Category: Oil Painting

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Art theory Oil Painting Outdoors/Landscape Painting People

The Surveyor in the Lavender


Oil on canvas panel, 12×9″ (Larger)

A couple weeks ago there was a team of surveyors on my street, measuring the block. I’d always wondered what they saw when they looked through their surveyor thingees on tripods. I asked them what they were doing, and whether I could look through their device to see what it looks like. It was really amazing. This guy stood at one end of the block and held up his device, which I think was a target and the other guy looked through his scope and aimed it at the target. It had a powerful computerized magnifier in it, so that from nearly block away, the target looked like it was one inch away. Then I asked if I could take pictures of them and they agreed. The other guy was too far away and this one was cuter anyway so I took a bunch of pictures of him and then selected one of the photos to paint.

I spent a lot of time drawing on the canvas freehand before I started painting, trying to get the drawing correct. I used a white pastel pencil to draw on the medium-gray toned canvas, which worked really well — it was easy to wipe off for correcting and didn’t smear into the paint.

There’s more I could do to finish this painting but my goal right now is to make lots of paintings for the practice instead of taking a few paintings as far as I can. On the other hand, if you see any areas for improvement or problems with this painting, I’d greatly appreciate the critique.

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Art theory Landscape Oil Painting Other Art Blogs I Read Outdoors/Landscape Painting Portrait

Watching Painting Videos

Watching Painting Videos

I’ve been renting videos from SmartFlix.com on oil painting landscapes, portraits, and plein air painting and have enjoyed watching most of them, and so has Fiona, pictured above. SmartFlix.com is a website where you can rent videos on any kind of artistic endeavor or just about any other “how-to” — from welding to piloting a helicopter.

The service works well. They charge $10 for each video (theoretically for a week but I’ve kept some two weeks with no problem) They mail them to you with return packaging and postage included. My only complaint is that occasionally, after ordering a video, I find that there will be a wait for it while it comes back from the last member. Usually they’re shipped within a few days. There are no membership or monthly fees. You pay only when you rent a video. Like Amazon, there are user reviews which I found very helpful in making my selections.

Here are the videos I’ve watched so far, with my comments about them. (Please click “Continue Reading” below.)

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Art theory Glass Oil Painting Painting Still Life

Conscious Competence?

Lemons on Green Glass Platter

Oil on canvas panel, 8×6″
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I think I’m finally making a little progress with my oil painting. I’m starting to understand about color temperature and how to make transparent darks (which you absolutely have to protect just like the white of the paper in watercolor). I couldn’t figure out how to get the little highlights on these lemons but maybe I have to wait for the paint to dry and then use a dry brush to sweep across it. Or maybe I could do it with a knife? I tried painting it on with a brush but just kept smearing and muddying the paint. Any suggestions?

In July, I did these lemons on a different green glass plate and …

Lemon on green glass plate (P1010468)
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…I think I see some progress.

My friend Judith told me about a learning theory that divides the stages of learning into four stages:

  1. Unconscious incompetence .(You don’t know how much you don’t know and sometimes have beginner’s luck that makes it seem like it will be easy to learn).
  2. Conscious incompetence. (Now you’ve realized how much you don’t know and how bad you are at the thing you’re trying to learn, and how many people are way ahead of you. You may have the knowledge or information about HOW to do something but not the skill to do it.)  A lot of people give up at this point. This is where I’ve been for past couple months.
  3. Conscious competence. (You understand how to do it, you’ve practiced and built some skill, but it doesn’t come naturally. You have to think through each step but you can do it and a basic level.)
  4. Unconscious competence. (It just comes naturally and you don’t have to constantly think through each step.)

Mom was half-right when she said “practice makes perfect.” I know that when I strive for “perfect” I only end up miserable. I think the saying should be “Practice makes Progress” and right now progress feels great after being mired in Conscious Incompetence for months!

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Art theory Oil Painting Painting Plein Air

What “we” did in painting class today

My teacher helped paint this

Oil on 12×9 panel
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First a disclaimer: There’s more Elio than Jana in this painting. I started this painting and really liked where it was going, with a decent composition and nice fressh, bright colors, but asked for help when my path wouldn’t stop looking like a waterfall. My wonderful teacher, Elio Camacho, has been hesitant to paint on my paintings but I encouraged him to do so since I was confused. Once he’d solved all my problems and added some beautiful touches, I stopped working on this one and started another so I could save this in order to remember the things he did.

