Speedwell final

oil on 6x8 panel

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Comment by kevin miller on September 28, 2015 at 17:41: Michael,

I agree, it was not the greatest scene selection and I knew it when I painted it. It was end of day and I had maybe an hour to get something set up and paint.

As far as the plein air finish in studio comment, no one told me that. I was mentioning it "felt" like that because I see so many plein air paintings that look really good (almost finished to me anyway). I am sure all it takes is practice. I was looking at some of my first plein airs from earlier this year and I almost cringed. I am not saying I am much better yet but I think I have seen some improvement. I hope anyways. I think that is what we tell ourselves to keep going. Haha.

Comment by kevin miller on September 28, 2015 at 17:37: Hello Candi and thanks. Good luck on your plein air and have fun with that workshop!! I am jealous. Plein air is so much fun and full of challenges but it is definitely something I would like to do more of.

Comment by Michael J. Severin on September 28, 2015 at 16:55: Kevin, it is very, very okay to finalize a plein air painting in the studio ....who ever told you that was cheating is full of it!! ...I do it ..so I guess I am a cheater? Values: take a value scale along with you and check the color you are going to use against the scale. I realize your goal was to go out and paint loosely, but may I point out something about your shapes .....you have 3 parallel rectangle shapes and two equilateral triangle shapes ..not very interesting shapes. Knowing you from VAA, I know that you are quite "tuned in" to good shape making ...when you go out with a particular attack plan ..a goal ...try not to forget about all the other "stuff" we have learned.

Comment by Candi Hogan on September 28, 2015 at 15:31: I like this Kevin, nice and loose! I'm getting excited, and nervous too, to try my first plein air painting this coming week, during my workshop with Saim Caglayan. I was surprised to find out that Saim painted with Richard Robinson in Hawaii (where Saim is from). Small world!

Comment by kevin miller on September 28, 2015 at 5:07: So I was curious as to if I had successfully differentiated some of the value shapes. You would think that looking at the two hills of foliage and their colors that their would be a decent change in value. As you can see, I was not successful in the first BW image. Unbelievable. So I took the BW image and made some very slight tweaks in photoshop. I thin went into the original and adjusted that in the exact same way in Photoshop. The change may not have been enough but the lesson for me, AGAIN, is to check these values while I am painting, not after. This just never ends.

Comment by kevin miller on September 28, 2015 at 4:43: I tried a plein air while I had my kids out by an old pond. The trees are just getting ready to begin their break into fall colors. Even though it was not a great scene to work with, my goal was to try to work more loosely and quickly but things became a mess. I tried to make some adjustments when I got back but it was difficult as I was not sure what I was really trying to accomplish. Hopefully, these forays into uncomfortable approaches to painting eventually lead to something I feel more comfortable with. Also, I really would like to be able to execute a plein air on site where I don't need to rework when I get back. It feels like cheating or something.