Fog at the River

Here is the painting I did on a foggy February morning a couple weeks ago.  The fog continued to hold on all through the morning and lasted almost till noon, maybe because I was down in the valley at the lowest elevation and next to the river. We'd had a recent snow and most of it was melting off leaving patches here and there.  I was hoping the fog would hold out long enough for me to get a painting finished and I got my wish. I really loved painting in the fog - I wish we got a lot more days like that. But Colorado is a fairly dry place and foggy days don't happen too often.
Fog Along the River, 8 x 10.

Winter Fields

This was from a couple weeks ago - finally dry. Winter Fields. I had done one painting,  finished it up, turned around and saw this scene and decided to paint it also. I ended up not keeping the first one. Winter Fields, 8 x 10.

Old Pumphouse

There's an old run-down irrigation pumphouse on an abandoned farm near here. It's right next to one of the parks where I often go to paint. There's an old barn and some other falling-down buildings which I've painted before but this time I decided to paint the pumphouse. I liked the fading paint and the look of the weathered boards.  Old Pumphouse, 10 x 8.

Spring Grazing along the Yampa River

While travelling last May and coming back through northern Colorado we passed through Steamboat Springs. Along the way I took pictures. This painting is done from something I took along that stretch of Route 40. The pastures were starting to green up, although there were patches of snow higher up. It looked awfully pretty. I couldn't stop to paint - we had to get home by evening. I did this painting all in one sitting - kind of an alla prima sort of indoor plein air. I started working from the photo as though I were on location. I didn't really plan it out too much ahead of time. It was kind of an experiment.
Spring Grazing, 10 x 20.

House on the hilltop

Last Saturday was a really foggy morning and I thought it would be great to go and paint that. I did one 8x10 down by the river. It went well, and I decided I had time to do another. I had a smaller 6 x 8 with me and painted this small painting of a house on the hill. The sky was still fairly foggy and began to lift as I was finishing up. The first painting is still drying, the second one I am posting here.
Hilltop House, 6 x 8.

New Paintings

I have them - but gee - they are taking FOREVER to dry in this winter weather. I've got 3 sitting here just waiting for those last patches to be dry enough to scan.  Maybe tomorrow.

Contrails

I saw this scene while driving to Boulder one evening. I was on my way to something, had no camera with me or painting gear. I noted the time and came back the next day at sunset to take some pictures. The site is right next to a busy divided highway with no real safe place to park or setup, I'd be a little afraid to paint there, so I took a lot of pictures and worked on this at home. I particularly liked how the partially melting ponds and random snow patches added to the view.
Contrails, 9 x 12.

Painting at NCAR

NCAR (National Center for Atmospheric Research) sits on top of a hill in Boulder. The PAAC plein air group of Boulder went there last Thursday to paint. There are great views all around looking south, east and north, and west if you want to paint the building or the mountains behind it. We all set up mostly on the south side of the hilltop. The weather was pretty great and the sweeping views to the south looked pretty fantastic. I chose to paint this partly still snow-covered ravine off in the distance. Below is a picture of NCAR that I borrowed from their website  https://ncar.ucar.edu/.  (Hope you don't mind the picture borrowing, NCAR).   Great place to visit, exhibits for visitors, etc.
The Ravine, 9 x 12.

Gourds

Another of my "plein indoor" paintings done on a cold dark evening when I was wishing I could be outside and painting in the sun. We have a bunch of gourds leftover from the summer garden, kept around for decoration.  I threw a few of these outside afterwards and watched the squirrels tear them apart the next morning to eat the seeds.  Gourds, 6 x 6.

The Frozen Lake

Hamms Pond is surrounded by large swaths of cattails. Here's an early morning painting I did there. I had to go back a second day to finish it - there were things I wanted to change and had to see it again to do so. Luckily it was pretty much the same weather.
Frozen Lake, 8 x 10.

