Acrylic Class Spring 2012

ACRYLIC CLASS – Apple Turnover Finish

If you have gotten all your under painting finished, it is now time to start the detail work that will finish you painting.

I need to reiterate about under painting: Just because I call it "under painting" doesn't mean that you have to paint over it all. Quite the contrary, most of what has been called "under painting" will become the shadows or texture or what ever else depending on where it is in your painting, it is very important to the final look of your painting so PLEASE do not paint over all of this good under painting in the process of finishing your painting.

The apples need a highlighted area. This is more than just a white dot if it is too look like an apple. If you haven't already or if need to do more to make your highlighted area look bright enough, mix orange with your red (napthol or cadmium) to make a lighter color. If you mix in white, it will turn your red to pink and that's not the look we are going for this time. Even using touches of yellow will brighten the color. This color goes on the area that is getting direct sun the top "shoulders" of the apples or the sides that you think are facing the sun. this color changes to a darker red pretty quickly as it curves away from the light so blend it into the rest of the apple with your finger or by adding touches or red. If you have any doubts about how light plays on the surface of an apple, if you have an apple or use something rounded and place it near a single light source such as a bright window or a lamp and LOOK at how the light plays off the apple. See where the shadows are. I can talk until I run out of words but unless you learn to see these things for yourself, you will have difficulty painting them.

A problem I saw with many of you was not only using this highlight color on your whole apple but you also weren't getting the shadows down in between the apples. It is hard to get a pile of apples but the next time you are in the store, look at the fruit on display. You will see – even in that bad light – that in the spaces between the fruit is very dark. They are casting shadows on their neighbors and on the fruit underneath them so it is very dark, this is even more pronounced when you have only one light source. You must have dark to show the light, you also need that light to dark to show shape and contour. Look for it and understand it so you will know how to use it in the future.

The green apple gets a mix of yellow, sap green and white for its lightest area but the same rules apply this is only where the sun is hitting it the most, not for the entire apple.

While those are drying, if you put in a handle like I did, you can detail it out by putting  on a highlight and a shadow just remember that the shadowed side won't be as dark as the inside of the bucket because it is getting a lot of reflected light into its shadow. You can even throw in a touch or orange or sienna into the shadow as light might be reflecting off the bucket and onto the handle.

You can also block in the leaves at this point if you are putting them in. They need to be dark green so a mix or sap or Hooker's green with blue and/or purple make a dark green for their under painting. We will detail them out later.

If your apples are dry you can put on the brightest highlight. This is white with a very tiny touch of yellow in it just to slightly tint it, it should still look white but with some warmth. This just gets put where you are going to have the "glint" on the apple like the glint in the eye. Just tap it on in a very small area then either wipe out your brush to tap the edges or use your finger to spread it just slightly, then leave it. When it is dry in a minute or so a tiny touch of pure white right in the center of that spot and your apple sans leaves will be done.

To finish the leaves you will need an apple green color which is sort of a bluish/ gray green color. To get this add sap green, blue a touch of sienna to enough white to make it light enough to show against the dark color then paint only the parts of the leaf that will be in the light. That dark under painting becomes the form shadows of the leaf.

Now for the grasses: I used my #10 flat bristle brush to start pulling up grasses around my bucket and my apples. I will do more detail with my liner but this is to get the mass color and shapes in. I used a "flicking" type motion. Holding my brush back on the handle and using my lighter colors (yellows, greens, orange, just light colors because they are in the sun light), starting at the base of the bucket and pulling up the grasses in front of the bucket, you will see how the dark under the bucket works for you by giving contrast to the lighter grasses in front. PLEASE don't cover all of this dark, just pull up enough grass to get your point across nothing more. Work you way thru the apples though the brighter colors will be where the sun hits, use darker colors where it might be in shadow and give some texture to the grass.

Finally, get out your liner brush. If you haven't used this brush much, you might want to practice with it. First off your paint needs to be very inky in consistency. If you tip your palette it should run. To load your brush, wiggle the whole bristle end of the brush in the paint and as you lift it off your palette, roll it between your fingers to bring it to a point. Holding the brush and close to the end as you can, using your wrist to make it go in circles, get your brush moving BEFORE you touch your canvas and keep it going! Touch the canvas or the paper on the up stroke, then lift and move to the next place while you are still circling your brush. You can practice on paper with just water if you want, but learn how this brush works before you get to your canvas and it will do some amazing things for you. Big circles make tall grass, small circles make short grass. You can also dab and touch with this brush to make seed heads. Try making circles in both directions (not as easy as it sounds) and bend and break some of your grass.

You will use different colors for your grasses depending where you are and you will use this brush in both the foreground around the apples and in the background grasses. Use darker, cooler colors in the shadows, warmer, brighter colors in the sunnier areas. I put some darker weeds in the corners to vignette the painting but you will have to finish the painting the way you want it to look.

I may work a bit more on my painting before next week but am ending this part of the project here. I see some things I want to change in mine that may be okay on yours so if you see a bit of difference between now and then, this is only for aesthetic reasons not to "pull a fast one" on you. I am going to show how I got the glow in the original painting we are working from and maybe how to varnish it when it is done. You may continue to work on this painting if you haven't finished it or start on another project. We only have two more weeks before the end of the semester so there isn't any time to work on something else.

Torrance only has 2 more classes the classes will start up again on June 19^th so be sure to get signed up as soon as you can. If you have Google Chrome, I have started a Circle for my art classes if you want to comment or post a photo of things you are working on, it can be a bit more interactive than just a blog. You are all doing amazing work, keep it up and I will see you next week.

Acrylic Class Spring 2012

ACRYLIC – Apple Turnover Week 4

This week we really start getting into detail on our bucket and apples. You should all have the main elements under painted and some of the highlighting started on your apples and bucket. This is the time for any adjustments you need to make in case your apples are too big or too small or maybe you need to adjust the size or shape of you bucket/basket ( mine looks more like a bucket now), while you can always make adjustments even if you are almost finished, it is easier on the psyche if you have not invested a lot of time into something that needs changing, if you have been working on the details which take more time and effort to do, you may be reluctant to make needed changes and you run the risk of over working the area or the areas around the trouble spot., so fix things now.

