I was wondering what I was going to paint this morning and so I decided to do a small still life. As always the first difficulty is what I am going to choose as my models. So I had a look around me and I decided to create something from what I had in front of me. Its like a chef that creates a recipe from what is available at that time. I just wanted some neutral colours, something colourful and an object at either side of the value scale. So I took my mocha coffee pot, excellent as a neutral grey with very dark handle but can create some interesting reflection on its shiny surface. I had a small diary, green in colour and so I had to find a complementary cloth and finally I took a coffee mug, the other end of the value scale. I placed these objects in front of a window and started painting. The palette I used consisted of titanium white, cadmium yellow, pyrrole rubine, ultramarine blue and burnt umber. I started by blocking in the background first and then moving to the objects from dark to light.
Starting from the darks, I started from the coffee pot. I find reflective surfaces a very easy to paint as they are usually grey and its the value contrasts that create the reflective illusion.  Then I moved on to the green book that is a mid-value colour. Finally I had to the coffee mug and that was the challenge. Pretty much the whole mug was shiny and one can barely see variation in tone. Using natural light as a light source especially on an overcast day, will soften the shadows and hence everything looks like flat. However, the problem is that one cannot paint this mug as flat white so I started looking at it more in details and started mixing a number of very light greys using the colours that I used for the objects around it. There were very light tints of green, red and browns while the part in the light was a whitish grey since the sky was overcast. I also tried to keep the values somewhere in between mid-value and white.  It was the hardest part of the whole painting challenge as one does not have too much space to play with values when you are approaching the lightest tones.
​

Landscape painting is one of the genres most popular with both art collectors and artists/students. Looking back at history of arts we observe that actually landscape painting was introduced and started being a subject matter very recently. Before that, paintings mostly depicted the human figure in various ways including as part of mythological or religious/biblical stories. Leonardo da Vinci was one of the first to introduce the landscape as a background for his famous painting of the Mona Lisa. From there onwards artists also started to go out and use sketching/drawing as a way to record what they observe and then translate those sketches into a studio painting. Later on as paint tubes were developed life became a little bit easier and artists such as Monet and other impressionists started painting more outdoors. 

If still life painting is fundamentally important for those who want to learn how to draw and paint realism, without doubt that outdoor painting is same as important to learn to paint the landscape. It is very difficult for a person who never observed with his/her own eyes sceneries away from city life, to conceive the vast space and effects of the light and weather on the landscape. These skills one cannot get them from using photography only as reference material. Photography is a good tool but only when its used in combination with other sources including your observation of reality. The hardest issue when painting outdoors is the constant change in light intensity, direction and colour. This issue will force you to paint faster and to make fast decisions about colour mixes. 

On a recent trip to Kangaroo Valley , while staying at a very interesting property at Barrengarry (Bedford and Bunker) I took the opportunity to paint a number of sketches of the farm land and surrounding scenery at different times in the afternoon. As my setup I used a pochade box with a glass palette, 12 x 9 inch Ampersand boards to which I attached a piece of linen double primed with a non-absorbent acrylic primer (Michael Harding). The palette of colours used was ultramarine blue, phthalo blue, Venetian red, Pyrrole rubine (PR264), yellow ochre, cadmium lemon, viridian and flake white replacement. Cold pressed linseed oil was used as medium when needed. One of the most important issues when painting outdoors has to do with your position in relation to the sun. The worst that can happen to you will find a place in the shade and within an hour you end up with the sun on your canvas in such a way that you cannot see anything. I usually also wear a hat with a wide brim or a cap to prevent constriction of my eyes due to the bright light which will not allow you to see and judge values well. Before I start painting I always spend a significant amount of time observing in which direction the sun is going to move across the sky as well as the landscape around me in order to decide my subject matter and make some decisions about the composition of the painting. To help you with the issue of the sun, there are a number of very useful tools that can calculate for you the position of the sun and shadows even at different days and times such as Sun Calc. 

