Lupines

Today Sharon and I went up to Left hand reservoir.  I've been thinking about painting some wildflowers, and finally got my chance today. I used a grey canvas and started directly into the color. This is a bit different than I am use to working, but it still turned out pretty good.

This is my second painting this morning. I didn't like it when I finished, but it is looking pretty good to me now.

Here is Sharon getting started. We really had a beautiful place to paint today.

 

 Earlier in the week, I painted this from an old figure drawing. I wanted to get some practice painting in this method of straight Burnt Umber in the shadows and burnt umber and white on the lit side. All of this is done on a grey canvas.

 this is from Weds. night. I used the same technique as described above with some color added on the pillow and robe just for fun.

Friday, I painted this from a black and white photo my uncle took of me when I was just a little shaver.  I tried using some suggestions my friend Jim gave me, using cool colors for shapes going away from me and warm colors on the shapes coming toward me. I used straight Yellow ocher, cad red, Alizerian Crimson and Ultramarine blue.

This is another mono chromatic painting of a good friend of mine, Dave.

pretty good week

It feels like I  had a pretty good week painting wise. This one is from this morning off of Cherry Vale rd. The trees are turning there fall colors every where you look. It is such a beautiful time of year.

This is from this after noon. I went back to sawmill ponds where there is something to paint any direction you look. I am on the shadow side of these trees. Trying to paint the light coming in from the other side was the lesson of the afternoon. 

This was painted last evening from our deck. I set up about an hour before I new the light was going to look like this. I had it all laid out and ready to go for when the light was just right, then I had to work fast to get all the colors and values just right. The sun was down in no time. All in all I think it turned out pretty good.

This was done Friday late afternoon from our deck. Again the sun went down quickly so I had to remember. I am quite happy with this.

I painted this earlier in the week I think my new under painting technique along with a new medium is starting to pay off.

This is another under painting done in our Weds night figure session. It was raining when I took it out to the car. Being oil I wasn't worried, but apparently this medium is water soluble. That's where all of the little spots came from. I think it looks kind of neat, Like snow is falling.

and finally I thought I'd throw this one in. I was able to get Leo to sit still long enough for me to get this quick sketch.

Trying to break out of a bit of a slump

I feel like I've been in a bit of a slump this week. This one is the best of the bunch. I went back to Sawmill ponds yesterday to paint. It was really hazy, which I think is kind of cool for painting. It's much easier to see the atmospheric perspective.

This is also from sawmill ponds. I am undecided on this one. I may work on it some more.

While there Some geese came in and landed on the water. I tried to do a quick sketch of one. They were gone by the time I started putting color on. I'm not sure, aren't their necks all black?

I am trying a new medium to do my under paintings, to try and gain some control. This is a self portrait with that medium. I've been practicing more since this try and am looking forward to useing it this Weds. in figure drawing/painting.

I've done this painting before and thought I'd try again. I had to cut my session short so it seems unfinished to me. But, still I think it has some things going for it, so I thought I'd share

Paintings for the week of 5-12-12

 I painted this from a photo I took in Ohio a couple of years ago. Cute little thing, isn't it?

I'm not going to show what I did in figure drawing this week. It was pretty awful. I copied this from an image I found on the internet. It is a painting by Robert Liberace. I only used yellow ocher, cad red, black and white.

This is from last weeks post, but I worked on it some more, so I wanted to show it finished.

This is also from last week, but now it's finished.

I painted this today with the same pallet of yellow ocher, cad red, black and white. It is amazing how many colors you can make from those four. I am trying to look sad. It's kind of hard to hold a certain look and paint at the same time.