Aloha and Welcome!
Home of Artist and Musician, Darrell Grindstaff

Digital painting (painting directly into a computer program) offers some very compelling advantages—such as, no messy paint spills, no progress-stopping, dried up paint tubes, little, or no, setup time, layers(!) and, of course, undo(!!).

And since, very often, the ultimate goal is to get the final artwork into the computer so it can be printed, distributed or further processed, a finished digital painting is already there.

For these reasons, I have been moving steadily into the world of digital painting.

Red Plumeria

Plumeria can be found amost everywhere in Hawaii and have become strongly associated with the state, most likely because of their widespread use in lei making. In Hawaii, lei are presented to honor guests and dignitaries, to welcome visitors and to celebrate important events.

But beyond the fragrant white ones with yellow centers, commonly used in lei making, plumeria come in an amazingly wide variety of colors, shapes and sizes.

One such example is the one I painted (shown here) with its long, slender petals colored in brilliant red, pink, orange and yellow.

And I didn't have to go far to find this beauty—it was growing on a spectacular, blossom-covered tree located in a neighbor's yard, and which I photographed. That photo became the reference for this painting.

Noelani

My son, Craig, sent me a wonderful photo of my great-granddaughter, Noelani, and I couldn't resist painting her.

I don't know what was making her so sad but it sure made me wish I were there to comfort her.

She is growing up so fast, and the time is whizzing by so quickly—it felt good to be able to capture this moment in a painting. And it was good practice at trying to make a painting with a mouse instead of a brush

Hawaii Kai Canoes

This is a fairly unusual painting for me, in that I kept closer to the way the light looked in the actual scene than I normally would. I knew, when I took the photo this is painted from, that the sun and its reflection in the water would overwhelm everything else in the scene. But I liked the composition and decided to try anyway.

As expected, it turned out very desaturated and dark, except for those blazingly bright highlights.

My normal inclination, after 40 years in publishing, is to brighten up the mid and dark tones and punch up the saturation to make a prettier picture. And I did some of that, but not enough to eliminate that "so bright it hurts your eyes" feeling that the real scene evoked. And I think this painting captures that.