During these two sittings I finished two paintings (shown in the images above) one early afternoon and the other an hour before sunset. I always try to finish the entire painting within a maximum of one and a half hours. I also took a number of photos especially at sunset when the light will be changing literally every minute and so its very difficult to capture the light in paint. Another tool I use is my memory. I try to sit and observe in order to memorise what I am seeing as well as the whole experience and atmosphere which consists of not only the visual sense but also the sensations from other senses. Using this combination of tools I am now working on a bigger studio painting of this location.
​

Today I am going to give a brief overview of the painting process of this painting. I found the subject matter interesting in a number of ways. The human figure looks like he is a meditative and reflective state while at the same time there seems to be a friendly and peaceful relationship with the monkey. It also reminded me of when I was young and I had this obsession that I wanted a small monkey as a pet, however this never happened. It also reminded me of our connection as humans with mother nature and especially with the other creatures with whom we share our life on this planet. It is also a reminder that we are part of the natural world from which we all are coming. 

From the artistic perspective I loved the combination of colours and contrasts. The background is fairly neautral leaning towards a low chroma orange which contrasts with the relatively high chroma complementary bluish tones of the turban. Other complementary contrasts are red/green and yellow/purple.

As a surface I prepared a stretched fine linen, primed with three layers of acrylic primer. The initial tonal sketch was done using raw umber which was allowed to dry for a day and then painted over with a second layer of transparent red oxide red. Both of these paints dry very quickly.

After allowing the painting to dry for couple of days I proceeded to the next layer of paint, where I started introducing more colour and opaque paint. A 50% cold pressed linseed oil was used as medium and added to the paint. After identifying the colour groups, an mid-range colour was initially mixed and adjusted to create a tonal variation of that colour suitable to use for shadows and light. The darker but warm underpaint helped me to establish and control the tone as well as for the darker areas in the shadows.

The last stage was focused to continue modifying the tones in each section of the painting, usually darkening the shadows and lightening where needed. During this stage both scumbling (for opaque paint) and glazing (using transparent paint) are used to continue adjusting the tones while creating more form.

The painting is currently in its final stages where I might do some minor and final adjustments before signing it.

I would like to share with you an over view of this still life painting. I always found still life painting as the best way to learn the various aspects of painting. Still life teaches you to see shapes and to observe with your naked eyes the subtle changes in colour and tone. These two are usually miss-represented in photography as the camera is not able to see what your eyes and brain can. It also teaches you about composition since a still life is not simply a collection of objects as in a bazaar store. 

From the technical perspective every object will have a different difficulty how to approach it and how to apply the paint onto the surface. For this painting I chose a highly reflective metal tea pot, a tea cup, tea bag and a pear to include some colour. 

The overall big shape of the composition running between the main objects is a triangular shape with the string coming of the tea bag and hanging off the edge creates a very gentle leading line to the main subjects. The objects are painted almost the same size as the real objects and are partly touching or coming off the edges of the canvas. I did this specifically to make the viewer feel like being part of the painting. This is an approach Caravaggio used in a number of his paintings. 

The green background is the complementary colour to the red design on the cup and the purplish tag of the teabag complements the yellowish colours of the pear. 

As support I used a 30 x 30 cm cotton canvas attached to a wooden surface and pre-stained with a middle tone mix of alkyd oil burnt umber mixed with titanium white. The solid wooden surface protects the paint layers as it does not allow the canvas to experience repeated cycles of shrinkage as a result of the constantly changing atmospheric humidity. The light position for this still life was at the very top and I used a small neutral white light (5000k) 

The colour palette is as follows cremnitz white, titanium white, ultramarine blue, pyrrole rubine, burnt sienna, burnt umber, yellow ochre, Indian yellow and cadmium lemon. Paints are from Michael Harding, Blue Ridge, Old Holland, Gamblin and Williamsburg. Cold pressed linseed oil was used as medium added only in the second layer of paint.

Most of this painting was painted "Alla Prima" with only slight adjustments of tone and addition of detail onto the initial layer. I always start from the darkest objects, so here I started from the teapot. Most people have the impression that metallic objects are very difficult to paint, I find it the opposite. The teapot was painted using chromatic black (a mix burnt umber and ultramarine blue) adjusting and lighting up the value to almost a mid value grey. The reflections are painted with a low chroma version of the colours used for the objects being reflected. The contrast between values gives the illusion that the painted object is metallic. Still life painting teaches you to observe chroma and makes you realise how low in chroma are real objects around us. From painting the teapot I moved on to the background followed by the pear. The most challenging were the tea cup and tea bag that mainly consist of high value blue tint mixed with umber. The golden colour is a mix of burnt sienna, umber and Indian yellow from dark to light value. Painting the pear was an interesting and fun part of the painting because one can observe all the effects of light on a single object starting from the reflective  and shiny top part to the dark shadows and reflected light at the bottom coming from the background colours and the white cloth on the table.

