First lay in of color

[Cindy Procious]

Patty, I am glad that you're starting over with fresh eyes and a ream of advice.

I would only add that I think you might consider keeping the t-shirt blue, rather than change it to red.

And hang in there - this one's going to be great!

[Patricia Joyce]

I received the new canvas last week and began again this weekend. Just finished putting in some color on everything but the kids. The foregound/sand/ shadows are very thin. I have not started to lay in color on the children yet. It is still the Raw Umber underpainting.

The colors on my palette are yellow ochre light, yellow ochre, raw umber, titanium white, ultramarine blue, cobalt blue. These are the colors I have used. I also have on my palette Indian Red, Terra Rosa, raw umber, veridian and cadmium red.

I would be so grateful for advice on color. The sky looks cobalt to me and the water more ultramarine blue. But when I painted them that way it didn't look cohesive, so I toned down both dark blues.

Should I wait untl the last layer of paint to put in the white foam and wave to the left?

Hopefully tomorrow I will work on the kids. Now I have to clean up and do some accounting and earn some money - YUCK!!!!

Thanks for your eyes!
Pat

[Patricia Joyce]

I'm so embarrassed...I made a few adjustment, now I REALLY have to get to work.

[Mischa Milosevic]

At this stage the horizon is not important rather your subjects. What you must first do is harmonize the value/colors in such a way to designate place of attention. Use the photo as an idea not as a means. You must create your idea and not copy the photo. You can combine cad red, yellow ocher plus white for skin tones and contrast this with variations of blue and raw umber, yellow ocher and white. So, your subjects are the center of attention, next the reflections in the watter of the subject then the water line closest to the subject and last a hint of horizon. If you think along these lines you will be fine.

Paint application. At this stage apply thinly all over. This way your paint will dry quickly and you will be able to make adjustments at will. Do not rush to the finish; let each day give you a fresh look.

I hope this will help.

[Patricia Joyce]

Thank you Mischa,
You are a great help and I will pay attention to your advice as I paint. Yes, it is time to paint the figures, it is frustrating that I cannot paint them today. I wanted to establish the largest colors first so that I can incorporate and so that the figures will be the correct value/color. I need to hear your advice that coming in on another morning with fresh eyes will assist my progression.

SO MUCH to think about, but I have to admit, this is fun!

[Alexandra Tyng]

Patty,

Why are you embarrassed? There's no need to be.

The ocean near the shore is rising up into waves. Every time a wave begins to form, you will see the "underbelly" of the water, i.e. the color of the sand bottom. The deeper the layer of water over the sand bottom, the more the sand color will be dominated by the water color.

Farther out, the water is deeper and reflects the sky. Though the sky is blue, there is a cloud bank. The water is a deeper blue than the sky. But because there is a haze of cloud, the blue of the water is tinged with shadow. To nail the color, try mixing just a tiny bit of cad orange into the blue and lightening the value with white.

The same mixture of ult. blue + cad orange (only a tiny bit of color needed--balance to make a cool grey and mix with a lot of white) can be used to make the underside of the cloud. There is this direct relationship between the cloud in shadow and the water in shadow. The front top edge of cloud that is catching the sunlight from behind should be white plus the color of the light (a clear yellow rather than yellow ochre which is an earth tone).

Hope this helps a bit. There are other ways to do it, but this is how I would approach it.

[Patricia Joyce]

Alexandra,
I am printing up your advice as well, and will play with these combinations as well.
You are a great help with your knowledge about clouds, sea, shadows, waves. I need all of this having never taken a landscape painting class. To be honest, this is my first landscape in more years than I want to count...

[Allan Rahbek]

Patricia,
to make it easy I will suggest that you paint the sky and sea first, before the children, and keep the values light, in the upper third of the value scale.

[Debra Norton]

Patty, I think it's looking great so far! At first glance my eye had to travel over the sand to get to the children, which shows depth already!

One thing I would encourage you to do is work on the children the same time you're working on the surroundings. My teacher called this "working a passage." She would draw an imaginary circle (like I've tried to do on your picture - hope it worked) around an area and say "paint inside the circle." Then she'd "draw" another circle somewhere else and say the same thing. And if you keep "painting inside the circle" you end up with a unified painting and avoid a cut out look. When you paint inside the circle you paint everything at once, rather than painting the individual objects. It took me a long time to understand this concept myself and I hope I've explained it in a way that makes sense.

[Patricia Joyce]

Thank you Debra,
I will try that today. It is Saturday and I have a whole day AND tomorrow afternoon - will be posting my progress....