a thing that is clear and translucent like glass, especially a smooth sea or clear sky
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2/3 of Inktober down, 1/3 to go!
Does that mean I've got figuring the art for the day out down-pat? Nope! I was probably the most lost I've been so far with this one.
But y'know what? I found my way in the end. The color palette is doing a LOT of heavy lifting, I think, but sometimes that's just what it takes!
Click the "Keep Reading" and we'll talk a bit more about my general thoughts/process. ✨
⭐️ Like My Art and Want to see more of it? Here's All My Links! ⭐️
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As the caption-y bit says: We are officially now 2/3 of Inktober down, 1/3 to go! On the one hand: Yay! 🥳
On the other:...What do you mean October is 2/3 over?? 😱 😖
But I will ignore the minor existential that thought stirs in me for now and attempt to at least get through writing this description first...
[Again, as the caption-y bit says] This was easily the word that had me absolutely the most lost on what to do so far. I was getting hints of ideas thanks to the noun allusion to sea and sky, which I think comes through pretty clearly [haha] in the final product, but I had several false starts and didn't feel like I really had any idea where I was going with this until I was maybe 70% done with it. 😅
Because let's review the images this word put in my head:
glass, like glasses you drink out of or stained glass ["glass" in general puts "stained glass" in my head 99% of the time]
a "smooth sailing" ship; Particularly at night for reasons even I don't fully understand
bright blue, sunny sky on a clear day
That's not a ton to work with, and none of those translate particularly well into mandala doodles. The sky might, but I learned the hard way on Day 17 that it's still no cakewalk, at least not for me.
I was also a little worried that if I wasn't careful, this one might come out too similar to previous days, and I was mostly thinking of shapes and color palettes we've already made considerably use of: Dark Blue + light colors, moons, clouds, etc. Not to even mention some of the more subtle ideas/motifs.
Still, I had to do something, so I started fiddling with cloud shapes.
Somewhere in there—maybe because I had both "glass" and "sky" top-of-mind and I watched Clue last night—the idea of a chandelier occurred to me. Chandeliers can be be made up of a lot of glass and hang up high, also as if they were in the sky. And, more pointedly, when I attempted to look up references I did find some chandeliers designed to kind look like clouds in various ways.
Very briefly this resulted in my own kind-of cloud chandelier, but it felt...Pathetic? I think it was something about clouds being "tied down" when normally they float around as they please. Either way, it was not working for me.
So I went for a more abstract "general" chandelier kind of thing. That worked a lot better, but it was far, far way from being enough to build the rest of the mandala on.
Still a loss, I went back to fiddling with free-form clouds and started thinking about stained glass options.
It was while looking "Sky Mandala" for more ideas of what to do with the clouds that the "biggest help" idea would occur to me—The moon with "light beams" radiating from it. It's such a simple idea, and I had touched on it just a little before on Day 4 and Day 9, but it was just what I needed!
I thought they were a great way to incorporate more rigid lines that feel very stained-glass-appropriate, fill a lot of space fast, and divide up the image a bit so what blank space I'd have left was less intimidating.
The moon also helped finally bring a cleared picture out of those hints of ideas I mentioned before: A little sailboat, drifting on a sea of clouds under a clear night sky.
So that's the image I tried to stay true to as put the moons in and fleshed out some details of what I already had. And short of adding the boat itself—which I had trouble figure out where to put, but I managed!—the stars, and some hatching, admittedly I didn't really do much else once the moons and beam were in...Because it felt like I didn't really need to. More stuff would just be more cluttered, and too cluttered would mess with the "clear sky" idea.
But the real star of the show here I think is the color palette, which really tied everything together and is probably doing the most heavy-lifting of any color palette I've used so far this month. 😆
I had gone into this know I'd probably use a lot of a desaturated blue or gray and white to go for a glass feel, which I did, but I'd also had inklings way back on Day 6 that I might want to squeeze a soft, blurred rainbow in there somewhere. That's why I specifically tried to stay away from using too much blue back on that day, and yeah the idea stayed with me all this time. Though I did second-guess if I'd actually end up going through with it after I actually got started today.
And for a minute there, I really was sticking with just the blue, white, and a tiny bit of yellow. But I'm so glad I stuck with my guns and kept pushing in those little bits of color. I think they really helped the chandelier stand back out after the moon beams had kind of subdued it, and they really marry together the sky and sea elements in a way they just weren't coming together before.
In a way, I think this one was the opposite of Day 17. For that day, I had what felt like good ideas but no strong ways to pull them together. Today I started out with what felt like no good ideas, but I managed to bring together some small ones really well. 😁
I think we might have a new favorite here, but I'm also a bit wary that I might just be that glad I managed to make something I like when I started out at so much of a loss...And I didn't have to rush through it, either! 🤩
It would be so nice if all the days when I start out super lost could turn out this well, but I know better than to get my hopes up on that. 🫠 I'd settle for at least half as much, most of the time though!
Speaking of getting my hopes up, let's see if I can have a similarly pleasant experience in cross-posting tonight. I really doubt that, as I always do, but you never know, right? 😅
Either way, I hope you Sparklers like today's piece as much as I do. Enjoy, and I'll be seeing you all tomorrow—Possibly a little earlier than usual as I work around some IRL things, but we'll see!
Reflection Lakes are named for the lakes’ hyaline waters which, like glass, are so good at capturing reflections of Mount Rainier. At times smooth as glass, many of the park’s lakes are also as clear as glass, allowing undiminished views of the underwater world of fish, amphibians, and plants. What are your favorite “hyaline” lakes in Mount Rainier National Park?
NPS Photo. A still, clear lake surrounded by forest and bordered by pink Fireweed wildflowers reflects an upside-down view of the rocky, glaciated summit of Mount Rainier.