I wanted to get as much of my highlighting and wood grain on the bucket before I started on the details, slats and the metal bands around the bucket. This is done with dry brush. I started at the top with a mix of white a tiny touch or yellow and tiny touch or orange to make a warm creamy color I apply it a bit heavier near the top of the bucket and lighter as I go down the sides. This color can also go into the lighted area of the inside of the bucket. I add touches of orange and sienna as I more down the side, then sienna and purple to almost totally purple at the very bottom. I will be bringing grasses up over the bottom of the bucket so I need it dark to put light grasses in front of it.

Another thing you can do to add character to your bucket – and this goes for any time you are painting old wood – you can dry brush in touches of other colors, basically any color you have on your palette or color that you have used in your painting. It really makes the old wood look like you could get splinters from it even though from a distance you don't see the individual colors the effect is what you are going for. I used my liner brush and just streaked several different colors into my bucket trying to keep the warmer colors in the sun lit areas and cooler colors in the shaded areas but I did put some of each color in all areas of the bucket. If you have to give yourself permission to do this, make up stories like maybe it use to be a red bucket that got painted blue and then had moss growing on it, what ever it takes to feel "safe" adding these colors even thinking I'm crazy to suggest this but you need to trust me and try it.

When you get your highlights on the bucket done now you are ready to add the slats and detail that will make this bucket look lie old beat up wood. With my liner brush I mixed a dark color using my blue, purple and burnt sienna, this should almost look black and you will need to add enough water so that it has a very ink-like quality to it. Those of you who were having trouble with this step weren't getting your paint thin enough to flow off the liner brush so if it doesn't flow, add more water until it does then as you lift your brush off your palette, roll it between your fingers and you will get a nice point to your bristles.

If it makes you feel more confident, sketch in the slats with your charcoal before you start to you can get them going in the right direction. Remember that on the top edge of the bucket the line will have to change direction so it looks like there is some thickness to the slats. The lines do not and should not be straight. This is an old beat up bucket, nothing on it is straight, there will even be holes and cracks in the wood. There will be tiny cracks along the top and bottom edge of the slats where the wood is splintering the edge needs to be rough. Don't forget the inside of the bucket as well.

One of the characteristics of old wood is where you have a crack there will be a highlight because where it has cracked the wood may be lifting up so if you have any of the highlight color (see above) left over, add water to it and along SOME of the cracks or spaces between slats, highlight along the edges. This does not need to be a solid line, more along the line of "dots and dashes" to give the wood more character. You really need to do this along the cracks you made at the top and bottoms of the slats and while it is not as necessary in the shadowed area at the transition between light and dark add a bit of blue to your highlight color and highlight a few of the cracks. This goes for the inside as well.

When you feel you have gotten as many cracks as you want sketch in the bands on your bucket. These bands go slightly above the wood at the top this is to give them some depth. I started at the top with orange, yellow and sienna and maybe a bit of white which will dull it slightly at the top of the band, as I worked my way round the side, more sienna until it was all sienna then sienna and purple until it went into the shadows and became very dark. This is wet into wet brush blending but it doesn't need to be blended well just enough to make the transition from light to dark. Along the top of this band, using my liner and the dark color I used for the cracks, I added a dark line for a shadow on both top and bottom bands.

Now for the apples: I wanted to make the lighter side a bit lighter but as everyone should know that if you add white to red you get pink and I don't want pink apples. To avoid using white to my napthol red I added a bit of orange. This color goes on THE LIGHT SIDE put this where the sun is hitting your apple the with your brush or finger, blend it into the dark part of the apple. I saw may of you painting the entire apple with this color loosing the shadows that you worked so hard to establish. What had been under painting is now shadow, DON'T LOOSE IT or you will have to put it back in. This color is for the apples that are getting direct sun so be careful when you are near the bucket only a couple of apples will get this color and then only slight touches.

The highlight for the green apple is white, yellow and sap green to get a light greenish color but the same thing applies: this only goes where the sun is hitting the apple directly, don't loose your shadows..

Just a couple more things I did before I quit for the day, first: The leaves of the apple I just under painted with Hooker's and blue to make a dark green, I will detail them out later, I was just placing them at this point. I also put a bracket for a handle on the bucket just on the side on the band and then I sketched in the handle and bale. I tell you to make up stories and as I've painted this bucket each time, I've tried to think of a reason why it has spilled, so in this version I am making it look like the bracket finally gave way and the handle broke so on the back side of the bale I suggested the bracket still attached and hanging in the air. I under painted the handle with a mix of yellow a touch of purple (complimentary colors make grays) and white to get a yellow gray. The bale I added white to my dark color I used for my cracks and with my liner painted it in.

That is where I stopped, I am hoping that we can finish up next time we meet so be ready to work. Everyone is doing a great job, this has been a fun project. See you soon.

Spring 2012 Acrylic Class

Acrylic – Apple Turnover Week 3

(Sorry, I apparently didn't post this blog =-O )

By this time you should have all your under painting done for the basket and the apples, now we will be starting the finishing process, your under painting is important, it becomes shadow and texture so be careful not to loose it all as you finish up your painting.

I started on the top outside part of the basket with a mix of white (gesso), tiny touches of yellow, orange and sienna, it should be a soft peachy color. Using a #10 bristle brush and the dry brush technique, I followed the grain of the wood and lightly stroked this color on. The harder you press your brush to the canvas the more paint will come off so as you move down to the side of the basket, lighten your stroke so you leave less paint with each stroke. Come down about half way on the side of the basket with this color.

