A Walk in the Snow

Snow Day, 6x8  oil

 A snow scene from my memory. A couple years ago I was walking through Neshaminy State Park after a snow storm and was taken by a scene similar to this.
I was in a part of the park that had a cathedral of trees with the sunlight coming thru throwing crisscross shadows and lighting up the snow making it glow.
I added people walking their dog to instill a sense of pleasure in freshly fallen snow.

Experimenting with different reference materials, winter landscape,11x14

Winter landscape  11x14  oil on wood panel



I did this plein air sketch (below) about 7 years ago late in the afternoon on the way home from work. It is very basic but captured the warm lighting that afternoon. A small patch of snow was left hidden behind a sloping bank and I wanted to capture the sun light on the snow and the shadows.
I always liked this sketch and wanted to use it or parts of it in a painting.

Seeing the snow we had recently inspired me want to try a snow scene, so I looked thru my sketchbook for ideas and came across a sketch I did last year at a local park, it was a footbridge crossing over a small brook.

I want to try combining the lighting from the plein air sketch and the composition from the pencil sketch to see what I could arrive at.

Winter Landscape, Core Creek Park

We had some snow in early December so one day after work I stopped off at the park to see what it looked like in a blanket of snow.  I had about a half an hour before sunset and hoped to catch the last bit of sunlight on the snow. I used my camera phone to capture some scenes before the sun disappeared.
Its almost a game with me sometimes to try to find a paintable scene in a limited amount of time. Sometimes (a lot of times) I come up empty but when you hit it right its rewarding.

Winter landscape Core Creek Park 8x10 oil painting

Winter at the Park

 The last time it snowed I took a walk in the park with my camera looking for subject matter. I have painted this tree a few times in the past and this day I liked the contrast between the tree and snow and sky.

I distilled the scene to the bare essentials, leaving out the multitude of trees surrounding the scene. I used acrylics on a 6"x6" Ampersand panel.

Winter Landscape

Whitetail Deer, Heading for Cover  11x14 oil

We haven't had much snow here in southeast Pa this year except for a few quick storms that dropped 1 to 2 inches and most of it melted by the afternoon. I felt like painting a winter scene while I'm still in a winter mood. I had started this painting a while ago and it sat around waiting for another winter for me to get motivated to finish it.
The little snow events we did have this year got me out on walks and sparked that interest in painting snow.  I have two other snow paintings I'm working on that should be finished soon.