Visualizing

Whenever I am deciding what I am painting, I always play it through in my mind before I touch a brush. I can then see potential problems before they occur. Such as… You always start painting the things that are farthest from you first, so you look those things over as they get closer. Now you know what order you will be painting them. And as you play them over in your mind, you can imagine what brushes you’ll use and how you’ll use them. Now, …. you aren’t always right. Sometimes I think I’m going to use a brush for a particular effect, but it doesn’t work like I thought it would so you have to improvise sometimes. Then there’s always drying time (unless you’re Bob Ross). Before some things are painted over another, you need to allow it to dry; Sometimes it just needs to get tacky and other times it needs to completely dry. Practice and experimentation will teach you what works best for you. You’re also seeing what colors you’ll be using and thinking about how you might mix those inbetween colors. And I always find I experiment a little with effect, so i always learn something new as I do each painting. Sometimes I only learn what not to do, but I’m learning. The main thing is to visualize what you’ll be doing before you start painting to avoid potetial problems that you might encounter. And the most important thing of all is, … Have Fun!

Light Source

If I could only teach one thing about painting, it would be about your light source. Where is the light coming from. Sometimes it’s diffused but usually it’s direct in nature.

Before you add those highlights to your mountains always remember where your light is coming from; is it from the left or the right? Then you’ll know which side is light and which side is dark.

Ok, so now you’ve painted the mountains but, when you continue on, the rest of your painting has to also have that same light source. Otherwise it won’t look natural.

I use pictures a lot when I paint. it helps me in making sure that the proportions and shapes are proper. It shows me light source and in general, it saves me a lot of time. However, when I’m mixing and matching pictures later on, the light source of the two (2), three (3), or more pictures I combine aren’t always the same. In fact they rarely are. So you’ll need to be sure that the highlights and shadows are all on their proper sides or your painting won’t ever look right.

Well I guess that will get you going there. I may add some more comments on this later, so you might want to check back on this post.

Take care….

Linseed oils

I usually use linseed oil to thin my paint when I’m painting. It not only thins the paint but it also makes the paint shiny.

I sent my wife to the store to buy some linseed oil so I could show her some new ideas I’d been working on and I was out of linseed oil. She returned with some boiled linseed oil from the hardware. I really hadn’t used anything but artist grade linseed oils found in the artist’s supply catalogs, but its linseed oil, right? Wrong! This “boiled” linseed oil was darker in color and after washing our brushes, we put them away as usual.

After some drying time I noticing that the stretched canvas was buckling, I got back to my brushes and they were getting hard. We almost lost all of our brushes. If we’d waited two to three weeks in between painting I’m sure we’d have lost all of our brushes.

So, all linseed oils are not created equal. Be sure to use artist grade linseed oils if you plan on using it to thin your paint. I love the effect that I get with it, but I’ll always be sure to use the right kind from now on.

Enjoy your painting

sungmanitu

Mountain piece from one of my paintings

Chief Expansion (copyright 2008)

This is one portion approx. 6″ x 8″ of a painting I did. The original complete painting is 18″ x 24″ and the mountain range alone took about a week to ten (10) days to paint. (NOTE: The mountain range spans the entire 24″ length of the canvas). Maybe I’m just slow but I spent a lot of hours painting the mountains. The complete painting has an Indian escorting his chief on horseback.
I guess I just wanted to explain that you can’t rush your paintings. The amount of time you spend on them is dictated by what you’re doing. If you just want to make money, then paint them as quickly as you can, but if your intentions are to please yourself with the end results, then take as long as it takes to please yourself.
I usually hang my paintings up and look at them for a week or two before I varnish them and if anything bothers me about it during that time I will work on it some more till I’m pleased with the results.
Some things take more time than others so don’t be afraid to take longer than somebody else. The end results is what you should be looking for.

Enjoy and I’ll catch you next time.
sungmanitu