"Mini Heirloom"

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"Mini Heirloom"

6 x 6 in

Oil on Canvas Panel

We were at the store today getting ingredients for a baby shower my girlfriend is throwing, she's cooking a whole lots of cupcakes and I'm gonna try to steal some before she takes them.  While we were at the store I saw this adorable little heirloom tomato and automatically wanted to paint it.  I was gonna paint in my kitchen and do the natural light method again but she's cooking away all day with her sister.  Instead I decided to paint in our room where the natural light is not to bad.  I really do enjoy painting in natural light, there's so much more colors and subtle tones that one can't get through pictures.  

I started with the usual dry brush approach using a bit of raw umber on the brush.  Once the drawing is complete I stated the local colors of the heirloom, at this stage I'm not concerned with stating the lightest and darkest values.  The colors I used for this stage were cad.red light, naphthol red, cad.yellow light, and viridian.

Then I stated the background and wooden base to give more of a whole feel to the initial phase of the painting.  The colors I used were cerulean blue, naples yellow, titanium white, burnt sienna, and raw umber.  Then I stated the middle to darker values with their specific forms.  I like to slow down in these later stages to really conform the shape and get the subtle value shifts, it's almost impossible to get those subtle information when your in a hurry to finish.

Then I state the lighter values with their specific forms and take the heirloom to a finish.  Then I start on the wooden base and state the darker values with their specific forms.  The colors I use is ultramarine blue and raw umber.

Then I stated the lighter values with their specific forms and took the base to a finish.  I also added more naples yellow and yellow ochre to the background, and also brought the value down.  I really enjoyed the process of creating this painting, painting from life is something one has to do in order to get an intimate feel of its subject.  One has to see its true colors and how light really wraps around the form.  Pictures are not bad for reference use, but it does limit the information one can get from life.  Thanks for stopping by and viewing, hope you guys enjoyed this one.

Picture of the finished painting next to the model.  I'm getting used to painting more on my pochade box, I just have to get used to painting sitting down.