plein air

Pages in my sketchbook from a little plein air outing the other morning.

Forecast calls for rain for the next five days, so no more plein air till next week!

iris

                         10x14

Another iris, many blooming in the yard right now.

Dried up tulips and amaryllis.

travel palette

                             11x15

Made a little chart of the colors in my plein air palette. Had the paints out so I painted an iris from my yard and a couple of persimmon, which are so pretty, and delicious.

When i filled the palette i made a map of the colors but i can't find it now. Some colors i can ID, others i can't--like the 2nd from the left in the top row: is that quinicridone gold? Doesnt seem bright or transparent enough? So many yellows!

Going to eliminate some redundancies.

And finished my sparrow.

diversion or groundwork?

Lately I've been playing around in my sketchbook-- low effort, less time- and mind-consuming?--rather than making "paintings."

Idk: maybe it's all in preparation ...

Started two bird paintings this a.m. after a little sketchbooking.

My favorite: a sparrow.

And some gulls. This one is a good lesson in why you should never walk away from a wet watercolor.

beach scene

                             10x14

Painted along with a Paul George video on YouTube.

morning painting

                           10x14

Now that it's getting warmer, and I'm getting up earlier, I'm going to try to spend 30+ minutes painting every morning.

This morning I painted along with a session of Birgit O'Connor's plein air class.

She used Winsor blue red shade for the sky and water. I think the one I have is blue shade, but I rarely, if ever, use it ... I always thought it was too intense. But I kinda like it!

And below: yesterday's mess. My first attempt, top, with the reflection of the far shore scraped out--the paper was to wet when I started adding foliage, and it was a swampy mess.

And the start of a second attempt. Letting it dry!

I'm never happy with my foliage shapes! Wish I could figure it out.

Painted this along with a Paul George video on YouTube

birds with John Muir Laws

Sketchbook pages from a 2-hour online class with John Muir Laws. Lots of great tips for drawing birds fast.

You can get a recording of the class, and others, at Wild Wonder Foundation; the classes are pay-what-you-can, which is a beautiful thing.

assateague ponies

                              8x10

Made my reservation to camp at Assateague National Seashore in October. My brother and had camped there every October for about 5 years; had to cancel for one reason or another the last two years! Hoping we make it back this year.

classwork

                                 9x12

Tonight's class with SaltyWater Art. I need the wet in wet practice!

Now that I've painted it, I should paint it again-- faster, looser.

Below, practice paintings to try out color.

sketchbook pages

classwork

                       9x12

This is the 3rd go: all wet in wet and without "correcting."

Here's the 1st try, top, somewhat overworked, and the 2nd, unfinished!

And below is a copy of a painting by Catherine Gill in her great book, Powerful Watercolor Landscapes. I love her paintings and I'm going to try to copy a few more and hopefully learn something from them!

classwork

I missed class with SaltyWaterArt last week so I'm trying to catch up. It was the first week and I'm already a week behind!

I put the first one at the bottom ...First one is overworked: the first strokes were not bad but then I tried to "correct"!

The 2nd is weak: not enough paint. Also true of the 3rd, but I could add to it.

Last is 1st because it turned out best, imo: I used more paint.

seascapes

                       4x6

                       9x12

More painting along with Birgit O'Connor's class on seascapes.

values/shapes

More value/shape studies. Paths to the beach.

These are fun to do; surprisingly relaxing.

cropping

                      cropped

                     original,  5x8

Had some paint left on my palette and some space on my paper and no pencil to hand, and I decided to paint these two gulls from a photo I took without any drawing.

I like the way it turned out, a little wonky....  I will have to try to summon these conditions again.

And here's a crop by my friend Gina, which has a more modern feel to it.

studies

Very loose value studies of a couple of photos I took at Keurners farm in PA last May. In these studies im basically trying to connect shapes by painting the midtones, as recommended by Andy Evansen.

I then added slightly darker washes just for a bit of clarification. 

I like these just the way they are-- they remind me of the paintings of Megan Marsden, with whom ill be taking a class next month.

Below is a little exercise from a different Andy Evansen class I bought through Artefacto.

waves

Catching up on a Birgit O'Connor class I bought awhile back, Expressive Seascapes.