Saturday 20 July 2013

A bit more dabbling....updated belatedly


This is the final version of a painting I did to "enhance" a charcoal drawing on canvas at the request of my daughter (who drew the original). I'll include some of the early versions below this one. When it gets to the point where I can't see what I did last, I usually decide it's time to stop. The photo was taken in good light outside, whereas all the others were taken in my studio.

oaks - final version

I wanted drama, so I painted the sky orangy-red and the whole painting seemed alive. This idea was rejected! The bark of the big tree trunk is moulded with a gel medium, so it actually feels like a tree-trunk. For design reasons (and to let more light in), I turned one tree-trunk into two and inserted a slope! Even so, the left side appears dark on the photo of the finished painting. It isn't that dark and is textured. Repainting the orange sky entailed repainting nearly everything.
original sketch

lovely orange sky 

sky corrected to pale blue