'Mountain Valley, New Zealand' - Painting Process Photos and Final Art Work

I painted this art work earlier on this year and it is based on an area just outside of Queenstown, New Zealand. The view is in a valley that is characterised by willows and pine trees set to a backdrop of the mountain Cecil Peak.

I love this view and on the evening I took my photos the light was shining through the trees and there was strong shadows, which I thought would communicate well in a painting.

In this blog post I will show you how I created this painting, I hope you find it informative.

To start off with I gathered my photo reference and sat down my sketch books and did some small quick thumbnail sketches to plan the composition. This is one of the reference photos I used.

This was my pencil drawing I did before I start my painting, I referred to this when I was painting my art work. Doing some pencil sketches first prior to painting can really help with getting creating a good composition and will often save you time in the long run if you discover your painting is not working.

Prior to starting my painting I prepared my canvas with a layer of burnt sienna, this helps to give to give vibrancy to the painting and is also gives your painting a more traditional 19th century feel to it.

I sketched out the scene in burnt umber. You may have noticed the lines which divide the canvas, I use the golden ration (1:1.618) to help me place focal points in the painting. This is a naturally occurring ratio in nature which artists employed to help create more pleasing compositions. I mark this in as a guide.

I start by blocking in the sky using flat bristle brushes. I mix the sky with cobalt blue, cobalt teal and titanium white, and mix the clouds with ultramarine blue, burnt umber, quinacridone magenta and titanium white. Next I start painting Cecil Peak, using the same colour combination I used in the clouds for the shadows and by adding yellow oxide and burnt sienna to create the rusty colour of the mountain foliage.

Next I start painting the trees and the grass in the mid ground. I am careful not to use overly saturated colour as it will come too far forward in the painting and the illusion of depth will. I mix the green with yellow oxide, ultramarine blue, titanium white and the tiniest amount of pthalo green.

I block in the trees using a mixture of cadmium yellow deep, ultramarine blue, pthalo green and a little quinacridone magenta to reduce some of the saturation. I use my most saturated greens in the foreground as these are closest to the viewer and this helps to give the illusion of depth and perspective.

I wait for my painting to dry and then I start working of the next phase of the painting which involves building up the fine detail. I limit the fine detail in the background as it can be confusing for the eye and may kill the depth of the painting. The suggestion of shapes, objects, shadows etc serves just as well as fine detail as the brain fills in the rest of the details.

In this stage I start painting the branches of the trees, adding bushes, foliage and the grass. Building up the detail and modelling the paint takes a while and whilst I am doing this I keep in mind to save my lightest tones until the end of the painting. This should make the painting pop when it is finished.

In the final stages of the painting I paint the grass in the foreground and the highlights on the branches of the willow tree. I add the sheep as a further focal point in the painting. 

I hope you enjoyed this blog post and if you like what I do you can donate to my bitcoin address below, any support for my art career would be greatly appreciated.

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I have more painting demos on my website: samuelearp.com