IN THE SAME PILE OF COLOR, add more sienna and a touch of orange, same brush same technique, start just below the color you just added and dry brush both down the basket and also lightly dry brush up to about the quarter area of the brush. If you do it right, you will not see a line of demarcation between the first color and the second. The third color is applied the same but this time add purple and/or blue to your sienna and dry brush it on just like you just did before, It need to get very dark under the basket as it goes into the shadow just be sure to feather out the color so there aren't any hard lines, you need soft edges as it disappears under the basket.

The inside of the basket is done EXACTLY the same way just be sure to locate the lightest area on the side of the basket, the darkest area will be on the inside of the basket.

At this point you might want to locate your apples, you may need to use chalk in the darker areas to see where your apples are in the basket. Inside the basket if you have alizarin crimson use it, if you don't have AC use your napthol with a touch of blue to purple it up be sure that the brush you are using doesn't have any white in it or it could turn you apples pink.

Here is the part you need to pay attention to because you can easily make more work for yourself if you don't pay attention to what you are doing. That dark under painting you did on the apples now becomes the shadows on and between your apples. DO NOT COVER IT ALL UP. I saw many of you when you got to the red apples, you painted the whole apple red both the light side and the shadowed side which made your apples look flat, to make them look rounded, you have to put the shadows back in that you just painted over. Learn to use your under painting, while we may need to go back and darken certain areas, most of the shadows will be you under painting, don't paint over all of it.

That said, using either the alizarin or the napthol with blue ON THE TOPS of the apples in the basket, following the shape of the apple you are painting, add the color and if you need to, use a brush or your finger to soften it into the dark part of the apple. Paint each apple individually so you get the shading right. You will build up speed as you learn, at this point, take your time.

You can use the same color on the apples that are out in the sun but it goes on the sides away from the light source: the back and the underneath. If you are putting in a green apple, the shadowed side is Hooker's green and a touch of purple. Go to the picture page and see where I have put the color for each apple so you have a clear idea what you need to do.

Where the sun might be hitting the apples in the basket and for those outside the basket, on the light side I used straight napthol red. Cad red will also work if you don't have the napthol. This is only the start of the highlight but it needs to be done before you can add the final touches.

Another thing I did to the apples inside of the basket and to some in front was to add a reflected highlight into the shadow areas. This is just a hint of color added lightly into the shadows. It is blue, purple and a touch of white to make a soft lavender color. This color is in many shadows if you look for it but it is not LAVENDAR on the back sides of things, it is a whisper not a shout.

We should be finishing up this painting in the next class, or more precisely, I will be finishing the painting up. If you need another week or more you can continue to work on the class project, however, if you are keeping up with me you will need to start looking for your own project to work on for the duration of the semester, I will do demos that will help those with problems and but it will also benefit the class as a whole. See you in class.

Spring 2012 Acrylic Class

Acrylic – Apple Turnover Week 2

By this time I hope that everyone has their under painting finished so we can add the basket, there are a few things that we need to do before we start painting in the basket and apples the key thing is to be sure that we have a good dark area behind the basket and the only way to find that out is to draw the basket in with the chalk or charcoal. Here's the thing: you want to make the dark grasses behind the basket fit the basket, not the other way around.

When you sketch in the basket and apples they should be dominant in the painting probably around 40% of the painting will be covered with the basket and apples. Keep the basket heavy to the left side and let the apples "spill" out in front and across to the right side to the painting. If you need to, extend the dark area behind the basket to it is slightly above the top of the basket. You need to have dark to show light. We will add back the highlights to the weeds later.

Next, in the area of grass that is behind and to the right of the basket is s sunny area, using yellow, orange and touches of white (gesso) and sienna I added some highlights using that same patting stroke I used the first time. I brush mixed my colors with this patting stroke to give more variation to the area.

Once these things are done, now we can start basing in the basket, re-draw it if you have to. The light is coming in from the upper left side so the top left of the outside of the basket will be light and the lower right side of the inside of the basket will be light, the apples on the inside will be mostly in shadow. I want to work wet into wet so I will keep moving down the outside of the basket, I started on the outside top of the basket with blue, sienna and white on my brush and following the grain for the wood I started filling in the top of the basket, thanking these colors down a little more than a third around the side, mixing on the canvas (brush mixing), it becomes a warm gray color. Without cleaning my brush, I picked up just the blue and the sienna on my brush and starting just below the first color and still following the grain of the wood, I applied these colors then first worked down a bit then worked up into the still wet previous paint to create a soft blend between the 2 areas. Wet into wet allows for these gentle transitions from one value to the next. The next section, I wiped out my brush but didn't clean it so there may still be some white in it but I picked up more blue and sienna and repeated what I just did, gently blending the colors together where one meets the other. The last and darkest color I first rinsed my brush to get out the white, then I picked up the blue and sienna but this time I added a touch of purple to make it very dark. You always follow the grain of the wood and remember to keep all your edges soft.

On the inside of the basket, I started with the dark – since it was on my brush – and with a similar technique, I worked to the light area. Please look at the reference photo and the painting from class if you are having trouble visualizing this, it will save a lot of repainting.

If you have alizarin crimson on your palette, you can use it or the napthol red will work for the apples with a touch of purple or blue, we are just basing in these things so don't try to be exact, just get in the mass color, next week we will start picking out the individual apples and start on some of the details. If you are going to put in one green apple, your Hooker's green and purple is a good color for the under painting just be sure that red or green, even though this is just the foundation color, you need to follow the shape of the apples with your strokes.

I may make some changes to my basket next week so you can see that changes are not difficult to make with acrylics. See you all soon.

Spring 2012 Acrylic Class

Acrylic Class – Apple Turnover

Be sure to have the reference photo and drawing before you start so you know where you are going. You do not need to draw the basket or apples just yet, all you need is a horizontal line about a third of the way up from the bottom – doesn't need to be exact – so you know just how far down you need to bring your background weeds. The drawing will come later.

