Between Paintings

Keeping your hand and eye hot between paintings is important.  When your enthusiasm wanes temporarily, try to find ways to keep your skill set practiced.  For me, that means getting my sketchbook out.

One of the best books to help me with drawing skills is Betty Edwards' Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain.  Now I look for negative spaces first.  Then I relate the next line to a line or angle in that space.  Then another line relating to the first line, and so forth. 

The claim "I don't want to be bothered with drawing; I just want to paint" rings of laziness and impatience to me.  Practicing the fundamentals should be part of a discipline that leads to better painting. 

Happy drawing, and Happy New Year!

Reflections

I love to paint water!  But that requires some knowledge of reflections.

In this painting, there are two different considerations of values in reflections.  In the foreground boat, the shadow side of the lobster boat is lighter than the darker reflection.  In the background, the dark dock shack and pilings are reflected in lighter tones.  You must look carefully at the values of reflections before assuming what value they should be.

Also, look at the gradation from bottom to top and see that the closer to the viewer, the darker the value.  And as the gradation unfolds, it goes from cool to warm.

And last, the reflections of the dock link up to the boat to form a shape.

Always look and study values before beginning to paint.

Spotlighting

Directing the viewer's eye to your major subject is an important consideration when composing your painting.  Sometimes you can use "pointers" -- lines that lead the eye to a certain spot on the surface of your painting.  Other times you can use color or size to attract attention to an area.  In this painting of a Venetian Canal, I used a method called spotlighting.

This technique depends upon values.  In this case, the focal point is the gondola.  A secondary subject is the light on the building on the right.  To draw attention to the highlighted areas, I've surrounded them with darks which creates a spotlight effect on the water and the buildings in the distance.  In addition, there is very little detail in the darks to distract the eye.  Describing every window or texture on the buildings in shadow prevents the eye from resting there.  The light summons your eye, and the silhouetted gondola stands out because of the contrast.

I've said it before; painting dark values requires a lot of paint.  Learning how to cover large areas of dark values is essential.  Paint quickly and make your brush go all different directions.  Painting fast prevents the paper from drying which is deadly to keeping a fresh look.  Mix a large puddle before you sail into the area. 

It also helps to have a value sketch as a road map to help speed up the application of the paint.

Merry Christmas!