Saturday, June 14, 2014

Mountain Range

I wanted to compete this painting that I had started a number of years ago (see post on 26 May 2010).

Working from the background forward I started by rounding the top of the middle mountain so it didn't look as though someone had put off the top.

Next using various mixtures of cadmium red and cadmium yellow, I brushed in some areas with colour to give a little more depth to the autumn colours, but not enough to make them jump out at you.

Now I wanted to work on the rocks. Beginning with the further back ones on the right shore, I tidied up the top edges that were against the background trees. This was followed by adding some darker colors and lighter colours to give the rocks shape.

On the middle section of the rocky shore, using various mixtures of French ultramarine blue, burnt sienna, raw sienna and alizarin crimson, I gradually added more definition to the individual rocks, instead of having them as one large mass. This was followed by adding various textures to some of the rocks, while leaving others fairly plain.












On the foreground rock face, I toned down the far left section and added a few cracks onto the rock surface.

Lastly, I wanted to make changes to the the lake, again working from the back forward, I lifted a few highlights from the dark reflections in the water below the reeds at the shoreline.

Below the furthest back ones on the right side I darkened the colour in the water slightly, while still letting some of the paler colour show through; and dry brushed some of the dark green colour right across the water.

I removed the dark section at the bottom of the middles section of the rocks leaving only a thin line at the base  of them.

Using various mixtures of burnt sienna, raw sienna, and French ultramarine blue and using a dry brush I put in ripples through the middle section of the lake from the base of the rock across the other side.

From there I continued working across the lower part of the lake with a dry brush to add more ripples on the lake.

When this original 6-1/2" x 11-1/2” watercolour has been matted and framed it will be available for $245.00.