Winter Sketching

A couple of weeks ago a stretch of cold weather had put a layer of ice on the lake.  I went out for a walk with my painting gear, and on days like this (overcast and dreary) I"ll have a little fun and challenge myself to find something interesting to paint.

What interested me was the zig zag pattern of the ice and the reflection of the land on the ice.
I did a small sketch capturing the important facts of the scene.

On days I'll be out sketching at different locations I'll take a couple of 11x14 panels and tape them off into 4 sections as seen above. The two panels fit into the slots on the back of the easel.

From the information I got from the location sketch and things I remember from that day I was able to do this 9x12 acrylic painting.

Thin Ice  9x12  acrylic

Farm Fields

Farm Fields  8x10 oil

My brother Chris and I  had some free time to get out and paint today. We went to a local State Park that has open fields and farmhouses. Even though the conditions were not the best (overcast and windy, 43) we found some rolling fields, farm buildings and a sky full of fast moving clouds.
When you have clouds not willing to stand still for you I find it best to pick out a formation fix the image in your mind and paint away, the next time you look up they will be in a  different position anyway.

We wanted to try to capture the gently rolling fields in front of the buildings. The farm buildings added a welcome value range to the rest of the scene.

Plein air oil painting of Graves of the Unknown Soldiers

This painting was done last week the same day as the last painting.  I painted everything on location except the flag pole,  if I had tried to do it while the first layer of paint was still wet I would have made a mess of it.  I gave it time to dry and used two pieces of tape to mask out the flag pole and just painted in between the two pieces of tape for a straight flag pole.

This is at Washington Crossing Park in Bucks County. Here is a link on this historic site.

http://www.ushistory.org/washingtoncrossing/visit/graves.htm

First plein air paintings of 2012

I promised myself I would do a lot more painting on location this year. It felt great getting out today even though it was 38 degrees and a little windy out by the lake when I started. I was glad I brought extra clothing because I ended up needing it later on.

When I started at 8:30 this morning it was overcast but the sun was trying to show. As I looked out over the lake I thought  what a dull colorless scene. I started to walk back to the car to find something else but I stopped and gave it another look. I forced myself to find one thing I liked about the scene no matter how small.
 I liked the area of water in the foreground, you could see the slight blue/grey of the sky reflected there and the contrast of the brown leaves right in front of it.  OK I found a center of interest and then I  built the rest of the painting around that.

I never realized how cold I was till I finished the painting. Your concentration is so focused you are not aware of the cold. One improvement in my equipment are fingerless gloves. The tips are cut off making it easier to handle brushes, palette knives without having to remove the gloves every time you want to do something. I spent about one and a half hours on this painting standing in one place with the wind blowing on me.

On a side note, as I was approaching the lake I failed to notice the two bald eagles up in the tree. A quieter approach might have given me a better look before they flew off.

Edge of the Lake  8x10 oil

I'm back from our trip upstate, it was a good trip as always.We had rain every day except Monday and Tuesday but that didn't stop us from fishing and scouting other streams to add to our list.

I got some painting in too, I wanted to try out a light for painting at night. Its called a Mighty Bright and it clamps onto the top of my easel so I can see the canvas panel and my paints in total darkness.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              

This is a painting of the logs in the fire ring

Tom and fire

When I turned around the moon was rising and clouds constantly passing by so I decided to capture what I could for the rest of the night.

This is a set of pine trees painted at dusk

The rushing waters of Hyner Run  coming out of the forest.

Annual flyfishing/painting trip

My brother and I head out Sunday morning for our annual flyfishing trip to northcentral Pa. We do alot of walking, climbing, and crawling along the streams during the coarse of a day,and I like taking my portable paintbox( wood cigar box) with me but by the end of the day it starts feeling pretty heavy so this year I wanted to try to lighten the load a little.  This portable setup is just for my stream  fishing, I also bring an easel and tripod when  back at the cabin.

To lighten the load I am going to leave the box at home.

I have different size pieces of canvas I precut and toned to get rid of the white of the canvas. These I will tape onto a 8x10 masonite panel which will be my easel now, I can prop it up against a tree or a rock or just hold it in my hand. I am also switching paints, going from oils to acrylics. With the fast drying acrylics I won't have to worry about smearing the painting while we are walking to the next spot. I just remove the dry painting from the masonite panel and tape on another canvas.

To help keep the acrylics workable I brought a bottle of Liquitex pallette wetting spray. I was actually looking for a spray bottle to put water in and found this.It is liquid medium. I'll use a small clear plastic pallette to put the paints on.
To wash the  brushes I have a small container of soapy water, a rag and sponge in a ziplock bag for cleanup.
              
A week of flyfishing and painting sounds pretty good to me. The weather forcast is not as promising, chance of rain each day except Monday.



Will return on Fri afternoon.

Here are some images from past trips.

Neshaminy State Park ,plein air

My brother Chris (pictured above) and I got out this morning for a few hours of plein air painting.
We went to Neshaminy State Park  to paint the wild growing fields and the view of the Delaware river. We had a bright overcast light and every once in a while the sun would peek thru.
Its been a while since we got out so it felt good to be painting outdoors again.

Valley Creek

Valley Creek  8x10 original oil painting       

I painted this early in the morning as the sun was starting to light the landscape. Usually we are here flyfishing but on this day I was here to paint.Valley Creek holds a good population of wild brown trout which we have caught and released over the years.