Poppies and Peaks

Nearly every day Maureen and I go up to the ranch where our horses are boarded to check up on them, get them out of their stalls for a while and feed them some grain. Maureen usually rides one or the other of them too. I don't ride so often, so sometimes I take a walk with our dog, Darby, instead. We were recently walking down the hill near the barn when I noticed a nice patch of poppies. I thought that they would be a nice subject to paint, so I took a couple of photos with my iphone. I wanted to get the hill and sky behind them too, so I got right down on the ground among the flowers. My painting followed the photo quite closely. I feel that if there is creativity in my photography, it will show up in my painting too. For this painting, I decided to use a bit larger paper size than I had been using before, 11x16 instead of 10x14. Somehow, covering a larger area feels like a bigger deal and maybe I put a bit more into it.

I was trying to think of something that I would like to paint, and for quite some time I have had in the back of my mind some old memories of high and wild places in the Sierra. In particular, I thought about an area I hiked through in September, 1976, on a week-long solo backpacking trip from Yosemite Valley to the east side of the range at Silver Lake. The headwaters of the North Fork of the San Joaquin is very far from the beaten track, and it felt wild, lonely and beautiful. Late in the day, I remember thinking that the surrounding mountains looked like those of a Maxfield Parish painting. I think I caught the feel of the place pretty well in this painting.

The morning after the scene of the last painting, I hiked up out of the canyon and into an area as wild and desolate as any I had ever seen. This was Ritter Lakes, just west of Mt. Ritter, the highest peak in the whole Yosemite-Mammoth area. Beyond the lakes is Mt. Ritter's southwest glacier. In 1976, the glaciers were fairly good sized, but I would guess that they are smaller now. A few minutes after I passed this view, I ran into another hiker, the first person that I had seen in four days. By a strange coincidence, he was following nearly the same route as I was at the same time. We spent the next couple of days together, and it was really nice to have someone to talk to again.

Sacramento Valley

 For the last project of the winter session of my painting class, we painted this goldfinch. The week before, Ron had told us that we would be painting a pelican, and I think everyone was a little disappointed when they arrived and found that he had changed his mind about the bird. This painting caused me more trouble than any in a long time. With the bird and the flowers masked, we painted the background wet-on-wet with mostly greens. I wanted my background to be fairly dark to make the bird stand out more, but I just could not get a smooth dark green without lots of visible brush stokes and splotches. I tried scrubbing it off and starting over. I tried starting the whole thing over on a fresh piece of paper. After about four tries, and still not very satisfied, I gave up and finished the bird and the flowers which were relatively easy to do. I guess one of these days I should waste a few sheets of paper and try to learn how to do smooth dark backgrounds.

I still had a couple of ideas for paintings from the photos that I took on our weekend at the Snow Goose Festival in Chico. I wanted to focus a bit more on the landscape of the Sacramento Valley rather than the birds, the long-distant views and wide open spaces, and the funky little towns. This painting is based on a photo from the bird viewing platform on 7 Mile Road in Rancho Llano Seco, a very large area of protected land in the middle of the valley. During the winter, much of the valley is flooded rice fields, which makes it a great place for ducks and geese. In the distance, the Sutter Buttes rise as an isolated volcanic formation in the middle of the flat valley floor.

There are many little towns scattered around the valley. Most of them are rather sad looking with abandoned businesses and a few old homes. I think they once served communities of family farms, but large corporate farms have made them obsolete. This painting is Butte City, and there is not much more to the town than what you see here. I found the sign on the store amusing, and I had to stop for a photo. I guess it wouldn't be so funny if I were a duck hunter. When I was a boy, my grandma had me pluck a chicken for her, and I imagine that plucking a duck would be a similarly tedious job. Duck hunting is still a popular activity in the valley, and through the day we heard lots of gunshots across the fields.

March 2015

I was quite inspired by all that we saw at the Chico Snow Goose Festival -- the countless birds, the Sacramento Valley landscape, and the changing light as each day progressed, and I took lots of photos. In choosing images to paint, naturally at least one had to include the festival's namesake, the Snow Geese. We got to see lots of them, usually in tightly crowded flocks on the ground. We saw this flock as we slowly drove around the several mile loop at the Sacramento National Wildlife Refuge. Most of the way, you are not allowed to get out of the car because it disturbs the birds, so I was shooting through the car window. Something caused the birds to fly off, and I got a shot just as they were starting to leave. I had thought about trying to blur the birds in the air to show their motion, but I couldn't figure out how to do that and still have them look like geese. I like my painting anyway.

