"Circus Plums"

Click here to purchase this painting at my Etsy shop

"Circus Plums"

6 x 6 in

Oil on Canvas Panel

I wanted to revisit these fun plums and be a bit more whimsical, I also miss painting this beautiful marble top.  Painting these two surfaces together contrast each other nicely.  The tension this composition creates is pretty interesting, the plums seem to be having a hard time holding up the top plum.  You can create infinite story lines with this one, it'll be interesting to read what you guys can come up with?  I've always said if you want to better yourself in painting paint marble, it's so true.  Aside from painting flowers which also excels you in every way, painting marble teaches to control your medium and notice with each stroke the type of textures you'r laying down.  You can easily apply what you've learned to anything you paint, of course you have to conform it to the subject you'r painting.  I miss painting the wooden board I use for the majority of these alla prima's, but painting this marble has given me so much joy and teaches me something new every time.  

I started with the usual dry brush approach using no mediums and a bit of raw umber.  After the drawing is established I stated the background and middle value to the base, the colors I used where cerulean blue, naples yellow and titanium white for the background.  For the marble I used raw umber, ivory black and titanium white.

Then I stated the middle and darker values with their specific forms, and do the same with the lighter values.  Once the front part of the marble is complete I start on top and repeat the process.  

Once the whole marble is complete I start on the first plum by stating the middle to darker values first.  At this stage I'm applying the middle local color of the plum and turning the form, later I start to add more colors once the values are turning with the light.  Then I add the lighter values and take the plum to a finish, I repeat the process with the second plum.

I do the same process with the third plum.  The colors I used for the plums were naphthol red, ivory black, cad. red light, quinacridone magenta, cerulean blue, and titanium white.  

I take the painting to a finish by going in the cast shadows where the plums meet the marble, I tie them together by pushing the darks and blending the two together.  It was beyond fun painting this one, I truly enjoy learning from a painting and this one definitely delivered that.  That's what I love the most about painting these alla prima's, they teach me something new every time.  Thanks for stopping by, I hope you enjoyed this one!

"Ranunculus"

Sold

"Ranunculus"

10 x 8 in

Oil on Canvas Panel

Todays alla prima painting is of ranunculus, these beautiful flowers resemble peonies to me even though I know there not.  I went to my favorite coffee place in town and met up with a couple friends which I'm glad I did because I ran into these beautiful flowers.  They were sitting right on my table and instantaneously I fell in love, the movement within the petals and rich colors made it more of a reason to paint.  I thought I was going to be done with painting flowers for a while and suddenly changed course again after seeing these beautiful flowers.  That's one of the reasons why I love doing these alla prima's, you never know what your next painting might be and if you do it can change in a split second.  Inspiration comes from everything I see and what moves me is what I enjoy painting the most, I hope you enjoy this one as much as I did.

I also wanted to let you guys know that I've finally published the video of the portrait demo I did at dick blick last Saturday, thank you to everyone that was able to show up I greatly appreciate it and had a lot of fun.  I have the video on youtube you can see it by clicking here.  

I started with the usual dry brush approach using no mediums and a bit of raw umber on the brush, again not spending to much time on the inside of the drawing just stating the general shapes.  After the drawing is complete I start on the background the colors I used are ultramarine blue, naples yellow and titanium white.

After the background is complete I state the general colors and keep all the edges soft, I'm not concerned with details or the darkest values just the general statement of colors.  I keep the paints really thin at this stage this creates a base for when I put more paint it'll glide easier and blend better.  Then I state the darker and middle values and their specific forms, I start narrowing down the shapes at this stage still keeping the edges soft and subtle.  The colors I use at this stage are quinacridone magenta, viridian, cad. yellow, titanium white and ultramarine blue.

Once the darker and middle values are close to completion I start on the lighter values and their specific forms, I'm able to take the whole section of the flowers to a finish when painting this stage in.  I'm constantly going back and forth between values and adjusting them to their specific look that's why I get to a close finish with the darker values, when I paint the lighter values I can really take the whole area to a finish.  After the flower section is complete I start on the vase and also darken a bit of the lower section of the background to have more of a fall of light.

I sharpen a bit of the edges on the vase and add highlights which brings that section to a finish, then I go back to the flower and tweak certain highlights and shadows.  I'm glad I was able to run into these flowers today and paint them, I had fun doing so and learned something new.  I hope you enjoyed this one, thanks for stopping by and viewing!

"Peonies Fuchsia"

Sold

"Peonies Fuchsia"

8 x 10 in

Oil on Canvas Panel

I've been wanting to paint just fuchsia peonies and glad I did so, they have so deep colors within them I wish I had all the colors in the spectrum to render their beauty.  As stated in my other posts about peonies they are not easy to paint and especially when painting with the color fuchsia, you have to be careful in the way you apply lighter colors to the mix.  Peonies have such beautiful textures to them thats one of the main things I enjoyed the most about them, playing around with the brush and experimenting to see what kind of textures you can get is beyond fun.  With this painting I also decided to paint some baby peonies, they look so neat from there beginning stages all curled up and when they blossom they are even more beautiful.  To have baby peonies together with the full blossom ones gives a nice feel to the overall painting.

I started with the usual dry brush approach using a bit of raw umber on the brush just to get the main placement of the drawing down.  I was not concerned rendering every petal at this stage I wanted to just concentrate on the overall composition and how sat within the canvas, later I'll be able to render the peonies to finish when the base is applied.  After the drawing is complete I stated all the colors at once from the background to the stems and peonies, reason I did that is to have a general feel of the painting.  When working on such an intricate composition and there's so much going on its good to see the color harmony between each object.  I keep the paints thin at this stage I try not to get to thick, keeping the paints thin creates a base so I can easily maneuver around with my darks and lights in the later stages.  The colors I used are quinacridone magenta for the peonies, ultramarine blue and cad. yellow for the leaves and stem, and ultramarine blue and naples yellow for the background. 

After the general statement stage I move on to modeling the forms with the peonies, I make sure not to go to dark at this stage just to get the form turning in a subtle way.  The colors I use to mix with the peonies to turn the form is ultramarine blue and ivory black.  Then I start adding the darker values and its specific forms using the same colors as stated before.

Then I added the lighter values and its specific forms, at this stage I'm bouncing back and forth between values and adjusting them to the right look.  The colors I used for this stage is titanium white, naphthol red and quinacridone magenta.  After the top peonies are close to completion I them start on the bottom ones, I first add the darker values and its specific forms as I did with the previous stage.  I'm using the same colors as I did with the other peonies.

Then I add lighter values and its specific forms and take them to a close finish, again using the same colors as I did with the top peonies.  Then I work on the leaves and stems, I start to emphasize the darker values and its specific forms.  The colors I used in this stage were ultramarine blue, viridian, yellow ochre, cad. yellow pale.  After finishing the leaves I then went around all over and started softening edges, doing this effect pushed some peonies further back and in turn left the other peonies in focus.  I know I've said it in the past how important it is to soften edges and keep some sharper, but I cannot stress it enough.  Edges can make or break you'r painting its vital to understand them and pay close attention to them.  With my initial stages I like to keep all the edges soft this allows me to gradually build up in values and keep the form turning.  The later stages I start to add sharper edges to show more focus or where I want your eye to lead.  Edges are important in many ways they are fundamental from rendering and turning the forms to finishing the last touches in you'r painting, never lose sight of them and experiment as much as you can with them.  Thanks for stopping by and viewing, I hope you enjoyed this one!