Autumn Trees 2 - A Work in Progress

Today is our last day at the Knoepfli Inn and we will head home after breakfast.

Having gotten everything ready to go last night, I spent the morning working on this little painting that I had originally started here a couple of years ago (see posts on 20 October 2013, 17 February 2014 and 10 July 2016).

With having both oak trees and maple trees in front of the balcony, I sketched in the tree trunks and branches, as well as the pine trees in the background.

Next I painted in the tree trunks on the main trees when I heard the bell ring for breakfast and had to put everything away.

I will post this painting again once I have put the pine trees into the background.

Thank you for coming to look at my artwork and I hope you will return often.

Old Oak I

Today I wanted to finish this pen and in drawing that I started a number of years ago (see posts on 22 February 2013 and 25 January 2017).

The first thing I did was to remove the building. I wanted the background to be uncluttered and I felt the house made it look too busy.

I indicated the distant hills in the background and put in various layers of trees adding more details to the closer ones.














Next, I put in some more fence posts into the middle ground.

This was followed by various grasses and growies at the base of the posts and into the field.

Into the foreground I added grasses growing around the base of the oak tree and some clumps of grasses at the base of the front posts.

Lastly, I added the barb wire to the fence posts.

This original, 6-1/2" x 9" pen and ink drawing will be available after it is matted and shrink wrapped for $60.00.

Stone House - A Work in Progress

I wanted to do something today so I thought I would work on this piece that I had started a number of years ago (see post on 21 June 2013).

I wanted to get the large oak tree in the front of the drawing completed.

After working on the drawing and finally finishing the tree I decided I need to take a break before starting work on the house.

That was a big mistake. When I reached for my cup, I accidentally knocked it over.

I ended up spilling tea over the right side of the paper.

I have cropped off the ruined sections ans when I decide what I am going to do with it, I will post this drawing at a later date.

Old Oak I and Lily Pond I - Two Works in Progress

Today isn't a very nice day with the temperature at 37F (3C) and the wind chill making it feel like 30F (-1C), but the worst thing is the mixed precipitation making everything cold and wet.

So I decided that I would do a little more work on a couple of sketches that I had started a long time ago (see posts on 22 February and 18 June 2013).
















Old Oak I

I started on the fence posts to the left of the oak tree first and once they were finished I added the grasses in some areas of the foreground.















Lily Pond I

From there I did a little work on the fence in front of the barn and decided that I needed to do a little more work on the drawing. I will post each of these drawings at a later date once more work on them has been completed.

Oak Leaf 1 - A Work in Progress

Today I came across a number of photographs I had taken last fall of leaves on the ground with water droplets on them.

I thought I would do a small painting of oak leaves and perhaps in the future do other kinds of leaves with water droplets.

After putting the main leaf down, I indicated other leaves beneath it and then placed water droplets on the leaf.














Using a wash of burnt sienna I painted in the main leaf and left spaces for the three water droplets white.

With various tones of burnt sienna to make the water droplet and its cast shadow, I put in the largest water drop.

I will post this painting at a later date once the painting has been completed.

Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog and enjoy the artwork.

Autumn Trees 1 and 2 - Two Works in Progress

Today I pulled out these two paintings that I had started while in Magnetawan ant the Knoepfli Inn (see posts on 20 October 2013 and 17 February 2014).

I worked back and forth between the two paintings to try and keep the background in the same colour range in case I wanted them to be made into a diptych.

I started by wetting the paper first and then brushing in the background with a mix of raw sienna and new gamboge.

While the paper was still wet I added a little aureolin into some of the lighter areas of the background being careful to blend the colors together.

Autumn Trees 1

In the darker areas I added in some cadmium yellow and a little more raw sienna, once again being sure that there were not hard lines.

Using cadmium yellow with a touch of new gamboge I dropped the paint onto the still wet paper in areas where I wanted to indicate leaves but not have them very detailed.

As the paper continued to dry, with a very pale wash of raw sienna I added a little bit of darkness into the bottom of the paintings.

I will post each of these paintings once I have started painting in the tree trunks.

Autumn Trees 2

Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog and look at the artwork. I hope you will return often.

Shady Place 1

It is unbelievably hot for the first week in September with the temperature reaching 91F (32.8C) and with the humidity making it feel like 106F (41.1C).

I spent the morning on the front porch and did this drawing of the main trunk of the big willow tree on the front lawn.















The tree just by itself was too stark, so I added a couple of cows around the base of the tree settling in for an afternoon in a shady place chewing their cud.

I may add another couple of cows, but I will leave that choice for another day.

Autumn Solo 1

It is another day that I am greeted with a light covering of snow on the ground with cold temperatures of 21F (-6.1C).

I decided that I would go out to Burleigh Falls and take photographs as at this time of the year the water is quite high, but I also wanted to do a sketch of an oak tree that was near the water that I didn't have time last year draw.














The colours on this particular tree instead of being the usual shades of brown and rust, was in shades of red, yellow and orange.

At a later date I may do a painting of this tree against the rapids above Burleigh Falls.

Winter Oak 1

Today I taught a class at KAGS and the lesson was on tree structure. We worked on the various coniferous and deciduous trees.

We drew four different coniferous trees first white pine, blue spruce, cedar and tamarack followed by four deciduous trees maple, birch, oak and weeping willow.















They then transferred each image onto a piece of watercolour paper.

Next week we will decide which of the deciduous will represent each season and the same with each of the coniferous.

My students will end up with two sets of four seasons of trees.

Autumn Tress 1 and 2 - Two Works in Progress

These are two paintings I started last year when I was at the Knoepfli Inn in Magnetawan, Ontario (see post on 20 October 2013).

I started by masking out the leaves on both paintings with liquid friskit and then set them aside to dry.

Once the friskit was dry on the first one, using a pencil I lightly did more drawing on the birch tree trunks and to the branches to give them more definition.

I then did the same to the larger maple trunks and branches and added in some of the background tree trunks that didn't need much detail.

Now that the second piece was dry I indicated many of the pine branches from the trees that were in the background.

Next I added more details to the larger oak tree trunks and added many of the branches joining them to the clumps of leaves.

Lastly I worked on the maple tree trunks, branches adding the maple leaves which will be masked out with a different friskit.

I will post both of these paintings at a later date once I have  masked out the maple leaves and have the backgrounds completed.

Oak Trees in Winter - A Work in Progress

Today is the first day of the New Year that I went to paint with the Buckhorn Tuesday Painting Group at St. Matthew's Church.

There are a number of oak trees around the Church. Many of them have a lot of the leaves clinging tenaciously to the branches that will stay there until the early spring when the new leaves are starting the cycle of life again and the wind will take away.















While it is only slightly above freezing as the temperature has climbed to 36F (2.2C) and much of the snow has melted. I went outside to do this sketch of the oak trees by the parking lot behind the Church.

Once I finished my sketch it was time to go back inside and have a cup of tea to warm up and let my fingers thaw.

I will post this piece at a later date as I develop this sketch into a painting.

Old Oak I - A Work in Progress

This is one of the big oak trees that can be found on the outer edges of Peterborough. It has been bent and twisted by the winds and it still remains standing and unbroken.















I will post this painting at a later date once the background buildings have been completed.