Barns always seem to make good subjects for painting. I found this one on a hike in the Hayward hills. The Ukraina Trail in Garin Regional Park starts next to Stonebrae Elementary School and runs for a couple of miles into the hills next to the Stonebrae golf course. On the way it passes the site of the farm of Agapius Honcharenko, a Ukrainian priest who spent half of his life in exile here in Hayward in the latter part of the nineteenth century. He was a very interesting character, and his fascinating story is worth looking up. This barn is next to a park residence and is unrelated to Honcharenko. I am quite pleased with my painting of it.

In my painting class, our assignment was a seascape based on a photo of the rocky shore of Pacific Grove. I got plenty of praise from the rest of my class, and I think I did pretty well too. As is often the case with watercolor painting, there was a good deal of luck involved. Some days my washes come out the way I want them too and some days they don't. When I'm lucky, a little touch-up is all it takes to make things look good.

February 2015

The second class project for my watercolor painting class was to be a winter scene based on a summertime photo of a rocky coast. Ron wanted us to mask out tufts of snow on all of the rocks. But I liked the photo as it was. It reminded me of a spot where we stopped on a trip along the sunshine coast north of Vancouver, BC in 2003. I have no idea where the photo was really taken, but in my mind it was coastal British Columbia. I feel like I got lucky on this one. I really like how it turned out, and it got lots of praise from the others in my class. Talent and skill certainly matter in watercolor painting, but I feel that luck plays a large part too. Some days it all comes together, and some days it all goes wrong.

About a month ago, we spent a weekend in Chico for the Snow Goose Festival. My last post included a painting of a Pintail duck inspired by that trip. One of the most interesting tours that we did was to the Rancho Llano Seco, a large area of protected land in the middle of the Sacramento Valley. As the day ended, we stopped at the edge of an area of wetlands to watch the ducks and geese. Then at sunset, a huge flock of Sandhill Cranes flew across in the distance. We only knew that they were cranes because out tour guide told us. They were too far away to see clearly without a scope. It all made a beautiful scene which I captured in several photos. I started this painting right after I finished the one of the rocks and sea, and I feel that I got lucky once again. Large areas of blended colors often don't work out very well for me, but I am happy with this one and I think it shows the mood of the time and place quite well.

Snow

Our first class project of the winter session of my watercolor class was a snow scene of Lake Tahoe. Our reference was a photo done in a portrait format. Ron changed it to a landscape format and just about everyone followed that by adding more trees to the sides. The snow on the trees was all masked. My painting makes me wish I was there in the mountains with lots of fresh snow, especially since we are going to spend the coming weekend near Bear Valley with the family. Unfortunately, our chances of lots of snow are next to nothing. Our weather has been completely dry since last Christmas Eve, so most of the old snow is probably gone, and a big storm is forecast for the whole weekend with rain in the mountains, but no snow.

We spent the weekend before last in Chico for the Snow Goose Festival. Our friends, Terry and Mike, go every year, and they invited us to come along this time. We got to go out to lots of interesting places in the Sacramento Valley to watch the thousands of geese and ducks that spend the winter there. I took lots of photos, partly with the idea of painting some of them, and I chose one of a Pintail duck to try first. I've always thought that Pintails were one of the prettiest ducks with their elegant markings. I followed the photo quite closely to try to get the reflections in the water to look real. I think I did a pretty good job.

January 2015

The winter session of my painting class has started and as usual, the first couple of weeks us continuing students were free to paint whatever we wanted. I had several photos picked out as possible subjects, but I forgot to bring them to the first class. Ron brings to the class a big stack of prints of miscellaneous photos, so I chose one of a French village street scene. It turned out to be a good choice and it was a lot of fun to paint. I am quite pleased with how it turned out, and I got many compliments from my classmates.

December 2014

 

I finished up the fall session of my painting class with one more painting, a beach scene. It was based on a photo that was dominated by the mass of dune grass on the right, and the fence across the bottom. I didn't like the composition much, and I changed it a bit, but I could have changed it more. After I had done most of the grass, Ron commented that it was a bit too uniform. I tried to vary it, but with the dark shadows already in place, I couldn't do very much. But I like how the colors came out, and overall I think it is pretty good.

One afternoon a week or so ago, Maureen and Cherry were going to ride our horses, and I went along to help with the work, but mostly just to sit and watch them ride. It was nearly sunset and the view of the bay beyond the arena was really beautiful with warm colors and low-angle lighting. I thought that it might be fun to try to paint, so I took a few photos with my iPhone. I knew that the colors would probably not show up correctly, but at least I would have the outlines of the scene to follow. I chose one of Cherry on Rio to paint. When the sun hits Rio a certain way, his reddish coat really glows. That's what I wanted to show in my painting. I always seem to have trouble with large areas of dark painting like the foreground here, which I wanted to be smoother and darker and not so muddy. If I had started out with my first wash much darker and not so wet, it would have turned out much better.