VIRTUAL PAINTOUT THAILAND

This month the Virtual Paintout is located in Thailand. The basic idea is:  On the first day of each month the blog master and very talented artist, Bill Guffey, announces on the Virtual Paintout Blog the featured country.  Artists are invited to use Google Maps and Google Street View as the reference for their painting or drawing.  Google Street view seems to have been created by people in a large vehicle driving ALL OVER the WORLD taking 360 degree photos of the places they pass.  These places can then be virtually explored using a computer with internet connection.

You can tell where the Google video truck as been by dragging the little yellow peg man from his station on the left side of the Google Maps screen.  Any place the camera has been is highlighted in blue.  Put your peg man down where you want to explore and use the arrow keys to travel.  But you already knew that.

I really wanted a rural scene of Thailand to work on but it seems most of the street views of the country were  taken in Bangkok.  I did a LOT of "exploring" down narrow streets and scary neighborhoods before I found the Flower Market on Empire Street near the Chao Phraya river.

I picked out a flower stall and did this painting.

I loved the pattern of the baskets and the bright colors of the flowers.  I have no idea what a lot of the products displayed there are, but I feel like I do know a little more about Bangkok from virtually sitting across the street from this place.  Artists are allowed to submit three paintings a month for the Virtual Paintout.  I have at least one more location I hope to sketch and send in for July.

Mr. Guffy has put up my painting.  If you check it out here in the next few days you may be able to see it along with a bunch of other superb submissions.