The core of the series, of course, are her painting tutorials. They're so very well done - with reference photos to download. There are journaling prompts, recipes for French treats, and a video each week of Dreama exploring and talking about various places in France. I enjoyed the exploration videos - of a winery, of an antique market, of a little village. However, I'm just not going to watch a video of a field of flowers and meditate. And I have enough ideas of things to journal about, and so those suggestions (except for one) weren't helpful to me.
One journaling idea that Dreama showed DID appeal to me. She has a painting journal in which she uses watercolors to sketch something and then write about it. I bought watercolors and a sketch book - and I sketched/journaled ONCE. LOL! I intend to do it more. It's just not at the top of my priority list - which means I probably won't do it much. I can see it would be helpful in both documenting one's life and also in improving one's art.
The reason I wanted to take the class is because I love Dreama's colorful impressionistic painting. I eagerly waited for the classes to start, and each week (except for week 6) I followed along and painted my own version of that week's painting. I loved watching her paint and listening to her explanations of the whys and hows of what she was doing each step of the way. I felt it gave me a good basis for oil painting.
I had varying degrees of success. Dreama uses oils - and I memorized her palette almost immediately. I still use her method of using transparent paints to do an under-layer, and then the opaque paints for the top layers.
The first week, we painted a series of French pastries on small gesso boards. I think it was helpful to start off with small paintings of single objects. Here are my paintings for week 1:
Week 3 was a basket of cherries with sunflowers. Yes, sunflowers - my nemesis! And these look amateurish. However, as I remind myself often, I AM an amateur. So that's okay. I like the basket in the background and then the front basket of cherries. Who knew leaves would be difficult to paint?!
Week 4 was a chair in a garden with roses on it - and with an antique watering pitcher beside it. I could've worked more on the roses and leaves - and the spout of the watering pitcher. However, overall, I'm pleased with it.
Week 5 we did a field of poppies. This LOOKED like it would be simple. It wasn't. However, after having it sit for a few weeks and then coming back to look at it again, I like it much better than I did initially.
I haven't done Week 6 yet. It's an outdoor scene of a French cafe with tables and umbrellas - and lots of flowers. I will get to that eventually. The course materials will be available online for a full year. So I have till next March.
Overall, I learned a lot through the online course. With the private Facebook group, I was able to see other participants' paintings each week - and some people are just now beginning the course. So each day there are various paintings to look at - and it is really helpful to see how so many different artists paint the same scene. I've learned a lot from the other people in the group.
There were also bonus photos provided each week that we could paint. One week, I tried a bonus photo. Here it is:
I love every part of this painting - except the flowers. I am really struggling to make realistic flowers. However, I love that I was able to get the clear vase to look right. And, of course, I still need to work on making realistic leaves.
There is so much material available. I could probably paint for months just from Dreama's online course. However, I'm not sure that style of painting is for me. That's the value of taking classes from a variety of people. While I LOVE Dreama's paintings, I discovered that I'm not really happy with my efforts to paint in that style. This is all part of the learning process.
When Ron and I made a trip to Texas, I took my painting supplies and painted while he was at his competition. I threw away my first painting - it was truly horrible. I tried to paint irises. Yikes! Then I decided I wanted to do a country house with clothes hanging on a line - and I found a Dreama painting of one on Pinterest. So I used that as a guide. Bleh . . . . There's so much I could improve, but I just don't like it enough to want to work on it anymore. It reminds me of a grade school kid's coloring book.
Dreama just re-opened her first online painting course, "Dream, Love, Paint" this week, and I'm tempted to sign up for it. That course was first available last year. However, it is pricey, and I'm not sure I really would benefit from a second Dreama class. I thought since she'd already made lots of money on the course the first time, that the price would be lower for the second go round since the material isn't new - no new investment of money for filming and producing the course. Nope - no discount for second tier subscribers. She's got a good deal going with hundreds of people paying hundreds of dollars for each online course. It's good quality stuff, but I think probably one course is enough for me. If it weren't so pricey, I'd do it, though.
I'm signed up for lots of other, different art classes, workshops and courses. I'll write about each one is future posts.
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