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[paintinginsomnia]

#89. Using Glazes to Pull a Painting Together. The Big Book of Painting Nature in Oil. Oil. April 9, 2024.

Took some time on this one due to vacations and busy schedule. Book instructions: paint the sky first, then glaze it with a yellow ochre and cadmium orange mix, then do the sky highlights, then paint cactus.

One up: Wow. Was not expecting it to be this dramatic. The sun beams came out really well, and the glazing tied the sky together.

One improve: the glazing technique. I waited a week for the painting to dry before glazing, but could I do it sooner? Can you do multiple glazings on a sky to create depth? I think I want to experiment with this.

Colors: titanium white, cadmium orange and yellow light, yellow ochre, India red, alizarin crimson, cobalt blue.

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#88. Making a Dark Foreground Spring to Life. The Big Book of Painting Nature in Oil. Oil. March 12, 2024.

This photo shows the colors more saturated than in real life. Wasn’t able to get a good shot.

One up: overall happy with the way it came out. I’m getting better with the trees over sky, but the going is still slow.

One improve: the trees came out better than the sky on this one, shows you where my focus is. Photo doesn’t show it but it’s dulled down by the tree line, I needed to push that further.

Colors: titanium white, cadmium yellow light and red medium, alizarin crimson, cobalt blue, phthalo green.

[paintinginsomnia]

#87. Deciphering a Landscape Partially Hidden by Fog. The Big Book of Painting Nature in Oil. Oil. March 4, 2024.

One up: this lesson was a new technique, go at it with a bristle brush and scrub the colors in.

One improve: I fought with the colors, especially with the sky. Could not get them right. Decided to just give up and move on.

Colors: titanium white, then ultramarine blue, alizarin crimson, burnt umber (ground), and cobalt blue, cadmium red/orange/yellow light (sky).

[paintinginsomnia]

#86. Laying in a Dark Yet Lively Sky. The Big Book of Painting Nature in Oil. Oil. February 12, 2024.

Did this one differently again. Painted the trees as large dark masses then painted lots and lots of sky holes. Which is opposite the lesson: paint the sky first then paint over with the trees.

One up: Still really like this method.

One improve: I need more variation in the size of the tree branches. Like the sky/don’t like the sky? It’s pretty intense, but because it’s all intense I kinda works? Intense colors seems to be a theme in this book.

Colors: Titanium white, cadmium orange and red medium, alizarin crimson, Indian red.

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#85. Making the Unusual Believable. The Big Book of Painting Nature in Oil. Oil. January 26, 2024.

For some of these lessons I wonder, did I get this? Something doesn’t look right. This is one of them.

I finished it a week ago, but needed to let it dry a bit for a final glaze.

One up: well, the fence line worked. I also got the road and hill cut.

One improved: the instruction has you paint the sky with cobalt blue and cadmium red. But that is just way to bold. Do it again I’d gray it down.

Colors: cobalt blue and cadmium red, titanium white, yellow ochre, oh what else, probably burnt umber, cadmium yellow light, maybe sap green?

[paintinginsomnia]

#84. Learning how to Emphasize the Sky. The Big Book of Painting Nature in Oil. Oil. January 26, 2024.

A quickie.

One up: sky came out pretty good, the yellow streaks make it pop.

One improved: the lesson has you lighten the ground to make the sky pop, here it looks too distracting and uninteresting.

Colors: titanium white, yellow ochre, burnt sienna, burnt umber, alizarin crimson, cobalt blue, then pthalo green and cerulean blue hue for the lower sky.

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#83. Constructing a Solid Underpainting. The Big Book of Painting Nature in Oil. Oil. January 11, 2024.

One up: overall the peices are here and it’s not a bad painting. Like the colors.

One improve: Little things. The hay door on the front of the barn sticks out and doesn’t fit with the rest of the building. The tree on the left needs some more work (looks funny). The orange grass in the foreground doesn’t transition well to the next layer.

Colors: titanium white, yellow ochre, burnt sienna, burnt umber, alizarin crimson, ultramarine blue, permanent green light, cadmium yellow light

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#82. Balancing Darkness and Light. The Big Book of Painting Nature in Oil. Oil. January 5, 2024.

First painting of 2024 and have 17 lessons left on skies; hope to get through them by April.

One up: ya know, I like the saturation and color contrast between the gold and the blue. It’s all intense.

One improve: For next time, rather than make all the colors saturated and intense, dull it all down and have the focal point be saturated and intense. Also, that gray rain cloud in the center was a bad idea, I emphasized it too much.

Colors: Titanium white, cadmium orange and yellow light, yellow ochre, burnt sienna, phthalo green, cobalt blue, ivory black (this lesson called for black, I really don’t use that color much).

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#81. Capturing the Delicacy of a Hazy Summer Morning. The Big Book of Painting Nature in Oil. Oil. December 29, 2023.

This one came together quick.

One up: Went right through the process - sketch, block, detail. The contrast and brush work looks good, especially on the shrubs. Lots of permanent green is in there, it’s just very subtle, I like that.

One Improve: Needs more haze between the planes to add more depth, especially on that tree.