Be sure that you have ALL your paints out and ready to go and PUT OUT PAINT! I do mean ALL YOUR paints and little dabs will not do ya, put out paint! I say this and still, I see tiny pea sized portions of 3 or 4 paints put out, that isn't even enough paint for a 3 x 5 at least an inch of each color.

We started by using our largest brush (this can be your 2" haki or blender or the largest bristle brush you have like a #12) and coating the upper 2/3s of the canvas with gesso. You will need to work quickly so the gesso stays wet for this part of the process and for the most part, you will not be cleaning your brush but keep a paper towel handy to wipe out your brush occasionally. You can wipe out your brush to get some of the gesso out if you feel you have too much on it otherwise, double or triple load your brush with colors such as burnt sienna, blue, purple, orange, yellow red, green (like I said ALL your paints), you double load by putting color on each corner, you will be using the chiseled end of your brush to paint with, not the sides.

Hold your brush near the back of the handle use long, overlapping, curving strokes (think grass when you are doing this), start working these colors into the gesso on your canvas. You should see streaks of these different colors as you paint your canvas but you do want to cover all your canvas with these colors and with this type of stroke. When you need more color, pick up at least 2 on your brush and work it into what is there as you work across. It needs to be darker at the bottom of this area and lighter at the top so plant on using your darker, cooler colors (blue, purple, sienna and darker greens) near the bottom and your warmer lighter colors such as yellow and orange with your sienna near the top. If you need to make it lighter pick up bits of gesso instead of white it will help opaque the colors.

One thing to watch out for is making stripes of color when you are doing this. You don't want a dark stripe and a light stripe, you want it to blend from one to the other. Another things that can happen is you make all your strokes exactly the same: Same size, same direction same ole same ole. Very the size and direction of your strokes, remember what you are painting: A field of uncut weeds and grasses, they will go every which way. Some will be straight, some will be slightly bent others maybe broken or almost on the ground, your strokes need to reflect this.

When you are done covering this area you should have a softly blended background that looks like out of focus grasses. If you have a lot of paint still on your brush, you can wipe it out on the bottom of the canvas if you want, or if you need to soften the bottom edge of the area you just painted. I will often just "clean" my brush in an unpainted area because it won't hurt anything and will actually work for you as part of your under painting.

In this bottom part of the painting we need to under paint for the grasses and apples that will be coming later, this is done with at least a #10 or #12 bristle brush, you will be double loading again but this time you will use the flat side of your brush in a scooping/patting type motion. The brush is held almost parallel to the canvas before you start then you pat down and push up quickly, this creates texture. this area is shorter grasses and the basket and apples are laying in a spot of sun so the area next to the darker area above it will be your lightest area, for this you will use yellow, orange and gesso (white) as your primary colors but to that you can work in red, green, sienna and near the bottom – especially in the corners - leave out the gesso and use your darker colors: green, sienna, blue and purple. Again, watch out for stripes of color these colors should blend from one to another so when you add an new color work the color in all directions as you move across and down to the bottom of you canvas.

This next part you will need to use either a sable (synthetic sable is fine) flat or angle brush or a # 6 – 8 round brush. These types of brushes will create a more definite stroke and make these next strokes look closer. If you are using either a flat or angle brush, the stroke will be the same as before using the chiseled end of the brush and just like before you will be making grass that has different angles. Its like scribbling out something with a pencil ((((((( only more slanted. This is tall grass so make big movements with your brush no matter what brush you are using. Get your arm going before you get to your canvas and hold it near the back of the brush. I don't mention this often enough but when you choke up on your brush, you limit your movement, save that for the detail, right now you need to go crazy with this grass. If you are using a round brush, it is like using a liner to make grass, make sure that the paint is creamy and will flow off your brush then hold the brush at the back and start making circles before you get to your canvas then when your motor is going, hit the canvas on the up swing and vary the size of your circles and occasionally switch directions.

Start with darker colors (sienna, blue, purple, Hooker's green) at the bottom, it need to be dark up far enough so that you can paint in your basket and have dark behind it so at least ¾ of that background needs to have these darker grasses. The tops of the grasses will be in sun light so you can add some of the lighter colors near the top. Just be sure that at the bottom of this area you have it well covered in dark, at the top, you can have spaces between the grasses as they come into the light. We will do more detail near the end so you don't need to finish it now.

We will be drawing in the basket and the apples next time and will probably get them all under painted as well. I will see you all on Monday.

Winter 2012 Acrylic Class

Winter 2012 Acrylic Class – Wave Study

I was looking at my blogs and realized that I haven't posted anything for the acrylic version of the wave! Sorry. I had it posted for the watercolor class because of PV and totally spaced out that the acrylic class might need some instruction. I will recap as best I can remember.

First is the drawing. Yes, even something as simple as a wave needs at least an idea of where it is going because for many of you, the problems started here.

A wave is not a straight line whether it is breaking or just a swell, be sure that when you draw your wave that you give it some shape. Look at waves. Take pictures of waves. Do what ever it takes so that you have the shapes of your wave more than just a straight line.

The foam is also a trouble spot for many of you, saw too many neatly trimmed wave foam. Again, go you your source. I know many of you print out my paintings as I do them in class, what you should be doing is downloading the actual photo and blowing it up to a size you can see, you get lost when you don't have a real map. The actual photo is like the difference between cryptic scratches on the back of an envelope and looking at a Google Satellite map, you may get there but you may have to wander around for a while. Use a real photo.

Under paint the water. The water behind the wave is bluer than the wave itself. Keep your strokes parallel to the top and bottom using long flat "u" shapes. The more pronounced the "u" shape the choppier the water will look. I used Ultra Marine blue, touches of green, purple and gesso to get a medium dark blue. There is a swell behind the crashing wave, to start that I just left out the white and added more blue and purple.

A breaking wave has 4 parts: the building part of the wave, the eye or transparency, the foam and the breaking part of the wave. I usually start with the eye of the wave and work out into the building part of the wave.

