February 16, 2011

Yellow Stripe

36" x 48" oil on canvas.
I probably won't post anything until spring break when my son is back from school with his camera. I'll have to see if I have images for one more painting on my hard drive.
Here everything was kind of back lit and from the left so I could get the purpleish (is that a word?) shadow on the ground.



Detail #1 I painted the sky several times because I wasn't happy with the color. I remember it started out blue but I think blue is kind of a twinky color for sky. Also, if it was blue it wouldn't make the hills in the distance be anything special.
If I remember correctly another time it was sort of pinkish.

Detail #2. Another shot of the background hill. Now that I look at it the orangeish highlights on the distant trees is too dark, so it doesn't work as light.
I like the way the yellow field is mostly just a horizontal line.


Detail #3. Now I see that the values could have been pushed farther.








Detail #4. The paint that breaks the shadow on the bottom was just runny paint. Here again I can see now that the value of the shadow could have been pushed farther...next painting.

February 10, 2011

Houses Near Water #1

40" x 48" oil on canvas.
Another of the 3/4 down shots. I wanted to try something quite different than the others I had done.










Detail #1. Sorry if these notes aren't lined up properly with the images. It seems to be something screwy with the blog, and I've gotten tired of trying to line up the type since it's different every time.
The paint is pretty thin so you can kind of see the painting underneath.



Detail #2 The paint here's pretty thin too.













Detail #3 Fairly abstract.

February 3, 2011

Red Truck #2

40" x 48" oil on canvas.
Ok so it looks like a maroon colored truck rather than a red one. But who in their right mind would want to buy a painting called "Maroon Truck #2"? Another 3/4 down shot...or at least that's what I call these. As I've said previously I like them to work 2D and at the same time 3D. I'm usually a pretty slow painter but this only took about 2 or 3 days.



Detail #1 Nothing amazing here but the paint for the ground was pretty runny. I know painters who always make the brush strokes describe the form...so if they're painting the ground, for instance, the brush strokes will go in the direction of the ground. However I almost never do that because I want the painting to be 2D rather than just a representation of a 3D object.


Detail #2 This is an example of how I like to ruff in something (in this case the shadow) and then create its shape by painting the negative shape...in this case the ground.



Detail #3 A board in light and in shadow.









Detail #4 Light and shadow...the shadow isn't black but that's how it looks in this photo.