SIERRA MOUNTAIN PAINTING LESSONLandscape Oil Painting Demo |
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Part 2 of 317. I begin to paint the lit side of the mountains using the same general approach, I block-in using essentially only two values... 
18.I like to keep my palette very simple...at this stage of the painting you can see I only have my three basic primary colors, yellow, magenta and blue, one secondary, red (used mostly to mix the brown) and a very dark color I call "blackenough". Through combinations of these and Titanium white I'm able to mix the few warm and cool earthtones that I use on the mountains. 
19. And so, essentially I procede in this manner across the mountains alternating between knife and brush... 
20. The difference in progress shown between this photo and the one above is about one painting session's progress...I have a long way to go!
21. The detail in mountains like this can be overwhelming to the painter, but to keep myself from being overwhelmed, I work in sections paying attention to the values and colors in each area as they relate to each other and the whole... 
22. Here's an "up close" shot showing the degree of brush and knife work that make up the mountains... 
23. And here it is standing back a bit... 
24. I'm nearly done with the rugged buttes and will soon be moving on to the mid-ground part of the painting... 
25. To finish off the mountains, I have to paint in a bit of the remaining snow that usually stays on them year round...I begin with the snow in the shadow areas - though shaded, still quite light value-wise... 
26. And the light part, though quite bright isn't really close to pure white (even though it looks so in this photo) I usually paint both clouds and snow with a fair degree of yellow mixed in... 
27. Ah, that snow is just the thing to really give some depth to these rugged peaks... 
28. Here's a shot of the main part of the buttes in their near finished state... 
29. The tree covered mountainside in the middle ground is barely beginning to receive light as the Sun moves east to west across the sky. Being still in shadow quite a bit, I underpaint a fairly dark area before painting any of the trees that cover it. Mind you, this is still quite a bit lighter than black though it's hard to tell that in the photo without anything to compare it to... 
30. This photo shows the actual value of that dark area a bit better than the one above... 
31. With my thin underpainting in place, I can now begin to paint the trees that cover it... 
32. And so it looked when I was about half-way done with the trees... 
33. The trees too, I paint alternatively employing knife and brush...this a great technique for anything that has a lot of texture... 
34. Here it is, about 6 a.m. as I leave my studio once again to get ready for the day job... 
35. Coffee is a great ally for these early morning painting sessions...those of you on my email newsletter probably remember this shot that I sent out when the painting was still in progress. I'm roughly a little past half done at this stage... 
36. A shot showing the tree covered area mostly done... 
Click to View PART THREE of the Sierra Splendor painting lesson
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