The eye is the thinnest part of the wave and also the lightest part of the wave because more sun light can shine through it. Depending on lighting conditions (morning, afternoon, sunset, storms etc) that eye can take on many colors but it will always be the lightest part of the wave. This wave is in the mid afternoon so I went with a yellow/green.

I started out applying gesso to the area where the eye will be and along the top part of the building wave and I applied the gesso to an area about twice the size that it will be when finished. I picked up on my flat bristle brush, yellow and a touch of sap green and with a circular motion worked it into the gesso where I wanted the eye to be. That part of the wave is like a tube as the water breaks over its self. Keep that in mind. You may need to add more gesso if it isn't light enough or more green if it is too yellow. As I worked out from the lightest area I added more sap and touches of blue (ultra marine or cobalt), making the water darker as it moves away from the eye so I get a graded look, no hard lines. Ideally, the eye should just be right under the foam, tapering out into the building part of the wave. It shouldn't be any more than a quarter or less (preferably) of the wave. Some of you took it too far down the wave and too far out into the building wave.

The building part of the wave is lighter at the top then at the bottom because some light manages to get through the very top while the bottom has the entire ocean behind it. Remember that this part of the wave is building up so your brush strokes need to follow the curved face of the wave. Brush blending from light to dark will give you a smooth transition of color because you are working wet into wet. It is sap green or hookers green with touches of yellow and white that blend into Hooker's green, UM blue and purple at the base of the wave. In the flat area in front of the strokes are flat again and a variety of colors from green to purple to blue, sienna and orange up near the shore line. This is just under painting and you need all those colors. Trust me.

The breaking part of the wave behind the foam is dark at the top and lighter close to the foam, not light like the eye, just lighter than the crest. Again, your strokes need to follow the direction of the wave. If the building part of the wave is a left parentheses then the breaking water will be the right parentheses. I used my bristle brush Hooker's green and UM blue at the top part of the wave and pulled down at the base I added white (gesso) and more blue and pulled up blending with the darker color. Add just enough white to lighten a value or two because you will need a darker background for your foam.

The foam is under painted in blues and lavenders. It is always a good plan to under paint anything white with blues, purples and grays. If you go directly to white you have no place to go with your values and what ever it is you are painting will look flat. With that in mind, I mixed a purple/blue color color with gesso, blue and purple if you have your value scale, it should be about 4 or 5 values darker than the white. As always, trust me on this. Before you apply this color to your canvas with a flat bristle brush, think about what you are painting: The foam is bubbling and boiling and frothing up, it is in a very chaotic state, your brush strokes also need to reflect that chaos. That said, I used the side of my brush in a circular motion, rolling and scumbling the color on making the top and bottom edges uneven and varying sizes (see picture page). There is even some foam around the eye and a little into the breaking part of the wave that can just be touches of color using the end of your brush. Each layer will be done exactly the same, each time leaving a bit of the previous color to be shadows. I think I had 3 or 4 layers of color, each time just a bit lighter until I got to white.

With your charcoal draw in where you want the receding waters to be. There are usually several "old waves" that are washing back to sea so look at a reference photo to see the patterns they make.

The foam patterns in the flat area in front of the wave and be a similar color and value but I think I added a touch of green to the mix. This foam is laying on the surface of the water so for the most part your strokes for the under paining will be long flat, over lapping "s" type strokes until they get to the bottom of the wave, just make sure that the base of the wave is dark enough before you add foam patterns, when you do that foam will curve up just like the water does and it is a very blue purple, my foam is at least 8 on a scale of 1 – 10 white being 1 black being 10, on my value scale so the water behind it is at least a 9.

The water behind the wave will take several different colors but all are done in the exact same manner with long flat "u" shapes. The swell in the back gets a bit of special attention to suggest it is building into a wave, first the colors you will use will be dark about an 8 on the value scale. I used Hooker's green, UM blue and purple together and separate and those strokes are still on the flat side because the swell hasn't quite built up enough to change the direction of the strokes. However, when you are painting with the lighter colors (add white to the above colors and cobalt if you have it), at the base of the swell the lighter colors need to turn up slightly as the get to the swell. The top of the swell is little short strokes of the lighter colors. Think about what you are painting before and as you are painting it.

The receding water in front of the flat foam closest to the shore is going to be dry brush, you will want that mottled under painting to show through so it looks like churning sand and whatnot when you are done so PLEASE don't cover up all that good under painting, it works for you not against you.

Still with my bristle brush, I mixed a bluish color with gesso (white) UM or cobalt blue and touches of green and the mud on my brush after wiping it off. This color is about a value of 6 on my value scale. Using the thin side of my brush and very little paint, I dry brushed the color into this receding water. Now this is different from the other areas of water because it is running back into the ocean so it is going slightly down hill, what that means is your strokes should angle back towards a central point, not a severe angle just a gentle one. Remember dry brush is a very light stroke and the water gets lighter (about a 5 on the value scale), and fades to almost nothing as it gets closer to the shore.

The foam along the edges of the receding waters is done just like the bigger foam, you can use a smaller brush or just tap it on but it always starts with a blues and purples for the under painting.

The wet sand in the near the water is a mix of sienna and purple and dry brushed into where the water and sand meet. When it is dry, you can take a bit of that light blue color from above on your brush (not too much this is still dry brush) and right under the edges of the edges of these receding waters, pull your brush straight down then quickly go straight across to form reflections in the wet sand.

Finishing touches: In the foam on the wave and foreground use white with a tiny, touch of yellow to slightly tint the white and stipple the color on using the end of your brush straight on. I like to smash my bristle brush down to "fuzz up" the end to create irregular patterns. LIGHTLY touch JUST THE TOPS of the foam where you think the direct sun would shine, those other layers of blues and purples are your shadows.

If you want you can put more foam patterns on the face of your wave but keep them dark, they are in the shadow of the wave, a mix of blue a touch of purple and white, remember they need to be curved with the wave and this same color is used in the eye because the foam is back lit.

