Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Mixing Greens

The other day I watched a video by Liz Haywood-Sullivan on using greens in a landscape.  She used a pastel and alcohol under painting of orange for greens in light and dark red for areas in shade.  She showed how it was possible to use green as the dominant color in a landscape painting.

I will watch the video again to really study her method, but not today, because I was itching to paint.  It has been a while since I have been able to paint, but it should be clear sailing for the foreseeable future.  There are a thousand ideas bouncing around in my head and I just want to paint and paint some more.

This painting was started with a pastel and alcohol under painting, using a light orange for the grass and a darker orange for the sunny part of the trees.  I think she used the same orange for both.  Now that I have done this, I think a darker orange for the ground would enable the greens to show better.  I used a dark violet for the under painting in the shaded part of the trees.  A light yellow was used for the sky and two different violets for the background trees and hill.

The painting is done on 5 x 7 UART 400 grit sanded paper and I used a variety of pastels.  It sure felt good to be able to paint again.  Thanks for looking.



Doug

6 comments:

  1. Yup, this is a keeper Doug! Great job, those sky holes are fantastic, I didn't even notice them, which means you nailed it! You're not supposed to notice sky holes when they're done right, suffice to say you did them perfectly. That means you made them look natural - you slayed the dragon! The grass is excellent, and I love the color you painted the distant trees. The sky color is perface, all around excellent painting.

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  2. Thanks, Chris. Maybe the challenge and blog are actually paying off. My hands are starting to do what my brain tells them. I know anyone who paints will understand that comment. Thanks for all your support. You have helped me a lot.

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  3. Those trees look reallly good, Doug. I followed your link over here from the WetCanvas 120 Paintings thread. I look forward to seeing more of your paintings.

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  4. Thanks for checking out the blog, Meredith. It's a fun path we are on and I am sure we will see improvement in our paintings. It is nice to know there are other people doing the same challenge. Thanks again.

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  5. Love this simple landscape and the interesting effect achieved through the under-painting and pastels.

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  6. Thanks, Carol. I find an under painting saves on pastels and gives you a road map for the painting. Win, win.

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