New Work

I have posted nothing in a while.  Doesn't mean I haven't been painting. Sure the weather's been pretty cold, so I haven't painted outside too many times. I have a couple of paintings here waiting to dry and be scanned, and when they are, I'll post them. I've hit one of those spells where I don't much like some of the paintings I have been making.  Either I've done a bunch of not-so-good paintings or I have been getting more selective and discriminating in my taste.  I like to think it's that... or maybe it's both. I've been taking a critique class - it's getting me to see things I hadn't thought about in my work. I highly recommend it.

Today I went and painted - I took a painting back out to the original location and worked on it again. It was one of those situations where the painting looks fine at the time but once it's home,  I start to see what's wrong, or think about what I'd like to change. "Fixing" it in the studio is never a good idea for me. I've tried it in the past - it always came out badly. I have learned it's something for me to best avoid.

 Today was a very similar morning, weather-wise so I took the painting back to the original location.  In a few minutes I had adjusted a few things and it's looking much better, and was easy to do when I could actually see the trees, the sky the mountains, the water, the actual colors again.  It was so much easier than trying to do it in the studio. Definitely an improvement.  With that finished up I then worked on a new painting. So far, so good. I see how I like it tomorrow.

Salt & Pepper

Another indoor painting of my salt & pepper shakers. They looked good on the red holiday tablecloth. I've been busy preparing canvas panels for future paintings and have a couple odd pieces left including these 6x6 panels, so have decided to do more indoor paintings on them.  Salt & Pepper, 6 x 6.

Toaster

Well it's so cold outside that it been "going in to paint" rather than "going outside to paint" around here. Here's from the other night, a little portrait of my toaster in the warm glow of the under counter lights. It was fun so I'm going to do some more.

Toaster, 6 x 6.

Winter Plein Air along the River

A heavy snow fell last week and it's been relatively cold, so a lot of it is still around. On Tuesday the 22nd it was a beautiful sunny day and most of my Christmas stuff was finished up so I went out late morning to paint. I wanted to work on snow and winter foliage.

 I chose a spot near the river and found this old cottonwood along an old river channel. I learned that it is essential to have your painting umbrella along on a sunny snowy day. The glare can be amazing.  Luckily I brought mine along. Should have brought sunglasses too.  Some artists carry those fold-up windshield dash covers to help shield their palettes, an item that would have been very useful too, but I did not have. Probably a good thing to add to my plein air kit. It's also helpful to bring some kind of lightweight waterproof ground cloth to set my gear /backpack on while I am painting. I also bring along a camera. Extra batteries kept inside my coat would have been a help. The cold made my rechargeable battery go dead really fast as I was out about 3 hours or so.

Snow is fun to paint - there are many different colors in the shadows reflected back by nearby objects. I really enjoy painting snow.  Here's the painting.  Old River Channel, 9 x 12.

Winter Watch

Here's another studio painting I've wanted to try for a long time.  I took the original photos a couple years ago and every now and then I'd run across them looking for something else and finally decided now was the time to work on this painting. I love how these foothills look when the tops are covered in frost and snow but the low areas have melted off.

Unlike the east coast that's suffering under a heat wave, we have more normal weather and recently had a 10 inch snowfall and then a little dusting yesterday so I am in the mood to paint snow.

 Well - back to getting Christmas ready - have a great holiday!
 Edit - I have since changed this painting - it's new look below. I thought the hills were too dark and didn't look snowy enough, needed to have more contrast between the buildings and the hills.

Winter Watch, 11 x 14, sold.

Same #3

Now that winter has set in, working on studio paintings is often my only option, the sun setting so early and the days filled with getting ready for the holidays. Also - I'm just a wimp when it comes to painting outside in temperatures lower than 25F or so.

So here's another set of painting all done in approximately the same place looking at the same things.
Looking east at Hamm's Pond. Top to bottom: Dawn at the Lake, Morning Glow, Red Sunrise, Purple Dawn.

