Our meeting with Derek Witts on October 22nd was cancelled at very short notice so instead
we were shown three DVDs.
THE FIRST
was a demonstration
by Geoff Kersey on painting a bluebell wood in watercolour.
He sketched in the main elements of the
picture and masked off tree trunks, branches and a horizon line. Then the
basic washes were mixed to produce different greens and yellows for the tree
canopy and blue for the sky. The colours used were :-
aureolin and cobalt blue
lemon yellow
aureolin, ultramarine and raw sienna
ultramarine and burnt sienna
viridian
cobalt blue and manganese violet for the sky.
After thoroughly wetting the paper the washes were applied starting with the
sky and ending with the darkest green in the foreground. The painting was then
left to dry.
The next stage was to paint the bluebells The masking fluid on the horizon
line was removed and the distant bluebells painted in sky colour. The colour
was deepened toward the foreground. Green was put around the base of the trees
and edge of the path.
Masking fluid was removed from the tree trunks which were then washed with sky
colour and burnt sienna for distant trees and branches and raw sienna added to
the mix for frontal trees.
Lemon yellow was added to the foliage using a No. 8 brush on its side and
shadow areas emphasised in the same way using dark green mixes.
Geoff then started on the final stage of painting the path using a wash of
raw sienna and burnt sienna. A highlight was removed with a dry brush and
dappled shadow added using sky colour.
Bluebell colour was deepened in the foreground and highlights added by
mixing the colour with a small amount of white gouache.
The Second DVD- a wave burst demonstrated by Roy Lang using oils.
After sketching in the rock, wave and sand
Roy
started painting by putting in the sky using ultramarine and alizarin. Then the
foam was placed behind the rock using titanium white and cadmium yellow pale.
The rock was painted using a mix of burnt sienna and ultramarine with
reflections at the top using deep sky colour and some sap green at the base.
Fissures were represented using a rigger brush and dark rock colour and white
trickles of water.
The sea was painted next using dark ultramarine and cobalt blue and foam put
in at the edge. Spattered foam was added over the wave burst and wave and the
sand painted in yellow ochre. Highlights were put in using titanium white.
The Final DVD
was Vic Bearcroft's
demonstration of an Amur Leopard in pastel.
Vic was using his own photographs taken in a zoo for his basic drawing. He
did a basic outline and then put in the dark markings with raw sienna using
soft pastel and
naples
yellow for the light areas in the fur. The eyes were painted with hard Conte
pastel using yellow for the base of the eye and highlight on top of the black
pupil. Dark pink was used for the nose with a black outline and shadows and
black for
the mouth. The next stage was
to strengthen the fur colours and add the white of the chest and white
highlights on the ears. Finally firm flicks of hard white pastel were used to
put in the whiskers.
All three videos were very helpful and informative and the evening
successful.
