"Off In The Distance"

(unavailable......6" x 12".....Water Soluble Oils on 300 lb HP)

"Off in the distance is the answer to my dreams." As we travel towards our dream the distance becomes closer and closer. We eventually see our dreams realized. 

This is a reference photo taken by a good friend of mine on one of her visits to Utah. We painted it together and she gave me permission to post it on my blog. It was an experimental piece for me and I would probably need to do it again to submit it for an exhibit. But I will leave that task up to my friend. She is totally capable of capturing the essence of this scene in a panoramic abstract landscape. 

We both worked on 300 lb. HP Watercolor Paper with Water Soluble Oils and palette knives. It is good to paint with other people because no two people think alike or notice the same things. In fact, we noticed several things after we painted that we should have noticed beforehand. That's why it is so instructive to paint the same image or one in the same category until the eye is trained to see all of the subtleties  in the image. 

Some of those important things to notice would be the actual size of the background mountains and bluffs in comparison to all of the other elements. It's called "scale". When the right "scale" is off, the whole painting can look a bit strange. Other words to describe "scale" would be proportion or ratio. It's a comparing of one thing to another. This is one of the pre-eminent things to study in your real life image or reference photo before beginning the painting.

 Alas, none of us done it well every single time, so take heart, go back to the studio and do it again. When you have a half dozen of the same one under your belt, then you are likely to have one that works. Or, you can simply make this one thing your priority and do six different images if you are easily bored. And there you have it...just a few more things to think about.