Some Quick Landscapes

These are a couple landscapes practice paintings I have done recently to work on some techniques.

the focus of this painting is the cloud passing in front of the mountain, the color pallet came out nice too.

Lonely Fishing Boat - Tillamook Bay Oregon The composition of this painting was all about the boat and the reflection pool, this was inspired by the beach paintings of watercolor master Douglas Treasure

Here is a small 5x7 painting of Mt. St. Helens from Sauvie Island I did it was a preliminary practice painting for a larger one but this one came out better

OSA Nautical Art Show

I have 3 paintings in this years OSA (Oregon Society of Artist) Nautical Art show. I decided to paint a series of sailboats because I like how the full sails react to the light and shadow and they also give the painting a nice sense of movement. All these paintings are for sail at the show (pun intended ha ha).

"Sailboat Race" 20"x28" framed - $300

"Sailing on the Columbia" 20"x28" framed - $300

"Nice day on the bay would'nt you say" (S.F bay) framed 16"x20" - $200 If they are still available after the show I will offer a friends and family discount to anyone interested.

Process - " Japanese Garden Steps"

I have been meaning to take progression photos while doing a painting to document the process but once I start painting I usually don't take the time or just plain forget. I finally remembered so the following is my typical process for executing a painting. This was a scene from the Portland Japanese Garden that I painted for a friend.

Value Sketch This is a quick sketch used to establish the light, mid and dark tones on the painting. With watercolors its very important to know the areas that will stay light because once you paint over them there is no way to lighten them.

Preliminary drawing Not all the details are drawn but enough to give you a good guide, it is very important to get the perspective right at this stage and not be guessing once the paint is flowing.

light yellow wash - these area will be the highlights where the sun hits the grass

drop in some green and let it mix with the yellow on the paper

start to work in the shadows

Add the pink values for the flowering bushes

Build up dark values and details. I like splashing on paint with a toothbrush to give the bushes texture and it just fun to do.

Finished up with the tree trunks and some hints of branches, stones between the steps and some shadows on the ground. I sometimes like to leave the bottom or corner of a painting unfinished so the viewer can get a sense of the many layers of washes that give the painting depth and a good sense of light and shadow.

Spring Showers

Considering the crazy stormy weather we have been having here in the Pacific NW I thought it would be a good time to post this painting of the Willamette valley on a typical spring day. This painting was a bit more detailed and fussy than I like, after I finished it I decided to do some dark washes over the sky and foreground to represent rain and cloud shadows I think it came out pretty good especially the areas of sunlight and shadows on the landscape although I would have liked it to be a little looser.

Fishing Village

A few years ago we visited Thailand, one of my favorite places in the country was Phang Nga bay next to Phuket Island. This is a painting of a small fishing village in the bay where we stopped on a tour. Phang Nga bay is a beautiful landscape of limestone islands with sheer cliffs on every side, the village is on stilts because there is not much land to build on. Check it out if you ever make it to Thailand.

Willamette Valley Hills

Here is another stormy sky painting of some vineyards in the Willamette Valley, Oregon. This was the first painting I did on my new Arches watercolor paper(140# graino fino)it handles the color really well but I like the rough texture of Fabriano Artisto a little better.

Atomic Pizza

I am the featured Artist of the Month at Atomic Pizza in North Portland, so if you are in the area check it out. Here is a painting I did of the Pizza shop some time ago.

These are 5 of the 10 paintings I have hanging it's a little tough to see them in the photo they look much better in person. Here is my blurb on their website