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Saturday, May 31, 2014

Kickstarter update: First Seven Paintings Imaged

Mulholland Light, 6x6 oil

It's been a week since I last posted, but I've been busy on my Kickstarter project, Fifty Paintings for the Roosevelt Campobello International Park's Fiftieth Anniversary.  (I've informally shortened this to "50450.")  I've painted fifteen pieces, seven of which were dry enough this morning to put on the flatbed scanner and image.  I am posting one of them here, and you can see the rest of them either at my Facebook studio page or at the special 50450 web page I've set up.

It's been a fun week, sifting through old photos for reference material and interpreting them in paint.  I'm looking for six different subjects:  vistas, beach, rocks, trees, buildings and boats.  I discovered early on that I am somewhat short on buildings, so Trina and I went out one evening and took some great building photos for me to work from.  I'm also short on boats.  The Park doesn't offer much in the way of boats, other than a dock it uses for the occasional tour boat from St Andrews and the annual Regatta.  I'm hoping some boats start coming in soon.

I tone two panels at once with Indian Yellow

A friend asked about the palette I'm using for this project.  I'm using Gamblin's FastMatte oil colors exclusively, since I want the paintings to dry quickly enough for imaging.  Here are the colors I'm using:  Hansa Yellow Medium, Indian Yellow, Cadmium Red Light, Quinacridone Red, Ultramarine Blue, Phthalo Green and, of course, Titanium White.  I wasn't sure about Indian Yellow at first - it has a very high tinting strength, and I was having trouble controlling it - but I am loving it this week.  I am toning all my panels with it, and it gives a nice warm tone to the finished painting.  It also works well for seaweed-covered rocks, fall foliage and other also as color for greying my blues.

Now it's back to the studio for the next batch!

I'm not using the pad of palette paper anymore; an old window makes a great palette!