in the moment, to appreciate yourself. Breathing listening to your heart beat feeling everything in that second, within you and around you. When you are at one, within the moment you can feel so much love and your inner voice becomes loud and clear. The pearl in between her hands is the essence of everything, you and all living creatures, in the ocean, on the land, in the sky, within the earth and beyond into our vast universe, its the pearl of all life and love.”Breath in the loving warmth and pass on that glow.”

Thank you for following my journey while creating this painting. Sharing this process with you has been very full filling and has enabled me to give something back. This was the 1st of my art tips and there will be more in the future. There are some lovely gifts now available from my zazzle store now available in ipad, iphone, blackberry, galaxy covers, skateboards, stickers, greeting cards and much more.

Coming soon! Handmade Jewelry from my etsy store

It’ s been a few weeks since my last blog post since part 3, being self employed and working on a few projects can hold you back from time to time, which can be a pain, but life never runs how you want it too at times so we just have to go with the flow and see what lessons we learn

So back to the painting, as you can see from my last post “Ocean Heart” has come on quiet a bit, in the first images you can see I have began working more greens into the hair and merfins, using a light wash of greens over the hair and building up darker areas to create depth by weaving the hair in and out. This acts as a guide to see where each curl is going. On this particular painting the hair is very complex so I try to map out as much of the movement I can in light layers first, trying to not make mistakes, if I do its means I can correct it early on. Sometimes its easy to get carried away with a certain area of the painting, and miss something because you are not seeing the full picture in your minds eye, this is where mistakes can happen. I try to stay fresh and stand back from your painting from time to time to see the overall feel. There’s nothing worse when you make a mistake later in the painting.

I keep moving from one area of the painting to the next so I can see how her hair merges with the water, and see how the highlights of the healing glow reflect on her hands and face. I really want the highlights to stand out and create a warm inviting feeling, whilst drawing your in, so you can feel the warm of the glow radiate from within you. Because this painting is very moving and is such a strong pose I’m keeping the water background simple as I can while adding more depth to the piece. To create movement and feeling I am merging the hair with the water so she becomes at one with the waves of the water. I loved this part of painting with a flow and working in beautiful swirls with the cirls. She is at one with the changing tides whilst remaining calm with the heart beat of the ocean, forever alert and feeling each moment in the present “this was a neat feeling that just ran over me, I love it when something inside speaks to me and connects me to the moment.” being connected with our work is being in the moment of life’s awesome pleasures”

In the second picture I have enlarged an area of the hair so you can see how I built the depth in the hair. With the close up of the hands you can see the reflection on her hands and hair, from her warm healing energy.

And finally the last picture is nearly complete and I have started working in air bubbles using them to create a magical alive feeling, hidden messages of the water and the spark of life. There is still quiet a long way yo go yet, more shading to do in the hair, hands, face, and water. Then finally adding some white hight lights to the water bubbles so that they really lift of the painting, this might need to be enhanced with photoshop, but were see how it go’s.

Until next time thank you for reading. I and Ocean heart would like to wish you love in your creations.

Tave

I have been feeling so inspired with this theme, that I felt the need to start painting her today.

“Ocean Heart” is what she speaks to me.

The paints I am using are Winsor and Newton Acrylic, I use them like watercolor paints and to build up the colors slowly layer by layer, giving it’s rich vibrancy to a painting. I Began with painting a watered down lemon yellow, using it as a wash all over the face, arms, hands and neck. From the photo you may not even see the faint yellow on the hands and arms, but its there, just ever so faint. I then built up the yellow in the darker areas. Once I was happy with that, I then added some deep turquoise to the lemon yellow and darkened up her mermaid skin tones. I have been mainly working on her face today, along with some subtle colors in the hair, arms and and mer-fins. In between her hands I have used the lemon yellow, this is her healing energy, you will notice flecks of this in her hair and hands and face to add some glow reflecting out from her hands. It is here that I work out by eye, where I think the glows should go.

So far I have a very good idea for the feel of color for the whole piece, but who knows what will happen later in the game. I may get a spark of imagination while I’m in the flow of painting and something new could be added to her at anytime

Today I have more to show you on how I create flowing hair. I adore drawing long hair and their is so much you can do with flowing locks creating movement and flow.

Above to the right you can see part of Hannah’s lovely curley hair. The first thing you can see is that it is quiet complicated to draw, because the curls are weaving in and out. I’m not out to replicate the hair exactly but I do want to base it on her hair as much as I can. As your drawing improves you will find your flow will improve and your work will become more complex. Another reason I don’t want the hair to be an exact copy, is that I want to add my own personal touch to the feel of the theme. More on this in the next paragraph

What I tend to do when copying hair is pick out the strongest curls in the photo and draw them in faintly. I also look at the weaving of the hair, some of the strands will appear from behind another curl. I also faintly mask out all the hair so that the balance is right, plus it keeps my eye moving around the paper. Building up the curls I can see a flow and I let my pencil play enhancing the natural shape. I keep adding more curls, until I’m happy with the overall feel of the hair. Just to make sure I stand back from the drawing and have a good look at the movement, at this stage I may add some more, after that I then go back into the sketching and start darkening the curls and work out which curls are overlapping. I use an erazor here and rub out the areas where their is no overlapping, this is helpful as a guide when I start painting so I can see the individual curls. A point worth when you look at you look air hair its very rarely smooth and you have bits and pieces that have a mind of there own and I always paint these in later, its one of the finishing off touches to the painting. Layers are amazing, they create depth and the more you have the more luxurious your hair will look.

