From Rockpile

Over the course of the last 8 or 9 paintings, I have been visiting the locations that I have painted the most.

This is the current line up of colors.  I have never used a set pallet.  As a pastel artist I would try to carry as many colors as I could.  When I painted inside I had the same approach.  I think I have just about every color that Old Holland makes.  One of the biggest challenges that I have is developing the mixing skills required to get the breadth of color that I am used to.

I am not sure where the drawing in purple came from, but I like the use of it to establish values and shapes within the painting.

I am continuing to work towards less drawing in the initial phase of my painting.  This painting ended up taking about 5 and half hours.  I want to get down to 3 hours for a painting this size.  

At this point, some of the value separation has been lost.  I want to get the values closer to their final representation right from the beginning.  This will speed up my painting considerably. 

The block in is finished.  I am trying to have each area of the painting as dark as possible so that I can work my way up in value.  I will try and leave traces of

All of the elements of the painting are in place and I am adding the details to them.  

Here I begin to work on the values.  What is the lightest area of the painting?  What is the darkest area of the painting?  I work to balance everything from the lightest to the darkest and in between.

Saving the detail of the palm trees for last.

The light changed quite a bit at the end.  

The saturated colors at the end of the day are the best.  I wish I could paint quickly enough to capture them .

This day just kept getting better till it was over.

What a great spot to paint.  

A shot of my pallet.  I like including this to get an idea of some of the colors that I am mixing and how my paint usage is changing.

Time to stop.

The finished painting "From Rockpile"  24x32 oil on board.

The value shot. I would like to see greater separation between the lightest and darkest parts of the painting.

The detail shot.  I like the progress I am making with my brush strokes.