The short video demonstrated the application of paint while painting the tea cup. Hope you enjoy.

Today I am going to share with you some tips about painting from life. Painting from life is one of the best ways to learn how to draw and paint. Besides the techniques that one can learn such a brush work, painting from life also helps you improve seeing subtle changes in colour while improving your observational skills. Both of these are essential if you want to become a better artist. My 3 years of training were almost entirely based on drawing from life objects and this helped me a lot when I came to the stage to paint. 

For this painting I chose the subject matter of drinking coffee. Drinking coffee is almost a ubiquitous activity across almost all nations. I wanted a simple composition consisting of the necessary tools including the mocha coffee pot, cup and spoon together with the raw ingredient, the coffee bean. This series of still life paintings is going to be focused to remind us about the connection between our daily activities with nature. Most of the time in this industrial age where everything is presented to us ready made, people lost touch with nature. 

I used a shadow box with a coloured background with a complementary colour to the objects. The mocha pot was placed towards the right hand side and light directed from the top left, casting shadows to towards the left, linking the objects. The reflective surface of the pot was also reflecting the bluish colour from the cup and the orange colour from the right hand side of the box. The spoon is leaning towards the edge of the table and of the canvas. The easel was placed close and towards the side of the shadow box, with the palette on the right and a small table on the left. Having all the tools needed handy is very important and helps to avoid distractions during the painting process.

The painting surface chosen is a cotton canvas attached to a 30 x 30 cm wooden panel, ready to hang, primed with an oil primer and prestained with mid value neutral alkyd oil mix of burnt umber and titanium white. This initial layer was prepared months ago.

The chosen palette for this painting is very limited and consists of Flake White replacement (Gamblin), ultramarine blue (Williamsburg), cadmium lemon (Blue Ridge), burnt umber (Michael Harding), pyrrole ruby red (Blue Ridge) with a touch of phthalo blue green shade  (Blue Ridge). The medium used was linseed oil. Most of this painting was done "Alla prima". Starting from the darkest object, the cup, moving on gradually towards the mid-range ones and to the lighter ones. This was done on purpose to prevent accidental contamination with titanium white of the darker colours. I used a colour checker to isolate and check the tones where necessary.

Today I am sharing with you part of the painting process of a painting I am currently working on. The scenery shows a view over the town of Bright in Victoria from Tower Hill Lookout. I visited this place couple of weeks ago at two different times of the day, at around sunset and mid-day. On my visits I prepared a plein air sketch and did a photo shoot of the whole scenery. Plein air sketching/painting is the best way of documenting the landscape as it gives you the capability to understand the landscape much better than taking photos, for the simple reason that you do observation from reality. Our eyes can see far more details than a camera could see. A camera is a machine and hence does not have a brain to created the illusion of reality. However its very difficult to capture the landscape at sunset and when the weather and light are constantly changing. So in that situation I preferred to use the camera to capture the light and my memory to record the atmosphere and the feel/smell of the air after the rain. 

This painting is a composite of three elements, plein air sketches, photography and memory. Its going to be painted on stretched linen 101 x 85 cm using oil paints. The first image above shows the first layer of paint (block in) where the main shapes and tones are established. Will keep you updated about the progress of this painting.

Painting outdoors is the best way not only to learn how to paint the landscape but also gives you the opportunity to experience being part of the same landscape. This experience will help you to understand better the subject matter that you are painting and to translate that onto the canvas. Apart from the visual senses one will also be translating the whole experience captured by the other senses, hearing the sounds of the birds, water, winds as well as feeling the heat or the cold air around that will affect the overall execution of your painting. I was camping around Lake Hume overnight and the next morning came out to be a very beautiful sunny and warm day. So while sitting there observing the view I observed a nice combination of shapes and complementary colour contrasts. So I took out my easel and paint box together with a small canvas panel. To help me construct the view I used a view finder same size as the canvas panel. I used a palette consisting of Ultramarine blue, phthalo blue, flake white replacement, permanent orange, cadmium lemon, Venetian red, ivory black, yellow ochre, Indian yellow, Pyrrole rubine and magenta. To help establish the light value of the lower part of the sky I used a colour checker. Working fast and from back to front I established the lightest and the darkest tones to start with, so that all the rest is in between. 
The end result is above. Happy with the outcome and the execution of this painting.

