This phase is scarey because it is a matter of pushing back the recessed and dark areas. With a painting that is set in the dark, that pretty much is all of it. These step photos may be boring but I want to see how it changes and these process pictures will be interesting for me too. It’s documentation. It’s a bit daunting to say the least.

Planning the layout for a canvas is one of the most important elements of what makes a painting work and starting a painting without a fair idea, a road-map of sorts, is a huge gamble. Most great artists do a series of preliminary drawings before ever touching paint. I have rarely done that and it is sometimes what makes my work fail during process, I suppose.
I do paint continually in my head and often have a fair notion of what I intend to do but I re-evaluate and adjust as I go. Most paintings start with a photograph (no guarantee of good layout) and the final look may drift far from where it started. Hard telling where this layout will need to go with so few elements to use.

The painting I started is of my husband, Ray, and there is no doubt that by the time I have completed it, I will have faced my lighting challenge. I know what I want to do but don’t know how to get there so this will be a tough one.
IF you are inclined to watch problem solving on canvas at its most agonizingly transparent, check back and feel free to offer comments from the peanut gallery.
Wheeee!

I have started a new painting this week.
Once again, I am going to try and stretch my comfort area by attempting something I want to achieve – NEED to solve – capturing the warmth of human flesh by firelight, within the chill of late night. It sounds easy in one respect since portraits are something I enjoy. But I have a challenge with firelight.
You see, earlier in the year I started another painting of a friend in candlelight. I wasn’t sure how to work out the lighting and I got stuck. Somehow I strayed from the spark of what makes a painting flow forward. That can happen. Life can interrupt, stresses can keep me from the easel, schedules can bump my ability to get back to it, and eventually I find my self stuck. I want to take this painting off the back burner and get back to it so I began another firelight image to help me learn how to do this.

The painting is complete, with light dappling the grasses and trees as the clouds recede and allow the sun to touch the outermost leaves.
You can see the finished painting in the Portfolio under Sale Gallery.
I will also open the process page soon with all of these stage pictures.

Today, I have continued to add detail to the savanna and adding leaves to the scrub trees that pop up in grassy and marshy places. This landscape is slightly different from what I have painted before, using a scale that is reminiscent of the early luminests, although in a very small scale.
When a painting gets this far it needs to sit and be studied. Every time I look at it I see a little something that is not right, something that needs a slight color adjustment, or something I wish I had done differently. I can’t and won’t change everything. I will just reach a point when I call it done and move on so I can begin the next canvas.

It had been a week since I had the opportunity to work on this piece but Saturday I found myself at a retreat with friends that included food, conversation, games and working on projects of choice…a great time to relax. For me, painting is one of my most relaxing endeavors.
It should be noted that taking these process paintings with my phone while in different locations and in different lighting, makes for an inconsistent string of shots. The actual coloring of the painting is between the bluish and the grey tone.

This is the painting at the end of the next session of painting I just finished tonight. At this point I am adding the substance and depth of the cloud formations – fleshing them out and adding the light. I also added some ground just so I can begin to get the weight of the land to sky ratio.
You are caught up with me on the progress of the painting. I will try and get back to my easel off and on all week but progress is always slower than weekends.
Look for the page to launch this week as well. That will help compare each session side by side to watch the progress. It’ll be fun!

This is the painting at the end of the second session. This painting will be mostly about sky – storm clouds that have just passed and are beginning to give way to breaking sun over open savanna with scrub growth. I am not entirely sure just what kind of tree or plant at this point but it will be small to allow for proper scale. The canvas is 11″ x 14″ and the medium is oils.