In the Studio from a Small

It has been 10 straight days in the studio.  Need to get out for a few hours to sharpen up.  Maybe Wednesday.


In the studio I paint several ways.  Sometimes from imagination, sometimes from life, on occasion from a photo, often from a sketch.  Here I am working from a small done on site.  In this case the small is a 6x8 and it is only going up to an 11x14.  Here is the set up.

Dark and Deep in process

When you paint larger, more information is required.  Here the rub is that I have only the 6x8.  So I have to try to remember what I was trying to do.  It helps that I have been on site for the small and that I have done this before.  I did a pencil sketch with notes for the small, and I have a photo.  However, I liked the small and decided not to bother with the other reference.  I decided to develop more depth.  After this photo was taken I realized that I still had considerable painting to do.  You will notice considerable paint on the palette.  I don't like to stop to squeeze out - breaks the zone.  I leave the fresh paint on the palette after the day of painting and clean up the mixing pools.  For the next day I add more fresh paint to the existing.  You can see the paint on the palette from left to right - Alizarin, Cadmium Red Middle, Cadmium Red Light, Cadmium Yellow Deep, Cadmium Yellow Middle, Cadmium Yellow Lemon, Viridian, Cerulean Blue, Ultramarine Blue, Mineral Violet, and Titanium White.  To this point I used only a #14 bristle filbert brush.  I may move to # 6 and #8 as the painting progresses.  So far the painting reflects only the correction of the main colour masses in the mid values.  The lightest and darkest values have been saved for hi-lites and accents.  In this case these are quite colourful.