Right under the foam of the crashing wave it is very dark to be sure to make it so using blue and purple and a touch of Hooker's green.

If you want, you can use your toothbrush and gesso to splatter some sea spray around your crashing wave, just don't over do it.

Upon request, I added rocks, first by scumbling some dark colors on and brush mixing ( UM blue, sienna, purple green, red?) then I came in and highlighted the tops of my rocks where I thought sum might hit using gesso, with touches of orange and sienna, in the shadow areas I added blue for reflected highlights and almost straight cobalt blue with mud from my brush to suggest water running off one of the rocks and I also created foam behind it just like I did in the main wave starting with purple and highlighting with white.

This is the basic game plan for the wave study. You can do as much or as little of this as you want it is up to you to decide what you like best.

We will start something new next semester, hope to see you all soon.

Week 5 Winter 2012 Semester

Winter 2012 Acrylic – Foggy PV Lighthouse

I will try to recap what I didn't manage to get posted last week so we can get caught up.

Before I put in the clouds, I used my toothbrush and gesso and put some stars in the darkest part of the sky. This is only an option, you don't need to do it but I thought it was something you needed to see.

The clouds can be done with either a knife or a brush, I think I worked with both. The color was a blue/gray ( blue with touches of sienna, purple and gesso to lighten it a bit). This was my base color for the clouds in the sky and the fog but to it as I painted I added other colors like red or orange to suggest the color of the sky reflecting into the clouds or fog, sometimes I added blue to darken the color to suggest shadows or gesso for lighter areas, this is impressionistic so what and how much is up to you. Even though this is impressionistic it is probably even more important to remember that the direction of your strokes with brush or knife need to follow the the thing you are painting. Clouds roll and boil so your strokes need to do the same.

I took the fog bank that is on the horizon almost all the way across the painting going behind the point with the light house. I need the dark there for later.

In the ocean area I mixed a gray blue/green with blue, Hooker's green and the fog gray and enough gesso to lighten it some and with the knife added this color to the ocean. This darker color needs to be along the horizon and in front of the point to help define the point and into the bay. It is okay to leave some of the under painting as highlights on the water, but try to get the areas closer to shore which is further from the light source, almost solid, this helps define the cliffs. You can use a knife or a brush.

I added the green to the top of the far point by adding more green to the mix I was just using.

Add enough blue, sienna and purple to that mix to make it gray again for the fog that is closer in, add gesso or white to lighten to the value you want. I tend to stay in the same area of my palette if the colors are close to the colors I have been working with.

One thing I did do that I corrected last class was I brought the fog too high up on the nearest cliffs, I had to go back in and add back some of the rocks I lost.

That was where I stopped the previous week, the following is what I did this past week:

I am at the point in this painting where I need to think about finishing up. Where can I add more light or dark? Do I need more or less fog? What is bothering me the most?

As I said previously, I thought I had too much fog in the foreground so I added back some of the rocks, I also added back some of the water around the rock in the water along with lightening some of the fog to leave a sunny break in the fog to light the rock. Notice that the fog in the foreground is darker than the fog on the same plane as the rock or the cliffs, this gives a reason for the highlights and shows a path for the sun.

I also added more blue to the water around the point because I didn't have enough to make the point stand out.

The grass in the foreground was that fog color with more Hooker's green and a touch of sienna. I used my brush to pat it on to give it a fuzzy look and as I put that color on I picked up other colors like blue or purple to darken the corners or touches of gesso or yellow to lighten. I did want it to look misty so I kept it cool in tone.

Finally, I put in the lighthouse and palm trees on the distant point. Whenever you add something like a lighthouse or a building be sure that you get the proportions right between the place it is sitting and its surroundings. In the photo, I measured the lighthouse then measure it against the cliffs, I found that it took a little more than 2 lighthouses in length to go from the bottom of the lighthouse to the bottom of the cliffs, this keeps the lighthouse from getting too big. If you let your brain try to do this on its own, your lighthouse will be 300 feet tall because the brain will assign importance to it and it will grow and look out of proportion to the cliffs.

Also, there is NO DETAIL in either the lighthouse or the buildings. I used gesso with a tiny touch of yellow and a bit of mud on my brush (what ever you have on the palette) and made a very light warm grayish color to block in the lighthouse and the buildings. These are JUST MARKS, just blobs of light paint to SUGGEST buildings. I used a bit of burnt sienna to touch the tops to SUGGEST roofs but that was it. Down and Dirty, no one haired brushes, it is too far away. It is the same for the palm trees, I used a grey/green color and just made a bunch of marks to suggest the palms but there is no detail.

The light beams from the lighthouse are gesso and a tiny touch of yellow to warm it up starting at the lighthouse and using a dry brush technique, I pulled the color away from the lighthouse in a "V" shape, I also used my fingers to pull and soften this color as it moved away from the light source. This is the reason I needed the darker fog behind the point so my lighthouse and light beam would show up.

There may be some things I will do to finish this up this painting once I have lived with it for a while but for class, I am calling this one done. We will be doing some studies starting with rocks so please find some images of rocks to have for reference for class, there are some on my reference photo page but it is good practice to have your own. See you all in class.

Animal Portrait Class

To recap what I have done the past couple of weeks on Jackson, I realized that I had some problems with the proportions on the face. The more I looked at it the more I realized that I had missed a whole section of his head when I was doing my drawing so I ended up painting out all of his face, redrawing and repainting. This happens to all artists regardless of how good they are especially if you are trying to talk and paint at the same time.

Once I had my face back in where it should be, I got to work on the details. The fur will take layers of dry brush to make it look like soft fluffy fur it also takes adding colors my may not see right off the bat. Just because he looks like a gray and black dog, he actually has a lot of other colors in his fur. I dry brushed in blues, burnt sienna, some pale oranges and some lavenders as I was adding layers to his fur. I would have put them in even if I couldn't see them because I know that they are there. If you look at anything bet it plant, animal, or rock, man made or nature, you will start to see that most things are not just one or two colors even something that "appears" to be one color. Look at a white wall and try to analyze it. Compare the sun lit areas to the shadows, if there are plants or grass near the wall look for reflected light in both the lit areas and the shadows. Look for the reflected violet light that is in the lighter shadows. You will see all sorts of colors and that is what is happening in an animal's fur as well. Adding other colors brings life to the fur as long as they are subtle they will add to your painting.

