Painting Part VI: Finishing
Oct. 7th, 2011 10:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
corvideye8/23 Today I aimed to finish the painting so it would be ready to show in a video interview the next day. My hand was steadier than in the previous session, but still not as steady as I would wish; touching up the gas giant rings was a challenge. I painted fine dividing lines in phthalo blue, then phthalo glazes on the back side of the ring to make it recede. The yellow half was so crooked, I had to completely paint over it with indian yellow, paint it back in white and naples yellow, then glaze the shadowed part with red transparent iron oxide + burnt sienna. To clean up the planet edge, I painted a smooth edge with white, glazed it with indian yellow, then added other color touchups as needed to make it match.
Fine-tuning on the figures: I did touch ups on the red guy, cleaning up edges and smoothing brushstrokes, detailing his fingers. The abrupt orange edge highlight on the backpack bugged me; I improved it by bridging between the blue and the orange with a mix of orange/phthalo/white. The yellow guy was standing out a bit too distinctly from the snow, as if hovering, so I put more shadow on him using burnt umber + payne’s grey.
I had been using cotton swabs to wipe off mistakes, and it occurred to me to try applying paint with them in the cloud area, for an effect similar to a finger but without leaving prints... it works pretty damn well! I put back some dark areas (but not completely dark), worked back and forth (darken, lighten; put paint on, take it off) with various grey tints and more titanium white glazes. I occasionally used a filbert brush to even out or smudge paint. By lightly blurring the mountain edges with white, I created an effect of snow sweeping off the mountains that I really like.
I had been stumped on what color to use for shadowing the yellow clouds; it finally occurred to me to use raw sienna, so I tested an area (upper right)... that might work!
Then I noticed that when I applied the raw sienna, I unconsciously created the more irregular cloud-edge I had been struggling for:
At long last I grokked the concept. I continued to rework the cloud edges in this manner using a stiff filbert brush with yellow transparent iron oxide, red TIO, naples yellow, diarylide yellow, etc... I soon made another discovery: orange cloud edges work over blue! (whereas yellow edges create unwanted green). Is this the right direction?? I don’t know!!
Then, to bridge between the cool grey clouds and the warm yellow-orange clouds, I added some touches of warm grey: yellow TIO + naphthol red + phthalo blue + white.
Finally I get that it’s the same lesson I learned about hard outlines on the hills: don't paint dark at the edge of the cloud; paint dark behind the edge. Don’t model a cloud as one unified globe, but a soft shredding mass that moves continuously towards and away from the viewer. I’ve learned so much from this!
Around 5:00 I decided it was time to stop, step back, and assess. I washed out my brushes and set the picture up where I could look at it from 10-15 feet away.
Upon which viewing I think... it’s actually pretty good. The clouds now err a bit on the distractingly fluffy side, but so it goes... Interestingly, the ones with the warm undershadow (top edge between grey and yellow) are the most convincing. I made a few minute adjustments, but from this point, I am just likely to screw it up by messing with it much more.
I'm really proud of my breakthroughs on the cloud concepts today! Flaws and all, this is certainly the best acrylic painting I have ever done... only partly because it is the only one I’ve recently finished!
8/25 Having let the painting cool, I did final touchups: a smidge of white to remove an unintended subliminal face in the clouds, a few smidges to cover little blemishes in the snow. Other than that, I see nothing worth changing, without continuing to nitpick the clouds to death. I did like it better when that front cloud was dark... too bad. No one else cares about the clouds. Let it be done.
The final result: (I'm hoping to replace this with a better photo; the light in this is a bit dim)
It took me about 30 hours total to paint. If there hadn't been the deadline and requirement to produce it for someone else, there was a point when I would have given up and walked away, maybe never come back to it. Instead I had to keep pushing till I made it work, and I did. That experience was extremely valuable.
