So, I worked on this one again. I know it's not there yet. I'm posting it to compare with the previous version which has been painted over. Two of you caught problems with the light source. Thanks! I'm still struggling with the trunks... but, BOY! did I have fun just digging in there with the dark background color and making some of them disappear! Making them bend was fun, too! Makes me feel like a sculptor ... and takes pressure off of being concerned about the brush stroke.

What do YOU think?

BEFORE & AFTER: "Aspen on Hwy 104" was begun in Mark Daily's class last fall. The point was to quickly capture the essence of the lighting of the scene in the block-in. "Key the painting to white" was emphasized when Mark demoed. He gave careful atention to the lights (values and colors) as they would represent the light source. Above is my field study.

Now, I'm ready to turn it into a painting. Below is the the second version of my efforts. I tried to capture more of the light and improve on the composition. I particularly didn't like the six tree trunks in a row; and the other trees and space behind the aspen was vague. I think this is an overall improvement, but now I want to work on the trunks more.... more variety of thickness and angles.... work on foreground grasses and shadow....

What do you see that I might be missing?

SNOW! hint, It's NOT White!

OK, well then what color IS it? (trick question!)

That depends on the light in which you are looking at the snow! It could be blueISH or violetISH, it could be pink, orange or yellowISH! Often, it's kind of GREYISH, but never greenISH!

AND, it's ALWAYS a darker value than you think! Only the spots where the light (sun) is hitting it directly can be painted with what you might think of as white, which is probably a very pale yellowISH, pinkISH, orangeISH color!

Good Luck! Thanks, I'll need it!

This painting was done on location in Salida, CO last September during the first Colorado Plein Air event there. After a little touch up back at the B & B we stayed at, it went in a frame and was hung at Joshua Been's gallery for the event show. It's been up in my studio since and eventually I got itchy to FIX it. The weather had been stormy and clouds we're moving fast. That afterstorm gloom shows in the painting, but doesn't necessarily make sense with the vivid colors of the fall grasses in the foreground. I thought the big tree was just too dark.

This is the "after" piece. I've lightened the mountains and the large tree/made more sense of the trees and foreground grasses/enhanced the "pond." What do you think?

Now that I think I understand the elements of the image, I think I'm ready to do it larger than it's modest 8"x10" size.

I have donated this painting to an ALS Fundraiser that will be held in Denver this Saturday night.

First Facebook, now blogging! Yikes! Too much thin air at an altitude of 8,800 ft above sea level! I've spent the day photographing older paintings so that I could, maybe, post them to Facebook. I'm thinking a blog may be a better way.... gives light to personal expression and doesn't clog the Facebook format which seems to be about brevity.....I'm not so good a brevity!