Experimental Digital Painting 2 with Daniel “papa.png” Reid

Join Daniel Reid (papa.png) in this four-week workshop on experimenting with and developing the “composition within the composition” through defamiliarization and strange-making.

We’ll cover concepts such as composition and story, the who, the what, and ostranenie.

Duration: 4 weeks
Date & Time: Sundays at 1:00 PM Eastern starting Sunday, October 25 2026
⚠️ Clocks will turn back 1 hour on November 1; School closed November 28–29 ⚠️
Skill level: All skill levels welcome; taking Experimental Digital Painting 1 recommended but not required
Tiers: Receive direct feedback in class or spectate without homework feedback
Format: 4–5 hour live class with combination of lectures, demos, and feedback. Recordings are generally provided within a couple days of each live session.
Materials: Any digital or traditional tools. Paintovers will be done digitally.

All weeks will be a combination of lecture, demos and feedback.

SYLLABUS

Week 1: Checkerboard Light, Camera & Material
Checkerboard lighting
Camera and lens as a painting tool
Material observation and translation
Bridging cinematic lighting techniques with digital painting

Week 2: Ostranenie / Strange-Making
Defamiliarization and ostranenie
Literary fiction as a tool for visual thinking
Building a muted, restrained world
Using strange-making to disrupt familiar forms and ideas
Developing concept through shape, atmosphere, and narrative

Week 3: Composition Within Composition
Shrinking and expanding
Controlling scale and visual hierarchy
Creating depth through competing or contained compositions
Using composition to direct narrative attention

Week 4: Texture & Brush Construction Logic
Understanding texture as structure
Brush construction and material logic
Translating physical material qualities into digital marks
Building a personal visual language through brushwork