Many beginning students misunderstand the use of purple. Purple is your natural shadow color so when you are mixing a color for your shadows it is good practice to add blues and purples to the color you are mixing, it doesn't mean that it is totally purple, it does mean that the color is on the cool side. These are subtle colors, not ones that hit you over the head unless that is what you want and it dose take practice to mix the right colors in any medium but once you understand it, your animals will look more real.

Sometimes adding colors you know should be there go against the grain of what your brain tries to tell you. This is usually your left brain trying to call the shots and in my case, my left brain was telling me that dog noses are black. Period. Well, that usually isn't the case. Just like everything else, the nose of an animal is influenced by light, texture, reflected light etc as well as slight variations in the color of the nose. This dog the nose leather was just slightly warmer where the top curved into the front of the nose and there was a tiny touch of pink on the inside of the nose, plus there was a reflected blue light on the top and sides and the highlight. All of this is what makes the nose look wet once I fought my urge to just paint it black and added the colors I knew were there, his nose just pops off the canvas and looks cold and wet like it should.

I've also started to add the markings to the face so I can get a better sense of where I am with Jackson. From this point on I will be refining this dog. Looking for highlights, checking the shapes of things especially the markings, making sure I am following the growth patterns of the fur, basically getting him ready for the final touches to finish him up, which I may do next class with any luck at all. The next animal I will be doing is my late little white dog and I will be working in pastels.

Winter 2012 Acrylic and Animal Portrait Class

Winter Acrylic Class Week 2 – Foggy PV Lighthouse

It is always good to get back to class and start a painting and this time I decided that we needed to try something a bit different when painting this project, I think it will be fun and challenging.

This will be out of a lot of students' comfort zone because it is going to be a lot less exact than most are use to but different is a good thing. We can learn a lot from trying something different whether it is different paint, different textures, different surfaces or in this case a different technique. This will be more on the impressionistic side and I will be using a palette knife in places and a lot more paint but the hardest part for you will be to put the paint down and to leave it alone. Most will tend to want to fiddle with the paint and smooth it out, however, with this technique the beauty of it is in the raw strokes and the texture it leaves behind.

I started off with a simple sketch with my soft vine charcoal so I had an idea of where things will be such as the horizon and the end of the peninsula, this gives me a place to start but I am not going to be married to those lines, they are only suggestions and I will be painting right through them or over them. Many of my students still have a problem with the charcoal lines seeing them more as barriers where their paint should stop rather than a suggestion of where something else might start. This might be important in watercolor – maybe – but with acrylics we can paint right over something that is already there so those lines have only limited meaning.

For instance, the horizon line in this picture: I did measure up from the bottom and use a ruler to make a straight line for the horizon only because I need to know where the horizon starts because that is where I wanted to start with my lighter colors but I painted right over it and down into the water to start my reflection of the sky. As I looked around the class, many of you saw that line as the demarcation between the sky and the water and totally left out the reflection colors in the ocean. I can draw that line back in when I need it for the water IF I need it what I needed it for this time was to tell me where to start painting. Same with the lines for the land: They were there so I would make sure that I got my sky color far enough down to go behind the peninsula, I can draw them back in if I need to but they are only charcoal, I painted right over them.

That said, I was using my #12 bristle brush and I will be working wet into wet plus I was picking up more than one color at a time such as when I started at the horizon, I picked up gesso for my white, and a touch of cad yellow light (Yellow) and using a scumbling type stroke (means every which direction), I worked those colors across my canvas where my horizon line was and I went above and below that line with that color and I went beyond the end of the peninsula as well (remember they are only guide lines not barriers). To the (my) left hand side of the canvas I added a bit more white (gesso) because that is my light source but not so much white as I got close to the lighthouse. While it was still wet I picked up some orange with a bit of yellow and with the same jumbled stroke I added these colors into the sky AND into the water (see photo). I repeated this same process with orange and red then just red, maybe a bit of crimson. These colors will stretch well past the point of the land so there is a glow behind the lighthouse.

Now I rinsed my brush well to remove the lighter colors and the gesso from my brush, but I didn't stop here because I want to blend the dark sky colors into the warmer sky colors and well as the water before the warm colors dry. We haven't done a lot of wet into wet type work but it can be very effective in many situations, it is a good skill to have and to practice. Be sure to dry your brush of most of the water or your paint will get too thin.

I picked up blue – I think I was using both my ultra marine and my cobalt blues at the same time here – plus a touch of purple and a touch of sienna. Please be careful using the purple, a little of it will go a long way and many of you end up with purple skies, it should be more to the blue side, the sienna is just there to gray the color slightly so not. I also used the cobalt to lighten this portion of the sky a bit rather than white because the white can make it look chalky and I wanted my colors to stay clean. Again, I picked up all these colors on my brush – you can make a couple of trips to your palette if you want - and with that same scumbling stroke I started in the left hand corner and worked my way across and down, almost to the light area but not quite until I got the rest of the sky covered. Yes, you need to work fast and not worry about it because you do want the light area to still be wet, the gesso does help extend the drying time or you can use an extender if you want but if you put the paint on thick enough it should still be wet when you need it to be.

As I moved across my sky area, I used less of the cobalt and more of the ultra marine blue a bit more purple and sienna to darken the color, you can also use burnt umber if you have it to really darken the right hand side. Blend quickly and be aware of any areas that don't make a gradual blend from the lighter blues to the darker blue.

In the water, you can add touches of green and a little gesso as you get closer to the light area, do keep in mind that it is water so try to keep your strokes parallel to the top and bottom of your canvas and work well past the ends of the cliffs both distant and close and forget the rock in the water at this point, just worry about the water.