I feel I've created a compelling image, one that helps define the project. I wanted to create an image that would make viewers curious, without giving too much away. I wanted to keep a certain ambiguity and tension between these characters, because that is important in the script. What's going on with these two? Is this help or threat, rescue or murder? Is the yellow man dead or alive? I'm pleased that it provokes curiosity about what happens before and after this moment. When I showed it to people who didn't know the story, they were immediately asking questions: "Is that guy alive? Will they fix their ship? What's going to happen to them?" That is exactly what I hoped.
Now here's hoping the filmmakers can raise the money they need and actually get this movie made...
Fine-tuning on the figures: I did touch ups on the red guy, cleaning up edges and smoothing brushstrokes, detailing his fingers. The abrupt orange edge highlight on the backpack bugged me; I improved it by bridging between the blue and the orange with a mix of orange/phthalo/white. The yellow guy was standing out a bit too distinctly from the snow, as if hovering, so I put more shadow on him using burnt umber + payne’s grey.
I had been using cotton swabs to wipe off mistakes, and it occurred to me to try applying paint with them in the cloud area, for an effect similar to a finger but without leaving prints... it works pretty damn well! I put back some dark areas (but not completely dark), worked back and forth (darken, lighten; put paint on, take it off) with various grey tints and more titanium white glazes. I occasionally used a filbert brush to even out or smudge paint. By lightly blurring the mountain edges with white, I created an effect of snow sweeping off the mountains that I really like.
I had been stumped on what color to use for shadowing the yellow clouds; it finally occurred to me to use raw sienna, so I tested an area (upper right)... that might work!
Then I noticed that when I applied the raw sienna, I unconsciously created the more irregular cloud-edge I had been struggling for:
At long last I grokked the concept. I continued to rework the cloud edges in this manner using a stiff filbert brush with yellow transparent iron oxide, red TIO, naples yellow, diarylide yellow, etc... I soon made another discovery: orange cloud edges work over blue! (whereas yellow edges create unwanted green). Is this the right direction?? I don’t know!!
Then, to bridge between the cool grey clouds and the warm yellow-orange clouds, I added some touches of warm grey: yellow TIO + naphthol red + phthalo blue + white.
Finally I get that it’s the same lesson I learned about hard outlines on the hills: don't paint dark at the edge of the cloud; paint dark behind the edge. Don’t model a cloud as one unified globe, but a soft shredding mass that moves continuously towards and away from the viewer. I’ve learned so much from this!
Around 5:00 I decided it was time to stop, step back, and assess. I washed out my brushes and set the picture up where I could look at it from 10-15 feet away.
Upon which viewing I think... it’s actually pretty good. The clouds now err a bit on the distractingly fluffy side, but so it goes... Interestingly, the ones with the warm undershadow (top edge between grey and yellow) are the most convincing. I made a few minute adjustments, but from this point, I am just likely to screw it up by messing with it much more.
I'm really proud of my breakthroughs on the cloud concepts today! Flaws and all, this is certainly the best acrylic painting I have ever done... only partly because it is the only one I’ve recently finished!
8/25 Having let the painting cool, I did final touchups: a smidge of white to remove an unintended subliminal face in the clouds, a few smidges to cover little blemishes in the snow. Other than that, I see nothing worth changing, without continuing to nitpick the clouds to death. I did like it better when that front cloud was dark... too bad. No one else cares about the clouds. Let it be done.
The final result: (I'm hoping to replace this with a better photo; the light in this is a bit dim)
It took me about 30 hours total to paint. If there hadn't been the deadline and requirement to produce it for someone else, there was a point when I would have given up and walked away, maybe never come back to it. Instead I had to keep pushing till I made it work, and I did. That experience was extremely valuable.
I feel I've created a compelling image, one that helps define the project. I wanted to create an image that would make viewers curious, without giving too much away. I wanted to keep a certain ambiguity and tension between these characters, because that is important in the script. What's going on with these two? Is this help or threat, rescue or murder? Is the yellow man dead or alive? I'm pleased that it provokes curiosity about what happens before and after this moment. When I showed it to people who didn't know the story, they were immediately asking questions: "Is that guy alive? Will they fix their ship? What's going to happen to them?" That is exactly what I hoped.
Now here's hoping the filmmakers can raise the money they need and actually get this movie made...
