This was my first exercise that I did in black and white learning value and having to establish design before.
1. My design was quite good
2. Value choices and splits were poor
3. Two sessions to come to something more or less final.
4. Need to arrange still life for the same exercise not to be frustrated
5. Need small synthetic brushes
I attached the design picture as well.
This is A5 (6 x 8 inch) size, oil on canvas paper.
I guess it is very hard to mix/mingle the oil paint values on a paper canvas?
@rucifi - thanks a lot for visiting and for your kind words!
@Voy - I premixed 6 values of grays on the pallet and blocked with pure black the dark areas first, with medium gray some of the areas and very light gray lightest areas. I used only turp as my medium. Some mixing on canvas still was happening which complicated process.
Next day I went in again to add touches of light to the rocks, paint was still mixing on canvas, but it was more manageable.
Interesting note: at some point I stopped seeing waterfall and it became just abstract painting to me. I had to ask husband what it looks like. And this also signaled me to stop for the day.
Lesson learnt: in this black and white I need to avoid mixing on canvas.
Canvas paper - this one not really a paper, it is textile primed gently from both sides. But it is very thin and these 12 pages are binded in album.
Great exercise. I’ve been reading a number of painting books recently (mostly regarding Impressionism.) Over and over, they all emphasize the critical importance of value structures. I really did not grasp this early on, but now I’m seeing how integral it is to good paintings. Great job trying to improve this skill. I’ll have to try an exercise like this too.
@mbbrickner - I missed your comment. Thanks a lot! I so much agree with you. I I read about this concept long time ago in my painting path. But I could not understand it till I heard about it again and tried this exercise. It immediately highlighted points where I lack experience. Good to learn exact areas to improve. I really want to repeat with something else, maybe some sort of still life... but I am a bit scared to attempt one more time. Maybe a good learning curve will be achieved if I limit time to 20 min to resolve and do 3-4 in a row of the same object/objects. Tell me please if you try this exercise too as you go painting outside and it shall help with development of artistic vision even more.
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I really do like your design and layout, I don’t know if I could paint in A5 size but it looks good