I painting this waterfall some time ago. This is the way I usually tackle this subject. The palette I used is given in the video. One of the major issues that usually is encountered when painting subjects with a lot of white paint such as water is that one uses the white paint too early. As you might see the first layers of the waterfall were painted with a middle tone greyish blue, rising the value as I progressed. In this painting, as in most of my other paintings I use a combination of brushes and painting knife to create the various effects and tectures in the landscape. Hope that you enjoy.

Couple of months ago I started this small experiment to test how light affects various pigments and mixtures of paint that we commonly use in painting. I am interested in some particular pigments since although they are very popular and were traditionally used, however now we know that these are in fact not as stable as one thinks and hence they tend to disappear with time especially on exposure to light. The technical term used in labelling on tubes is "lightfast" usually graded (numbered with an ASTM prefix or starred) with 1 being the best hence meaning that that pigment is very resistant to light even if exposed to sunlight. As an artist I am always trying to use the best and most stable pigments available on the market, preferably from brands that use the minimum amount of fillers and driers, since both of these affect the stability of the paint as time passes. My objective is always to give the best quality artwork that lasts for long time to my clients. Besides that I also want that the hours that I spend working on a painting will be worth it.

The experiment is going to take at least a year and today I am reporting some of the preliminary observations I did after 5 months from the start. The paints that I used were: lead/zinc white - PW1/PW4 (Old Holland), Ultramarine Blue - PB29 (Michael Harding), Cobalt Blue light - PB28 (Norma), Pyrrole red - PR254 (Langridge), Quinacridone Magenta - PR122 (Langridge) and Rose Madder Genuine - NR9 (Michael Harding).

I prepared some colour swatches on cotton canvas after first mixing the colour and preparing tints to around mid-value 5 on the Munsell scale on a glass palette. I prepared three replicates of each colour, one for each lighting condition. 3 lighting conditions were used: (1) normal room light conditions (similar to same condition a painting is normally hanged); (2) No light stored in a dark cupboard; (3) Exposed to sunlight in a window. I used these 3 lighting conditions because I wanted to test the performance of the pigment in conditions as close to the real situation as possible. So although manufacturers test the lightfastness by exposing the pigments to light however normally paintings are kept hanged on walls in doors and are not exposed to the lighting conditions used for testing. Also one needs to remember that each pigment might behave the same in oils and acrylics and differently than watercolour, so one needs to look at the lightfastness according to medium.

After 5 months I took them out to perform the first observational analysis by first photographing them and then analyzing the photos using a photography software to measure the intensities of the values and the three primary colours of light known as the RGB system (Red, Green and Blue). Using the software I used the colour picker function taking readings from various spots across each coloured squares and then calculating an average value. I took readings from areas having a similar value, using the values to normalise the results. I then calculated ratios of red/blue to check for colour shifts in the mixtures. A common mix of grays used in landscapes is that using either ultramarine blue or cobalt blue with one of each of the above red paints toned to a mid-tone value.

What I observed? So far the results didn't show any shift in colour between the conditions for the mass tones. Mass tone refers to the colour as it comes out from the tube. A control consisting of cadmium yellow light (PY35) known to be excellent lightfast did not showed any changes.
Some slight changes were observed in the mid-tone of Rose Madder Genuine and Cobalt blue exposed to sunlight. It was expected that Rose Madder will show a difference as it is known not to be excellent lightfast, however cobalt blue was a very surprising finding.
Both mixtures of cobalt and ultramarine blue with rose madder show a decline in red colour with ratios 0.58 vs 0.45, respectively, between dark and sun exposed. There were no changes for magenta however a slight change was observed for pyrrole when exposed to sunlight which I need to follow up with more testing on this pigment.

The pigments were returned to their original conditions for further testing within couple of more months. From my observations so far it seems that magenta is the best cool red to choose. I will need to compare the pyrrole red as a cool-warm red with permanent orange PO73 that can be used to give grayer hues when mixed with ultramarine blue.