This is watercolor is of me standing outside the Art Studio at Westerbeke Ranch in Sonoma, California. I took a break from teaching the ArtLife workshop to see the beautiful afternoon light hitting the Sonoma hills. My friend Wendy took a photo and then from this made a watercolor. I love how this watercolor painting captures the richness of the light.
What is unusual about this watercolor painting is that it only took about 34 seconds to make and no water was even used. Nor were any brushes. This watercolor painting, in fact, is not a painting at all. It is a digital photograph made to look like a watercolor painting. It was generated from an app called “Waterlogue.”
Armed with this $2.99 app you can take any digital photograph and convert it into a watercolor painting.
What is so compelling about this little app is that the watercolors that are generated are so much like actual watercolors. Not only do they look like they are made with watercolor paint on watercolor paper – that would be impressive enough – but the fact that it generates pretty good watercolor paintings practically every time is mesmerizing. The luminosity of color, the distribution of light and dark, the edge control, the spontaneity as well as the control of detail is surprising there. And it does so practically every time.
I don’t know whether to be happy or sad. I did learn how to watercolor before I learned how to paint in acrylic or oil so I am not a total amateur and still have some of my old watercolor studies lying around. I am, after all, an artist. This is my world. I spend a majority of my time making and thinking about art so it was somewhat disheartening to see my phone generating representational watercolors better than I could make, in about the same time it takes to take the trash out at night. I kept hoping it would make a dud, reveal some area of weakness, like not being able to do faces well or horses perhaps.
But no, this is an app, not a person. It possesses zero holes in its specific skill set. It utilizes a complex set of zeros and ones that when all added up together in some logarithmic way ends up creating a watercolor digital image that looks alarmingly like one created by a veteran watercolorist. It is quite consistent. It is fearless when it comes to laying down color and shies away from no color combination.
As I watched it generate its 8th watercolor from photos in my iPhone library I felt relieved that I didn’t paint in watercolor anymore and that my chosen media, at least for now, is mixed media. Clearly if everyone who has $2.99 can generate pretty damn good watercolors of whatever they want, why would they pay a 100 or 1000 times more for a stranger’s watercolors that are not even related pictorially to their own life? What are the chances that an artist, who also has a knack for watercolors, is going to choose your mother, your kids, your dog or even your close personal friends as subject matter?
I am not sure the outcome of all of this, however I do know that this app does have one primary flaw. It is incapable of producing one of the most important, treasured aspects imbedded in all great Art: the mistake. The correction, the struggle that comes from risking venturing away from what one already knows into an arena that is not certain. Art without this tiny imperfection does not, in the end, feel like you and I. And as a result falls short, by quite a distance, of actually being Art.
Although we generally try to avoid mistakes or going the wrong way, I would argue that it is precisely this facet of art/life, that gives it value and makes it all worthwhile.
Kind regards, Nicholas
6 Comments
Hi! I’m
Nicholas Wilton
the founder of Art2Life.
With over 20 years experience as a working artist and educator, I’ve developed a systematic approach that brings authenticity, spontaneity and joy back into the creative process.
Join me and artists from all over the world in our Free Art2Life Artists Facebook Group or learn more here about Art2Life.
Thought provoking – thank you. To me the other problem with an app like this is that photographs tend make all things in the photo equally important and in focus i.e. the eyes, nose, mouth, hair etc – while a painting does not – so it is far more dynamic and ‘soulful’ as far as composition, colour intensity, focus etc. This quick fix gimmick doesn’t make art – it makes pretty pictures. I think what could make it interesting is using a photograph of an already painted artwork and then seeing what it looks like translated +- into watercolour to see if it is worth actually re-painting it in real life.
well said!
I knew straight away this was a digital watercolor. I have no experience with apps but I don’t think this is a good watercolor. Dear Nicholas Wilton, I agree with your statement that “the mistake” is missing. I think: “it is too perfect to be true”. And it is too perfect to mesmerize me. I wonder when I will try/dare to start painting. So far I am a victim of realism, even if I start to let go a little bit… it takes time to evolve. Greetings from Germany
Dear Greetings from Germany, come out here and do a 5 day workshop w me–I will have you painting the way u feel u want to! Good Luck!
Nicholas, this is a cool app. I may never use it, but it does at least provide me with the security that if all else fails I can always just take a picture of the Poinsettia I am trying to paint a week before my cards need to be sent out in December and send it through the app. But it would feel like cheating!
Regarding mistakes in my painting – I also used to paint in watercolor and now paint with acrylics – and well, is there really any such thing as a mistake when it comes to painting? I used to feel that way with watercolor – I put a lot of restrictions on myself – but when I switched to painting with acrylics (and to painting intuitively) what might have been a mistake before became just another mark. I prefer to look at painting now always as an experiment – and a process – so every mark, even if it is eventually lifted or covered up, is part of the history of the painting and is an essential to its existence.
Thank you for bringing the app to my attention. And thanks for this great blog post!
Jim
Hey Nicholas, that is a cool app. Yes, my best work usually has lots of mistakes under layers of paint. For those of you reading this, last week I took the Artlife workshop from Nicholas in Sonoma, CA. Great class, great teacher and artist! I am a professional artist who has been showing in galleries for over 10 years. Working in the abstract expressionist mode, I mostly work from intuition and trial and error. My intuition was right about Nicholas and the workshop. I learned why elements in my painting worked or didn’t work, and why sometimes I struggled maybe more than I needed to. I now have an alternative way of working for those times when my work starts to look bland, or when I’m ready to bury the work in some distant faraway land never to be seen again. In all seriousness this is a public thank to you Nicholas for the workshop, and for your commitment to teach and inspire everyone that came. I didn’t even talk about the fact the workshop took place in a beautiful setting at the Westerbeke lodge in Sonoma, CA., and that the food was also incredible!
Truly inspired,
Chris