California Paintings

Getting around to it

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I started this digital painting near the end of October 2020. I fiddled with it some more in 2021 and thought I was finished with it in 2021 and signed it. I had forgotten about it then rediscovered it in 2022 and decided to add some more detail to it. I decided to leave the signed date as 2021. I was poking around in some folders on my tablet recently and here it is.

Spooner’s Cove No. 01
Infinite Painter 7 | Galaxy Tab S7 tablet | 3000 x 3000 pixels
Spooner’s Cove is located in the Montana de Oro State Park on the California central coast, San Luis Obispo County.

Phillips Gallery: Winter Group Show

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The Winter Group Show opens this evening at the Phillips Gallery 444 E 200 South, Salt Lake City, Utah. I have five small paintings from the Cayucos series in this show. Stop in and see them up close along with some great art by other artists represented by the Phillips Gallery.

Cayucos No. 23
Acrylic paint on cradled wood panel
10 x 10 inches (25.4 x 25.4 cm)
2021

Cayucos No. 30
Acrylic paint on cradled wood panel
10 x 10 inches (25.4 x 25.4 cm)
2022

Cayucos No. 32
Acrylic paint on cradled wood panel
10 x 10 inches (25.4 x 25.4 cm)
2022

Cayucos No. 33
Acrylic paint on cradled wood panel
10 x 10 inches (25.4 x 25.4 cm)
2022

Cayucos No. 35
Acrylic paint on cradled wood panel
10 x 10 inches (25.4 x 25.4 cm)
2022

Reworking Spooner's Cove No. 02

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I recently took another look at the Spooner's Cove No. 02 picture I created last year and decided to make some changes to it. I wanted to add some more detail while keeping the abstract theme and retaining the flat colors.

I didn't want to add texture to the colors like I have been doing by brushing over colors with the “Old Oil” brush using the same color which creates slightly darker and lighter streaks then filling it with a darker shade of the color. See the picture below for an example.

The original painting. It didn’t seem as finished as I thought it was and I wasn’t happy with the foreground.

I began by changing the foreground by adding some more shapes and modifying a few colors.

I added some more colors to the foreground and made some changes to the sky, the beach and the small section of waves and rock at the left of the picture.

Using the “Old Oil” brush this texture was created by brushing random strokes over a block filled with yellow using the same yellow color. This created some very light marks. Using the Fill tool with a tolerance setting of 2 or 1, the yellow block was filled with a darker color bringing out the lighter marks.

How I start a picture

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I thought I would show a picture of how I start a digital painting.

I start out by drawing black outlines of objects and shapes in the picture then quickly add flat colors to the shapes. These colors are starting points that I will add textures to and change colors by painting over them or refilling them with other colors.

A Bakersfield Hills painting progress 4

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I made a few color changes to this painting yesterday morning as you can see in the before and after pictures. I rather like both versions which presents a slight dilemma. Which one to keep? Or is it finished?

Before changing a few of the colors in the pyramid hill, deep shadow at the bottom of the hill and some of the oranges in hill and above to the right.

After making the color changes.

Subtle changes

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I recently received some kind words of critique from a fellow Infinite Painter user of a painting I posted on the community forum. After following his advice I made some changes to it and decided to do the same with this one by toning down the greens of the hills to add some depth.

The painting before reworking the hills.

After: I faded the hills and some of the trees in the background by making the colors not so vivid to help make them recede and give the picture a bit more depth. I also changed the greens in the foreground. I need to do a bit more work on it before I call it a day.

A Bakersfield Hills Painting Progress 3

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In this post I’m showing how I change colors slightly after adding some texture with the Old Oil brush I made a slight modification to. Infinite Painter gives one lots of options to make changes to brushes or create a completely new brush.

Detail of the top right corner of the painting showing texture created by brushing over areas with the same color. The Old Oil brush leaves streaks of light and dark versions of the color as you can see in the blue purple color.

I typically use the fill tool with a tolerance between 1 & 3. This time I set the tolerance to 1 so it would fill only the closest matching color that I choose to click on. This brings out a bit more of the brushed textures. Overall the color changes may appear to be rather subtle but compare the darker blue areas.

A Bakersfield Hills Painting Progress 1

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Here is a real sneak peek at a new Bakersfield Hill painting I started last recently. The outlines have been drawn and I will fill the shapes with solid colors after which I will add textures using various brushes.

I start out with a basic drawing then add solid colors using the fill tool in Infinite Painter before using various brushes to add textures.