Break in the Weather

It did warm up enough last week to go paint at dawn so I went last Tuesday. It was kind of an overcast morning.  Winter skies have a different look to them than the summer sunrises. Good thing I went painting, because we have since had a couple snowfalls and around 10 inches of snow this week.  I am looking forward to Christmas week time off to get out there in winter sunshine sun and maybe do some painting. Here's the last painting,  Icy Edges, 9 x 12.

Framed paintings

Someone asked recently about what the paintings look like when they are framed, since they are listed as framed on my website.  Here are two of them in frames. I use the black frame with gold liners but also use gold frames sometimes.  If the painting is really dark the gold frame might be the better choice although I prefer the black ones generally.
Rainbow Dawn  and Predawn in frames:

Same #2

I thought I'd post another "same" post. Here are a couple paintings I did from almost the same location, different days, weather. This time the location is at Hamm's pond, looking across the lake towards the mountains in the west. They are top to bottom,  Waking Up, First Light, PreDawn, and Winter Sky.

A City Farmhouse

Here's the studio painting I just finished, worked from photos I took walking around one early morning after a light snowfall. I've always been interested in painting this house that sits near the top of a nearby hill not far from a busy intersection. The house and its small farm are now surrounded by housing developments -  a little island of rural in a suburban area.  The light on the snow covered roof and the long blue shadows in the fields with the golden morning sky looked pretty spectacular at the time.   I moved a few of the outbuildings closer together to get it all in the picture.
9th & Pace, 12 x 16.

Goose Hunt

Wednesday it warmed up during the day but the early morning was still a bit chill - around 14 degrees when I got up to go out. It's not so bad painting in the cold if the sun is shining on you, but really frigid out there before the sun is up.  I still wanted to go but knew I'd freeze if I tried to stand out in the cold and paint, so I took some backup stuff. Armed with some oil pastels and a pad I hunkered down in the car and drew. I don't like them as much as paint, but they worked in the super cold. This was an experiment - maybe I'll try it with pastels also.

 When I got there geese hunters were just about finished setting up dozens of oversized goose decoys in the nearby field and getting ready to ambush the Canada Geese and they begin to fly toward the lake in the morning. So the "geese" in this picture aren't real.
After the sun rose, flocks of geese starting flying in, but none went near the decoys while I was there. I finished and left before the shooting began.

Geese at Sunrise, 7 x 9, on watercolor paper.

Same place

I 've painted at the same locations, different times of day, different seasons, and they've all come out a little different, and the last painting I posted was one of them. Also my plein air style has gotten looser. Cold weather and the added pressure of a quick moving sunrise are some of the reasons that has happened. The choice is work fast or lose the scene. Just thought it might be interesting to compare a couple from the same general location.  These three were at Peschel Open Space, slightly different vantage points, different seasons. Here they are: Overcast Dawn, 2014, sold;  Late Afternoon at Peschel, 2014;  Warning, 2015.

Dark Skies

It warmed up a bit ( low of 29 ) so it was warm enough to go out again at dawn and paint. The sky had a heavy band of dark clouds with a glowing red stripe below along the horizon.  I had a short time to get it painted before the sun emerged and the dark clouds faded to white.  I named it after the old adage " Red sky at morning, sailors take warning".  Later that day a cold weather front moved in and we've been having a little snow each day since last Wednesday.Warning, 9 x 12.

It's looking more like winter.

We had a little snow last week and this latest plein air painting shows some of that. It was a bit too cold to paint at dawn,  so the morning after the snowfall I went for a walk at sunrise and took my camera - a gorgeous morning with the new snow. Maybe some of those photos will end up being reference for later paintings.

On Sunday it warmed up a bit I went out a little later and did some plein air painting. Thus this painting - "Frozen over", 9 x 12.  Most of the snow is melted by now but more is forecast for tonight - a Thanksgiving present.

