Crossing the Potomac at Point of Rocks has roughly this view, buts it’s really hard to see properly while driving over a bridge that’s blocking the view. I like the island in the middle breaking up the light.
Month: August 2016
Messing around with some sunset colors
For a while when I didn’t know what to paint I would play around mixing colors in a sketchbook. I’ve found it’s more fun to experiment in the context of loosely structured studies, especially with skies. I observe a lot when driving or waking the dog, but can’t sit out and paint them during those times, so am trying to transfer those observations into experiments–not so much for accuracy as for impression. Tonight I had a few minutes, and wanted to do some more wet into wet practice, seeing what could be done with a really cheap 3/4 inch flat brush and a few colors– yellow ochre, permanent alizarin crimaon, ultramarine blue, burnt umber, and hookers green. I just played around with the sky then added what seemed like a reasonable ground and horizon. This one is really about the sky.
Monochrome rural road
A simple monochrome in burnt umber of a road on the way to one of the vineyards nearby.
Light across a lawn
There’s a nice house and garage in town that’s set back from the street in the trees. I see it every week, and the light coming across the lawn is always so appealing. I’ve taken a bunch of photos over time. With a gloomy day today, it seemed worth revisiting them for a small sketch to practice capturing light across a lawn.
Sleeping puppy
My 13 year old puppy taking a nap. First serious attempt at watercolor pencils and watercolor–and at drawing my dog, for that matter. Good thing she sleeps so well.
And another salvage job turned into a nocturne
This one came out a little better
Salvage work
On my way home I saw some incredible clouds that I tried to capture and fantastically messed up, so I coated the whole painting with a mix of Prussian blue and brown madder, dropped in some deep red clouds and lifted out some moonlight and put in shapes on the horizon and foreground to convey some nighttime activity on the beach and ended up with this moody wreck. Seemed worth sharing what can be done to salvage a sketchbook page.
Another Potomac River study
I’ve drawn and painted this scene before on pink paper, on regular paper, with a pink casein background, and now with a focus on warm and cool colors. I’ve been looking at Monet’s paintings, and he worked on the same scene on the Seine (which reminds me of this scene a bit) over and over again with different lighting and color schemes. Thought I’d give it a try with lemon yellow, cad red, and cobalt blue in a moleskine pocket watercolor notebook focusing more on color than value, trying to learn from Monet.
Some quick studies
Quick sketch of a few sailboats ready to go out. Wish I were on one.
And below a sketch from memory of assawompset pond at sunset.
Imaginary sunset study
Messing around with an imaginary sunset thinking of Turner. Prussian blue, brown madder, and yellow ochre with a 3/8 inch sable flat brush in the 3×5 pentalic sketchbook. I was trying to see how more wet-in-wert painting would work on this paper. Not quite as good as on Fabriano artistico or arches, but certainly workable.
Corey Aber 