Elio is such an amazing teacher. His shares his incredible enthusiasm for painting, his knowledge, experience and skill so generously. After the five-hour class ends, he starts a very large painting and paints until sunset. If we stick around, he will continue answering questions while he paints, which makes it very tempting to stay and paint or just hang out for another hour or two.

I thought I’d share a few of the things I learned in class today that I think are going to really help my painting (CLICK on “Continue Reading” below) to read what I learned about color, plein air composition, highlights, mediums, darks and sky-holes:

Continue reading “What “we” did in painting class today”
Categories
Art theory Faces Oil Painting Painting People Portrait

Persistence, Acceptance and Freedom

Don and Robin

Oil on panel, 9×12″
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This is a portrait of my son and his grandfather, Don, from a photo taken 30 years ago. I started working on this painting a few days before he died two weeks ago. Although he was afraid of dying he had tremendous acceptance, from years of regular meditation. Visiting him was a very peaceful experience. Even though he was experiencing so much loss, having been an athlete all his life and now watching his body fail, he was incredibly serene. We brought him some photos to look at, including the one from which this picture was made, and they cheered him up and made him laugh.

The reason I titled this post “Persistence, Acceptance and Freedom” is both because of Don, and also because I’ve had to accept that I don’t yet have the skills to make this a good portrait in oil paint, despite my persistence, and that this painting is as far as it’s going to get and it’s time to let it go. And that gives me much needed freedom, after working on this for way too many days. In the beginning it was a wonderful way to remember Don and think about those early days. I was determined to do the best I could but now by accepting that this is as far as I’m willing to take it, I free myself to move on to something else.

I didn’t spend enough time with the initial drawing, the photo I was working from was old and funky, and the color had faded strangely. Initially there were three generations in the picture, my son, his dad, and his grandad. First the two men were great but the baby was a mess. Then the baby got good but I messed up one of the men. After scraping off and redoing all or some of the people many, many times I decided to eliminate my son’s Dad, paint the background and clothes, and call it done. The thing with oil painting is that you can edit forever but I need to stop.

I’ve read it’s better for learning to paint hundreds of one-hour paintings than to spend hundreds of hours on one painting. I’ve tried the later and it’s not fun. I’m ready for the former and excited about doing timed paintings — more like sketches — one hour apiece.

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Art theory Landscape Oil Painting Outdoors/Landscape Painting Plein Air

Tilden Park Re-do

Tilden Park

Oil painting on panel, 9″x12″
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Last Sunday in my plein air oil painting class I painted this scene on this panel but it pretty much looked like dark mud so I worked on it some more today. I like to keep going with a painting until I either succeed, push it as far as it can go, get sick of it, or it just gets too late and I have to go to bed. I think tonight I hit all of the above.

I have the hardest time painting outdoors in the bright sun. Everything ends up much darker than it should be. I’m also not very good at mixing light colors in oils—possibly due to never using white in watercolor. Adding white to oil paint creates quite different color mixtures than adding more water to watercolor to let the white of the paper shine through and lighten the color.

I’m going to be plein air painting both Saturday and Sunday this weekend, and given the weather report of sunny days, I’ll continue trying to find my way painting in bright light. Tomorrow I’m going to try wearing my polarized sun glasses and see what I come up with. I’m also going to try forcing myself to make high key paintings, with most of the painting lighter than middle gray to force myself to get away from the dark mud.

Categories
Art theory Oil Painting Painting Still Life

Pear on Blue Plate

Pear in Oil

Oil on canvas panel, 8×6″
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After feeling like I’d taken one big step forward with my painting on Saturday, in Sunday’s painting class I felt like I’d taken two giant steps backwards. I wasn’t inspired by the view of dry, grayish rolling hills and just kept putting paint down, deciding it was all wrong, and scraping it off. I guess I was just tired after painting day and night on Saturday and also there were some new concepts that needed to sink in.

I was determined to do a better job today and wanted to focus on the guidance I received from my teacher on Sunday: avoiding muddy colors by putting strokes down and leaving them, focusing on color temperature and using colorful grays. I painted the pear about three or four times this evening, getting it almost done and then messing it up one way or another, scraping off all the paint, and starting over.

As it got closer to bedtime I got even more determined to put strokes down and leave them. It worked and I’m happy with the results.

