Saturday painting

I didn't have time to go too far - too many things to get done on Saturday so I did this at a nearby park. Afternoon Shade, 9 x 12.

Dawn at the Lake

Here's a painting from last Friday - another early  morning trip out to paint. The sun is rising slightly later now so I can get out there a little sooner before the sun comes up completely. I had odd piece of board I covered with canvas and decided to use this long narrow panel for a change.
Dawn at the Lake, 6 x 12.

Sugar Mill

After doing a bunch of dawn paintings, I happened to pass the old sugar mill the other night around sunset and thought it might be fun to paint an evening picture. So Friday I went back at 7:30 and started painting, finishing around 8:15 when I started losing the sunlight behind a low cloud bank. It's kind of odd - I found myself painting things in a reverse order from the morning paintings. In the morning one has to get the sky pretty quick before anything else because it changes so fast, then go on to the foreground.  In the evening I found I left the sky till last - waiting to see what it was going to look like as the sky turned more like a sunset, and putting in the mill and landscape first. Here's the result. I decided to trim this picture down to a different format - now square.  Sugar Mill, 8 x 8, sold.

Dawn at Union Reservoir

I went back out again last Thursday early and painted. I liked how it looked the other day as I passed it on one of my other morning excursions so I decided to go back there specifically. There was a heavy band of dark clouds and I was not sure it was going to clear up enough but the clouds started to dissipate and a band of sunlight broke through silhouetting the trees against the strip of water.

 Artists involved in the local Studio Tour are supposed to donate a small painting to a fundraising event to help pay for the tour publicity. Everyone was given a small 8 x 10 canvas. This is what I did on mine.  It's been donated and the auction is on August 22.   Dawn Light, 8 x 10, sold.

Evening Storm

I saw this scene while hiking at a nearby open space park called Hall Ranch. We had started hiking around 2:30 in the afternoon and took a trail we hadn't taken before. It ended up being a very long hike and we didn't get back to the parking area till almost 8 PM. The sun was setting and a storm was moving in with lightening and thunder at the same time making for some dramatic scenery. I took a few pictures and worked on this in the studio.  Evening Storm, 10 x 20.

High Country

This is a studio painting I recently finished based on photos I took this spring on a trip west. We were heading south toward Mono Lake along the California border after having just camped over the border in Nevada. It was a beautiful clear morning. The mountains I believe are actually on the back side of Yosemite Park. The passes to the park were still closed for the winter. By using Google Earth I tried to figure out what mountain this actually is. It might be Dunderberg Peak.  But I am still not sure. I wish I had time to paint there but we were running late and had many miles to drive. High Country Spring, 11 x 14.

Cloudy Dawn

Last Friday it looked pretty cloudy and I wasn't sure it was a good idea to go out and paint but I went anyway and it turned out fine. It is soooo hard to get up at 5 and go off to paint. But once I got there I was glad I had dragged myself out of bed. This was looking east at Sandstone Ranch on the hilltop.
The clouds burned off as the sun came up and it turned out being a great morning to paint. Lots of bunnies were out and about but not too much else was around. Cloudy Dawn, 8 x 10.

Aspen

Everyone paints pictures of aspen, especially in the fall when they turn yellow and orange. I haven't done any paintings of aspen, fall or any other time of year.  We were camping near the Buffalo Peaks wilderness area over the 4th of July in an area surrounded by aspen so I thought it was time to try painting them. The flowers there were spectacular and the scenery was amazing. I wish I could have stayed there all day painting everything.  Here are the aspens I did get to paint, down the dirt road from our tent.  Aspen at Buffalo Peaks, 10 x 8.

Sunrise at Sandstone Ranch

Painting super early in the morning is pretty nice so I did it again on Saturday. I got there around 5:45 - a little later than I would have liked but it worked out okay. I had to block in the shadows really fast before the sun rose any higher. The sun was just starting to come over the low hillsides making for some nice lights and darks. I set up painting next to the dirt road looking south. Morning Hillside, 9 x 12.

Sunrise near Union Reservoir

My early morning experience from the last time was so pleasant I decided to go out again facing the opposite way and see what I could paint. I went to the hillside near another lake and painted the view as the sun was coming up near an old farmstead. I got there right before the sun actually came up and managed to get my basic colors blocked in beforehand and actually got to paint the sun as it emerged over the horizon. Then I had to work really fast before the clouds all changed color which they did rather rapidly. I finished up quickly and went home and back to bed for a little bit. Getting up at 5 is really hard. Sunrise. 8 x 10.