Colors: titanium white, raw sienna, yellow ochre, ultramarine blue, and permanent green light.

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#80. Using One Strong Element to Establish Space. The Big Book of Painting Nature in Oil. Oil. December 26, 2023.

Back to the lesson book.

One up: Overall this came out nicely. Considering how bad my first backlit trees were this shows lots of improvement.

One improve: Trust the process. Painting out negative space from the trees goes through a real ugly phase and I almost called this one quits. Not quite happy with the orange foreground, needs better connection to the rest of the painting.

Colors: titanium white, cadmium orange and yellow light, yellow ochre, and burnt sienna, quinacridone red, phthalo blue to make Mars violet.

[paintinginsomnia]

#79. Coffee Berries. Photo from friend, Hawaii. Oil on hardboard. December 16, 2023.

Photo sent from a friend on vacation, I liked the look of the ripe berries. The intent was to do this as a quick study. Ended up not so quick.

One up: berries came out nicely, has that painterly look, I focused on highlights and reflected light.

One improve: leaves were hit and miss. I kept pecking at them without clear direction.

Colors: titanium white, sap green, cadmium orange and yellow light, ultramarine blue, alizarin crimson, and cerulean blue.

[paintinginsomnia]

Red Hat Adventures #5 (Oct 12, 2023) and #6 (Dec 6, 2023). Gouache. From photos taken at Lincoln City, Oregon, August 31, 2023.

The first was killing time at a conference, the second is for a gift.

One up: I really like how the sand, reflection, and water streaks came out in the first one. Just pulls you into the moment. The figures came out really well in the second painting.

One improve: the head/shoulders did not come out right on the first one, like I put the head on wrong (straight shoulders?). The beach not quite doing it for me in the second.

Colors: titanium white, yellow orchre, cadmium yellow light, burnt umber and sienna, quinacridone red, ultramarine blue.

[paintinginsomnia]

Plein Air #2 and #3. Lincoln City, Oregon. Gouache. August 28-31.

We took a lovely vacation in Lincoln City and just spent a week at a beach house eating cheese. Here are a couple of plein airs from the deck.

One up: These were relaxing, and I like the color schemes. Same rocks at different tide levels.

One improve: moving and flowing waves are challenging, that needs practice. I tried to add a human element in each one and I find it more distracting than contributing.

Colors: titanium white, yellow orchre, ultramarine blue, burnt umber and sienna.

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Flannel Animal. Acrylic on oak plywood panel. November 9, 2023. Second-hand wood frame.

For a friends 50th birthday. He gave the appropriate comment of “what the fuuuuuck?”

One up: The lightsaber has a great “glowing effect” and I had a lot of fun with the T-rex. At the end had to figure out how to subtly get his cat with a jet pack in there, think that worked well.

One improve: Human figures are hard, I was fighting with this one and gave up; the form is bad, and the arms and leg are driving me nuts. Though, I did nail the face.

Colors: titanium white, ultramarine blue, burnt umber, yellow ochre, cadmium orange and yellow light, alizarin crimson and lots of turquoise. Mixed it with orange for the sky, yellow for the dinosaur, and in the lightsaber.

[paintinginsomnia]

#78. Capturing Forms Silhouetted Against a Hazy Sky. The Big Book of Painting Nature in Oil. Oil. November 4, 2023.

One up: the colors were a challenge, the big bush on the left went through three different iterations. I ended going with receding color, lighter orange/red near the edges then going dark. Came out well.

One improve: sky holes are fun but challenging. The dark tree on the right was hastily done, and sky holes look sloppy. You need to think them through.

Colors: titanium white, cadmium yellow light and orange, alizarin crimson, burnt sienna, pthalo green.

[paintinginsomnia]

#77. Discovering the Hidden Detail as the Sun Sets. The Big Book of Painting Nature in Oil. Oil. October 25, 2023.

This was a fun one.

For comparison, here is the reference photo and lesson. I deviated quite a bit, and I think that came out for the better.

One up: really happy with how this came out. I used Macpherson’s method on the trees, where you cut out the negative space instead of painting over with the positive. It’s harder and more time consuming, but I love the look. Also like the receding mountain range in this one, I’ve had trouble with that in the past.

One improve: the sky should be painted more loosely to match the rest of the painting, instead I was up close with a small brush.

Colors: happy how the colors came out. Titanium white, cadmium yellow light, alizarin crimson, cerulean blue, pthalo green.

[paintinginsomnia]

#76. Painting at Night. The Big Book of Painting Nature in Oil. Oil. October 5, 2023.

Trying out the new tree/sky method here. You paint the tree as one large mass then paint over with the sky. Which is opposite the lesson, paint the sky first then paint over with the tree.

Here is a comparison of branches, painting vs lesson example:

One up: I found that varying the sky color between the branches was as important as shaping the branches. I was getting better as I went, trying different things. This also means the tree isn’t uniform, oh well.

One improve: It is a harder method, tough to work out branch shapes and I had to put branch masses back in that were painted over. Also has to be wet on wet, half the tree dried before putting in the sky and it just didn’t work.

Colors: titanium white, cobalt blue, alizarin crimson, burnt umber.