Once your sky and water are covered, rinse and/or wipe out your brush and start blending the light and dark areas together. Some of the dark can come down into the light and visa versa, you can even suggest clouds at this point. We will be doing more clouds later, these are just suggestions at this point, in the water you can suggest waves by streaking light into dark and dark into light, just keep them parallel to the top and bottom.

I did let this part dry a bit before I went on to the cliffs but you don't really need to if you want to keep working, I just don't like to get too far ahead of the class.

If your sky is still wet, you can use the end of your brush handle to sketch back in the cliffs, if it is dry use your charcoal. Don't worry about the lighthouse yet, we still have work in that area to do before we get to it, just worry about the cliffs be sure to make the distant point far enough out, mine is a bit more than half way and the closer cliff is just a bit less than half way. Too many of you were lining them up all on one side making your paintings look visually heavy to one side. Be aware of this tendency to line things up, you want visual movement in your paintings.

I used a knife to base in the cliffs and lots of paint. For those of you who have been asking to use a knife you need to be aware that you will be using a lot more paint than you normally use with your brush, you also need to be aware that you can fiddle with it a bit, but it looks much better if you just put it down and leave it alone.

On my palette with my knife, I picked up sienna, orange, yellow, a touch of red and gesso and lightly mixed them together. I want to see the individual colors on my knife so just pull them out on your palette to form a thin swatch of color and cut across that swatch with your knife, it should leave a roll of paint on the edge of your knife. With that roll of color, start shaping the distant cliff. Please keep in mind that even with a knife, the direction of the strokes matter, these are not granite cliffs like they have on the East coast, these are crumbly sand stone and when they erode, they slide down existing slides so the come down at angles in most places. You can move your knife back and forth to create ledges or strata but generally slope them down at an angle.

While this is wet, and down in the same swatch of color, add some sap or hooker's green to make a gray green and add it to the distant cliffs. This suggests those patches of weeds that grow on the side of the cliffs. You can blend a bit with your knife, just don't over blend.

The forward cliff had a lighter patch of dirt/rock and that color can be made with yellow and a touch of purple and gesso, the highlight for that color is to add more white/gesso and yellow, the bulk of the closer cliff is sienna, orange, blue, purple red, what ever is on your palette and think rocks as you knife these colors on. There is no right way to do this so just have fun with it.

The little rock in the water was done the same way, I just mixed a dark brown with sienna, blue and purple and highlighted with orange. I will be doing more but this is where I stopped.

For the most part, this is our under painting, next week we will be working more on the clouds and fog, I don't know how far we will get but everyone is doing a good job with a new technique. See you all in class.

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Animal Portrait Class

The fur of an animal is a series of layers regardless of the medium you are using. To get that feeling of depth in the fur, even with short haired animals, you need to work in layers. If you are working in watercolor, you start with your highlights and you may need to mask them out before you start then each layer gets darker, using a dry brush technique to create the feeling of fur – short strokes for short fur and long strokes for longer fur and these strokes should be overlapping and not lined up like fence posts.

Dry brush is also how I use my acrylics except instead of going from light to dark, I go from dark to light just like you would do in oil or pastel. Since I can't use oil for the most part, I do know that it is a bit different in that you might want to leave lighter areas unpainted until you get to that color but you also need to blend in these under painting colors so they don't look like ropes hanging off the animal. While there are a few dogs like the Komondor or puli who have that "mop" look, most animals have a soft fuzzy look to them so you would want to soften the colors together in oil using a soft brush such as a blender or a mop brush even a cheap blush brush works well for this, just a few very light swipes of the blender, softens the colors together and softens the look of your animal. You can come in later with a liner brush and do some individual hairs but at the under painting stage try to keep things soft.

Oil painters, if you want to use a more dry brush effect, you can let your oils set up for a few days and use the dry brush over the tacky paint that will also work. For those who do not know what dry brush is, it is literally an almost dry brush. It has very little water or medium and very little paint, it works best using a bristle brush in acrylics or oils but can also be done in watercolor using a round brush and spreading the bristles apart to flare the ends out before starting to paint. Some people like to use a fan brush but I have a problem with fans because if you are not careful, you can repeat that fan shape (this goes for oils and acrylics as well) giving your painting a very unnatural look. If you are going to be doing a lot of furry critters, you might want to find a grass brush, I know they have them in the watercolor brushes if you can't find them in the oil/acrylic brushes, they have gaps designed into the ends of the brush to create a grass or fur like texture when you use them with dry brush techniques.

This dry brush technique is what I was using on my dog. I mixed a slightly lighter color and added it to my painting following the direction of the hair growth. I also had some darker color handy so I could start to establish some of the darker markings on my dog so I could get a sense of where I am going with Jackson. I worked back and forth between the colors as needed, this is one of those things you kinda have to figure out for your self because you need to find what works best for you.

On the picture page you will probably notice that I have painted out part of Jackson's face, the reason for this is the more I painted him and got details forming I realized that one, his eyes were too close together and two, his nose was too long. In acrylics you just paint out the problem, oil you scrape it off, pastel you can erase and watercolor you had better have a good drawing because it can be very hard to lift a problem area off though it can be done so some extent. I will figure out what needs to be corrected and have it drawn in next time and show you that it really isn't a big deal to correct something.

This is also a good time to talk about how the spacing of the eyes is critical to the animal you are painting. Predator and prey have different spacing for their eyes. Dog eyes are usually about 2 eye widths apart, you find this by taking a pencil or the end of your brush (I have a chop stick for that purpose) and measure one eye from corner to corner on the reference material you have then put the end of the brush or pencil at the corner of the eye closest to the nose and measure across to the other corner, there should be just about 2 and about 1 ½ eye widths for a cat. Check your animal to be sure because this can very between species and even between breeds.

Everyone is doing very good, I do look forward to this class. See you there. end#