Categories
Landscape Oil Painting Other Art Blogs I Read Outdoors/Landscape Painting Plein Air Sketchbook Pages

Lake Merritt Japanese Garden

Lake Merritt Zen Garden

Oil on Masonite Panel, 12×9″
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I’ve been studying oil painting for months, reading piles of books, learning from others, watching endless painting videos (some that are literally “like watching paint dry”), taking a class and practicing every chance I get. Last week it seemed that despite my study and “book learning,” while I had the knowledge of how to paint in oils, I didn’t have the skill to actually do it. Today I think something has clicked and I’m finally starting to get it.

I nearly finished this painting on site with my plein air group this morning at Oakland’s Lake Merritt Botanical Garden. Unfortunately (or fortunately, really), the painting had a little accident on its way home and got smeared. That gave me the perfect excuse to work on it some more.

I’d been having difficulty with painting on the slick surface of the gessoed masonite with the stiff bristle brushes — the paint wouldn’t stick and kept sliding around when I tried to paint another layer on top. Then I got an email message from Nel, raving about a new softer brush she was enjoying: a Raphael Kevrin Mongoose Series 877. I picked one up at Artists and Craftsman in Berkeley and used that to fix and finish the painting. She was right — it’s a fabulous brush!

I had the most trouble painting the water, especially since I omitted the little island/tree in the middle of the pond and moved the big redwood tree all the way to the right. I had to adjust the reflections from what was actually there and I don’t think I quite got it right. Hopefully it looks a little like water and not grass!

Any tips appreciated (I mean advice, not spare change.)

Here’s the photo I used to finish the painting at home, and a couple steps along the way:

Continue reading “Lake Merritt Japanese Garden”
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Art theory Landscape Oil Painting Outdoors/Landscape Painting

Inspiration Point – Take Two

Oil on Masonite panel, 9″x12″
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This morning on the way to work I started thinking about yesterday’s painting of Inspiration Point and how what I painted didn’t really represent the colors I saw and generally annoyed me.  I started sketching and taking notes about for making another painting of the scene. Also yesterday I talked to technical support at Gamblin Oil Paints about putting together a good limited palette and he gave me some really good suggestions.

So anxious to put my new ideas into action, after work I ran to the art store, picked up a couple colors I didn’t have and set up my palette with the following Gamblin colors: (the ones with asterisks are what Gamblin recommended — the others are my additions)

  • Transparent Earth Red* (used primarily for the drawing and a tonal underpainting using paint thinned with Gamsol which dries in minutes and creates a beautiful glow), Titanium White*, Chromatic Black*;
  • Indian Yellow*, Cad Yellow Light;
  • Quinacridone Red*, Cad Red Light;
  • Ultramarine Blue*, Manganese Blue Hue (a form of Pthalo Blue that looks closer to Cerulean).

I did the sketch/underpainting quickly (a bit too quickly–didn’t quite get the shapes of the hills on the left) and then started in with the rest of the painting. The gessoed masonite is very slick which I kind of like and makes it easy to wipe paint off but also makes it easy to take paint off when you’re trying to paint on top of paint.

I’m happier with this version; pleased that I came closer to what I saw and that I managed to get in a painting after a long day at work.

Categories
Art theory Landscape Oil Painting Other Art Blogs I Read Outdoors/Landscape Painting Photos Plein Air

Inspiration Point, Tilden Park

Inspiration Point, Tilden Park

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Oil on panel, 9×12″

Sunday was my plein air oil painting class in Tilden Park and we met at Inspiration Point in Tilden Park in the Berkeley Hills. On a clear day you can see far into the distance from this site. Unfortunately, when we arrived at 9:00 a.m. the fog was so thick we could barely see halfway across the parking lot. Our teacher, Elio Camacho, had planned to start class by doing a demo — an expansive vista on a large canvas. To try to accomplish something until the fog cleared, he had us set up our easels facing the alleged view and get ready to paint. I enjoyed the idea of randomly picking a spot with no idea what I’d see or paint.

At 10:00, after delicious coffee and treats from Peets Coffee generously brought by a class member, Elio did an amazing small demo of the sun glaring through the fog above some nearby trees. Happily, just as he finished the fog lifted and we got to work.

This time I remembered to take a photo of the scene before I got started so that I could finish the painting at home:
Inspiration Point, Tilden - Photo

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