Painting Concepts

I got the idea of scribbling thumbnails for concepts of paintings from Stephanie Pui-Mun Law, another watercolor artist I mentioned earlier today. Much of my process of starting a painting has come from looking at her blog. Generally it goes like this: An idea or sudden inspiration strikes and you immediately try to scribble out a thumbnail in order to catch the gist of the painting in terms of composition. Then you begin to flesh out more detailed sketches of elements of the thumbnail, such as the focus or other figures. With today's wonderful technology, you can then scan it all into photoshop and play around with the placement of the different elements. Once happy with the result, you can print it out onto paper and then transfer it to the painting surface.
This system has worked well for me so far... at least to the thumbnail point. I'll admit I haven't had any time with school to consider working on any full-blown paintings, but if God can grant me a little peace and patience, I know it will happen eventually! However, I do have time to put down quick ideas and compositions throughout the day in random notebooks and in an itty bitty sketchpad that I have recently purchased. Here are a couple of examples:

What's funny is that I didn't even think of Narnia and the lamppost in the woods until after I had gotten the idea out!

The idea came to me when I was in need of a bit of comfort- the title "Solace" kept rolling around in my head. Sitting amid the starfish and shells as waves surge and fall around you and storm clouds billow in the distance... It's a calming thought.