Painting at Carvins Cove

 Hey Friends,  I was lucky enough to have a day with my plein-aire buddies, the DLPBR.   We went to Carvins Cove which I think is still a major source of water for this area of Va.

 I was sitting on a campers stool almost in the water when I painted this one.  I obviously need to finish it, but it's a pretty good start.  Plein-aire painting is a lot harder than you'd think!

 This is about my view, peeking around the trees.  I just wanted to leave the trees out.

But as you can see I'm over whelmed by all the green !!!    I'll probably just pitch this one.  I don't think I can save it.   You try it.  And let me know what you did with all that green.

I'm changing my sign off tonight - just a bit.

Happy Trails-Travel Well

Plein-Aire Painting at Gum Springs

Hey Friends, The weather was fantastic here in SW Va. today. So I went outside to paint. Plein-Aire its called. Haven't done that for the longest time. And it is TUFF. It's really hard for someone so easily distracted as myself to concentrate outside. The first one above is 10x8.

The second above is 9x12. The spring isn't really those colors but I've not learned how to make brown water look like water yet. I need to do some tiny studies of just the water.

The third is 10x8 also and not nearly as red as this photo. Getting decent photos for the web is way to hard with a camera. I'm used to my scanner but these are oils so I can't scan them yet.

All 3 are at the bottom of our driveway and it is one tiny little spring. Most of the year it is dry but we've had some rain lately so I had to make the most of it. Hard work but FUN !! Surely I will improve with practice. I intended for these to be paintings not studies. So maybe I'm putting the cart before the horse.

Any feed back is welcome, just leave me a comment. And I'm sending this to my friends that I paint with. They don't know how to leave comments so I'll find out the slow way.

Happy Trails.

RAVEN Original Painting Details

Hey Friends, I have a friend, Kelli, who lives in Alaska! She was curious about a couple of mypaintings, so I thought I would show her a few close ups. I thought maybe you would like to see also. This is a contemporary twist on the famous Raven. Ravens are so smart and good looking.

In this close up, you can see one section of the Real Gold Leaf and the Ravens tail feathers.

This close up shows a stamp I hand made from a sheet of foam. I like to make my own stamps.

Here is the famous nosy face.

This section just shows the effect you get by dragging things through the paint. Here I used a comb type thingy for decorating cakes! This style or technique is one of my very most favorite ways to create.

Tomorrow I will post another Raven, but right now I must get going to see my daughter in the hospital and take her some PB&J sandwiches.

Happy Trails!

A FAVORITE BLOG

Hey Friends, Today I wanted to share one of my favorite blogs by an artist, Sue Smith. She talks about a lot of things special to me. It will take some time if you click on all the stuff she has linked in her side bar, but I found it all very interesting. Enjoy! Sorry I couldn't figure out how to add one of her paintings, so just click on her name.

Happy Trails.