r/oilpainting – [How To] Turning Useless Blurry Photographs Into Artwork

We all have ways of overcoming life’s issues. I for one will be the first to admit, several of my images are not good enough to be shown here. However, in the same breath, many of those images can be saved simply because I’ve had a chance to rethink how best these blurry images can be viewed.

I’ve developed a nervous condition as well as rheumatoid arthritis in my back, shoulders, hands & arms. So caring a tripod is nearly out of the question. But for those pictures I’ve already taken, I was about to throw these away until I though about returning to my root as an art teacher.

The idea was to take a couple of these blurry hand held photographs, transfer them to canvas then paint over the images with oil paints. For the last 2 years, I’ve been systematically selecting a couple of photographs, transferring these onto canvas then with a limited color pallet, I painted in the colors. Sort of like an adult paint by numbers kind of thing without any numbers. I was relying on a second photograph for the colors.

One image, was something I did not long ago. I placed a small vase on the back porch step with some fall flowers. As the sun rounded the house and shine down into the steps, I took the picture. Then login to the walmart photo site and had this photo transferred to canvas. 1 week later the poorly printed canvas was ready for me to add my own color pallet.

“Flowers of Fall”

I set the canvas print on my easel and starting painting with a limited color pallet. One month later, I finished my “Flowers of Fall” impressionistic oil painting based on a blurry photograph. One simply paints over the blurry canvas print. Sort of like a paint by numbers but without the numbers.

There’s one good thing about all this, even though i shake with nerves & arthritis.. this adds something to stokes of the paint brush. So one doesn’t need to be perfect. Use the ability god has given you to the best of your ability. I hope to explore more images in the future with the new camera. Seems I’m better as a painter than a photographer, But both go hand in hand.