Actually I am pretty thankful that I've had a great year of experiences painting outside, many, many nice mornings. I have become especially enamored with sunrises - which is pretty amazing since I tend to gravitate to staying up late and sleeping late. Now I can't wait to get out there and paint, even when it is freezing. The infinite variety of sky and color is just amazing. The changeability that occurs at such a rapid pace during sunrises and sunsets is a real challenge to catch. I highly recommend it for anyone who wants to get faster at painting outdoors.  Happy Thanksgiving!

Lakeshore

Here's a studio painting I finished this week done from reference photos I took at Brainard Lake. This is a high country lake up near the peaks, and not too far from the tree line, but fairly easy to reach. The road in was closed for the last two miles so we had to hike in.  They had a couple snowfalls up there, and several more since I visited, so the lake edge was patched with remnants of the snowfalls, and the first set of winter ice around the edges was starting to form. I liked how the beach looked with the dark trees in the background.  Lakeshore, 12 x 16.

I managed to get in a pair of plein air paintings but didn't like how they turned out. You'll see them in the future with something else painted over them.

Cold Morning

It was a cold morning last Tuesday when I was out painting at sunrise. I didn't have much time so I didn't go far - just back to Hamms Pond.  This might be one of the last actual sunrises I paint in the rest of 2015 since temperatures are starting to hit the low twenties in the pre-dawn hour. I have a lot of difficulty keeping my fingers working right, without smothering them in big clumsy gloves that can't open paint tubes, etc.  I don't know what the current great famous plein air people do to keep their hands warm, I guess I ought to ask some of them. If anyone has some suggestions, let me know. Meanwhile, here's the painting - Cold Morning, 8 x 10, sold.

Waning Afternoon

Here's a painting from last weekend, the last bits of autumn color still clinging to some of the trees and bushes, done at Sandstone Ranch. It's amazing how fast the afternoon fades away. I left home around 2 to go paint and as I finished up the sun was dropping behind the mountains already. Even so, I started another but it started getting too dark too fast, so I'll have to finish it another day. Perfect weather for painting. Waning Afternoon, 9 x 12.

Autumn Sunset

Here's a painting I have been working on in the studio from some sunset photos I have taken. It gets dark so early and I don't usually have time to go out at sunset and paint, much as I'd like to. Now that the weather is getting colder plein air is getting a bit more difficult, or at least takes more planning to be prepared. There's a trail we like to walk on that's still partly closed from the flood two years ago, but you can see some great sunsets from there and this was one of them.  Autumn Sunset, 12 x 16. 

Painting last Friday

So, last Friday I painted near some small lakes. It was a scheduled paint out with a local plein air group. The morning dawned chilly and with a small sprinkling of rain. I decided to go anyway thinking the rain would probably clear up, and although it wouldn't be sunny, it might be a good morning to paint. A lot of the trees are turned color and with the water and reflections it might be very nice. Nobody showed up. Don't know if they thought it was too wet, or too cold or too dark? But it was fine, the rain quit by the time I got there. But here's the thing. There are 4 outcomes that could happen when painting.

 1. You feel like you are on a roll - the painting pours out of you and comes out fine, pretty good. You are pleased with it.

2.  You are not sure/don't feel like you should be painting that day, but you get into it and the painting turns out pretty good. You are pleased with it.

 3. You are not sure you should be painting that day, and the painting turns out awful.  You wipe it off later. You figure it was good practice and are glad you at least got out to paint.

 4. You are really into painting, happy to be there painting, but little by little the painting goes downhill, turning out awful. You give up, go home and wipe it off later. You think - what went wrong?  You figure it was good practice and are glad you at least got out to paint.

This was a number 4 day. Nice scene, nice morning, weather okay, but not so good outcome. You never know what you're going to get.

Hunter's Moon

Last Tuesday was the October full moon, sometimes nicknamed the "hunter's moon".  I wanted to paint the moon as it was setting in the morning so I went early to Hamms Pond and got a good view of the moon over the city heading towards moonset over the mountains. The mountain in the background is Long's Peak which conveniently sits over the city and now has a new coat of snow on it. Hunter's Moon, 8 x 10.