In the picture below you will notice that the right side of my hair I have not darkened this is so I can add some bubble effects, as she is submerged in the water, these will help create some more depth to the overall painting..

My Mermaid painting is about a deep love of respect for the ocean, sending out positive thoughts to help heal our waters and to clear out harmful toxins. Let me explain a little bit about reiki. Reiki is a Japanese technique for stress reduction and relaxation that also promotes healing. It is administered by “laying on hands” and is based on the idea that an unseen “life force energy” flows through us and is what causes us to be alive. Our hands have energy centers called chakras, and it is here energy is released. In my painting I am going to use color to show you where the energy flowing from the hands, and will add real feeling to the painting so you can feel the warmth and love also.

Some great links for more on reiki.
www.reiki-for-holistic-health.com
www.reiki.org
www.reikiassociation.org.uk
Next Week Part 3
I will talk about my painting technique.

Recently I was asked how I draw faces, I have never been asked before and I was honored to be asked. So I wrote back with my advice, while thinking it would be great to start a new painting and explain how I paint from start to finish. I know their are already many videos out there, but it’s alway nice to do something personal for my fans and fellow artists, and a great way to give something to the art community. We are all unique and we all have different experiences to share

How I draw faces, thats one question that makes me think and a little hard for me to explain in words. For now though words and photos will have to do A camcorder will be a great addition in the future.

People and faces are a wonderful thing. Many of my paintings are based around the facial expressions and a story. I usually start of with an overall rough sketch, just to make sure it fits inside my canvas. As you can see in the first photo I have drawn a rough shape for the face and I have used a rough lines to help me get the spacing right. I was told that a portrait is egg shaped.
1. So imagine your egg, draw a horizontal line half way through your egg this gives you a line where the eyes go.
2.Then in the bottom half draw another line at the halfway mark and this is where the nose goes.
3.Then half that again and thats where the mouth goes.
4. Now if you half the top part of the egg this is where the hairline starts.
5 Half the bit in between the the hairline and eyes then you have a rough guide for your eyebrows.

On my picture its slightly different as I’m looking slightly upwards towards the face. But this gives you the basics.

After I have drawn my rough guides in I then start to build up the line work slowly. It helps to stand your work up and look at it from a distance to see if it looks okay and the perspective is good. Once I’m happy I usually start with drawing the eyes in then moving down onto the nose, mouth and jaw line. I keep moving around like this, as it helps me get the whole structure right. After that I will start to add the hairline and hands in.

When I begin a new art work I always start off with a rough sketch, to get a feel for the mood and a message I’m trying to convey. Sometimes my models really say something to me so I incorporate that into my work. Healing hands is what I wanted in this piece and when I met Hannah for the first time this is what went through my mind, as it turns out Hannah always has warm hands and she loves giving reiki healing, this gives me an excellent start to my story, from here I let the theme, color and feeling speak to me.

Next Time I will go into more detail with the overall theme of this painting and share more ongoing work as the painting developes.

If you want to check out more Fantasy Artwork then take a peak here. More Mermaids some Beautiful Presents click here
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As well,deviantart.com offer excellent shipping rates, and they can post overseas. For those of you in America, this is perfect: Shipping originates from the US, so delivery is quick and prices are low. This also means you get to buy Local. No more waiting up to three weeks for your prints!

Besides buying my prints from deviantart.com you can purchase them at my website, etsy and zazzle.

deviantart.com use LASERLAB a 50×75 cm. (20″x30″) photographic color laser printer
* Print sizes range from 4″x6″ – 20″x32″.
* The LASERLAB printing resolution is 3000 dpi.
* Its 16 bit per color DAC (total 48 bit) the print quality has an exceptional tone continuity.

At the moment I don’t offer prints to retailers.

Artist Meet and Greet!The Black Swan Sukhumvit Road
Located next to Asoke BTS and across the road from the MRT.
29th July 7.00pm-11.30pm

The Model in this painting is Lady Amaranth to visit her website look here. She has some amazing photos, she models for many companies and is such an inspiration.

Ummm my first post this 2011 and it is the season of “Love” so I bring you “Butterfly Kisses” for the gothic valentine in you. For a while now I have been wanting to do something different and this was as good as chance as any. So the reds came out to play The model in this painting is called Lady Amaranth and her website is www.ladyamaranth.com. I just let my feelings guide me this month and embraised my darker side and added some beauty with it. I also wanted to create something different with Lady amaranth so I turned her into a zombie, she is like sweet nectar to the butterflies and they love to kiss her. There is no particular story behind this piece I just felt inspired to create what I did, towards the end of the sketching process I felt it fitting to add “The Frog Prince”. Will she kiss her prince before midnight to save her soul? This is the first of my gothic images and I hope to bring you more in the future. Thinking about your write ups has lead me to an idea for a Competition!

The best story or poem for Butterfly Kisses.

I would like you to write a romantic short story or poem for Valentines Day. No more than 150 words. The winner will receive a signed 11×17 print by myself and there poem will be printed on the back of the card credited with your name. If you have a website I will also credit you on my website too. In order to enter add your comment below and on 28th February 2011, I will pick the most fitting story or poem. Any questions please contact me here.

I’m really excited about seeing what you guys come up with Good Luck and have lots of Valentine fun X

Anyone interested in a signed print please contact me here. As its Valentines this month I decided to release this design on free desktop wallpaper. In order to recieve this and many other free desktop art simply sign up to my newsletter. Every month I give away a new design to my subscribers along with a 15% discount on your first order.

Coming Soon!
signed prints, greeting cards, bookmarks, jewelry, iphone covers, ipad covers and much more.