Dawn Treader At Dawn - Finished?

24" x 18" Oil on panel.

Coming back from vacation, I worked on the painting that was still on my easel. I changed some values all over the painting. I mainly lightened up the water and worked on the reflection of the sun back in the rippled water. I also worked some details in the boat, but stopped before I got too far past a suggestion. I think this is probably done. It has a nice punch with such a rainbow of colors. I left the last few strokes at the bottom of the sun reflection alone, since they captured how I remember Impression Sunrise. (It's interesting that my memory of the painting makes it more vivid; an interesting little "exhibit" on the painting is here.)

Dawn Treader At Dawn

The boat sketched:


The initial plan with paint. I left room for the Sun and its reflection to come.


Most of the panel is covered now.

Billster and Julia the Child

Whoa, a few weeks ago, Margo posted this beautiful family pic to Facebook and I thought it would be fun to paint. It took a while, but here's my take. The photograph still might be better, but I'm calling this version done as it has been on my easel for quite a while.

I took some in-progress shots along the way.


My first session was just establishing some water color and beach color. Then I moved on to the figures.


I finished sketching in the figures and boat without trying to be too tight and detailed for this size painting.


I finished up with darkening the distance after trying it lighter. I think the difference in light reflecting on the water is greater than the atmospheric lightening that I usually think of in landscape painting. The darker water also helped the boat and figures pop out more.


20" x 16" Oil on pumice panel.

Digging In

12" x 24" Oil on panel

$290 (Framing and shipping extra.)

Sold

I painted this over the weekend. It's obviously another composition from the Dragon Boat photos. After the initial posting, I reworked the painting some to downplay some of the background details that were too prominent.

BWCA

8" x 8" Oil on panel.

For those of you that don't know, the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness is an amazing international wilderness area along Minnesota and Canada. (I suppose it is now the BWCAW.) I've had some very memorable trips there in my life; it's been a while since I've paddled there. This painting's reference is from my friend Bruce's trip this last summer.

I recommend planning a trip when you can (and plan to take mosquito repellent; it is still worth it!)

Dragon Boat Painting

Cat's Dragon Boat Painting is finished. Thanks to Brian McElaney for permission to paint from his photo. I used the reference after rotating and cropping it some. The drawing is straight from the photo with some details obviously omitted and simplified. I exaggerated the brightest parts of the photo to be yellow sunshine.


(Click for a larger view.)
48" x 24" Oil on linen.
In a private collection.

Here is a time lapse of the work in progress:

Laser Level

Some lines really should look straight. Vermeer would have used a string attached to a couple of pins and I thought about that technique. But since I have a laser level, I used it. I'm sure he would have used one too if he had it handy. This really helped even up quite a hump in the middle of the boat.

Scraaaape

(Click for a larger view.)

My last painting session started out with a scraping session. Not with a household paint scraper, but with a painting knife. I wasn't happy with the yellow and orange shirts being so much more rough than the rest of the canvas. I wasn't sure about this since I actually prefer an interesting and built up paint layer. Still, here is a view of the scraped part of the painting. If you look closely, you can see the linen weave in spots. Overall, the area still has about the same color, but it is much flatter. I also got to scrape back a couple of faces I was not too happy with. I would be interested in comments on whether I should have scraped this back or should I move ahead with making the rest of the painting thick and built up.

I will come back and repaint there area later. I am also updating the In Progress post below.

Saturday Plein Air and the Boat

10" x 8" Oil on mounted canvas.

I decided to shake the rust off of my plein air setup today after working on the Dragon Boat painting for a while. I got down to the creek and had everything balanced on a couple of rocks to get an interesting view. Then I realized I forgot to bring any paper towel or wiping rags! I didn't want to tramp back to the house, so I painted this with quite a handicap. I resorted to using only the knives, wiping them on the palette. I think my next expedition will be better.

I am still updating the previous "in progress" post for the Dragon Boat painting, but here is a bigger detail of the end on which I have been working.


(Click for a big version of the detail.)

Dragon Boat - Work in Progress

"Work in progress" can be a bit like watching sausage being made. You may find it interesting, but you won't appreciate the result as much in the end. Yet, I do want to share this, so if you are not squeamish, read on:


(Click for a larger view.)

This is after a session of block in work.

Comparing to the study, you can see where the yellow and pink bands will provide a contrasting under-painting that is not a direct complement. I'm not really using a split complementary palette in those areas, but the color jump is about the same. Uh, the bottom line is that I liked how the underlying contrasts turned out in the study, so I am doing that again.

For all of the bright shirts and tank tops, I am following the "Cape Cod School" approach. I'm aiming at getting the pure color masses right at this point. The end goal is to create a bright shimmering impression out of pieces of pure color.

After the second session, the dark background is beginning to set off the figures more. The next step will be to decide on the right underpainting colors for the highlighted fleshtones and boat. I am not in too much of a hurry to work in the water at this point.


(Click for a larger view.)

And after the 3rd session:



The next session focused mostly on the yellow and orange shirts. Lots of broken color here. I am trying to get the shadow and light to read correctly and show form. I would like to get this done in fewer stokes perhaps. The paint surface is getting complicated (do you like a Monet grainstack or cathedral?).


(Click for a larger view.)

Results of the next session simplified the yellow shirt and brought the left side of the boat closer to completion.


(Click for a larger view.)

Another session brings the left side even closer. I like how the gloves and hat turned out. I also worked on the blond hair again.


(Click for a larger view.)

This update brings quite a bit of change. The right side gets the attention this time, plus I started some color notes in the water. Finally, I started to scumble the final color on the boat side at the left.



Next I worked on a couple of random hands that are not done. I was musing about how to handle Cat's back. I knew it would be a little more detailed since it will be a focal point in a busy painting. I just slipped into painting it to see how some glazing would look over what was already there. I just kept working and fairly far done.



After painting some rippling muscles, I went back to painting some hands, hair, and cloth folds. The changes are getting less dramatic at this point.



The next sessions involved scraping back some of the painting and continuing with Cat's head, arms, and back. I discovered a missing arm that I have to add to the painting. Can you spot it? BTW, there are two and a head missing in the study, so it can still look good with some "minor" mistakes.



Then I worked on the rail and side of the boat. It needed quite a bit of straightening. Then the next session I added some glazing to the side over the top of the blue underpainting. The effect worked nicely when viewed up close or from a distance.

Rowboat

(Click for a larger image.)
14" x 11" Oil on mounted linen.

This painting is from a Different Strokes reference. I struggled with this one, scraping off that little face about 7 times. Working on the boat and reflection was fun and the result looks better in person even though I have updated the photo for the blog.