"Welcome" is probably the way most new blogs start off, but that's OK. Now I can get right to the "art" of the matter.
Painting and drawing will be a couple of the main concerns of this blog, so I think I'll start right off with a demo. The following is of an 8" x 10" oil painting on panel I did yesterday, summer solstice 2011. The way I paint is continually changing, so this is a demonstration of how I generally paint now. It's a rough demo and I wish the photographs were better, but I hope this might be helpful to anyone interested in this kind of painting process.
Here is the intended victim; the trees, and my weapon of choice; the 8" x 10" pochade box:
First the initial block-in:
Re-establishing darks and lights as I add color. The speck in the upper right is NOT an eagle flying majestically over the Rocky Mountains. It's a bug stuck in the paint. I'll let the paint dry and then just brush him off:
Adding the foliage:
Paint highlights, add distant cows, and voila'! It's finished! At least as finished as it's going to be out here:
The cows were actually in a different pasture, but with a few strokes of the brush I herded them onto my painting! I've seen them here before, and thought they would be good for adding interest across that part of the painting.
A parting shot of my setup:
