Plein Air stuff

[dpaint]

Wow you really naled this one, especially the water. Beautiful piece...

[JeffX99]

Hey thanks - I was pretty happy in the end with it. One of those that felt good because it just sort of painted itself out with no real issues.

[LORD M]

Absolutely gorgeous, Jeff! Beautiful water and believable depth in the painting, how I would love to have that hanging on my wall haha. Great progress throughout your posts! And the small demos are very helpfull, thanks Jeff!

[Lightship69]

Hi mate

That last one in bear country was well worth the risk of getting chewed up its beautiful my mate simple beautiful, thats the only way to put it.

Thanks for posting it took me to a happy place, and that cant be bad! all the very best to you where ever you are.

[Flashback]

Awesome painting! I wish Miami had mountainous regions.
How long was traveling to that stop? Moreover, How long did it take you?

[JeffX99]

Thanks guys! That spot is about four hours from where I live...really rugged country. I did a small plein air there a few years back but sold that one right away. This was a studio painting, much larger than I usually paint on location. Took probably 6 hours or so.

[Featheredface]

I really enjoyed looking through this thread. Beautiful stuff, Jeff, I look forwards to watching more paintings be posted. And I'm inspired to do my own painting now. haha.

[Syle]

Jeff, simply awesome work my friend. Your process shots are greatly appreciated as well. I find it really inspiring how stripped down your tube color selection is.

I'm looking to get into some Plei Air painting myself, but I'm a bit in the dark as to what makes a good Plein Air easel. I already have my paints, panels, and brushes ready to go. My local Artists and Craftsmen store carries some "French Plein Air" easels for like $140, but they look sort of cheaply built, so I'm a bit skeptical of them.

PS: how do you clean your wooden palette? does the wood not just soak up the oil and then leech into any fresh color you may lay down later?

[Whitesock]

These are great! It's really good for a newer artist like me so that I have an example of something to shoot for. Thanks a bunch!

Oh and for Syle, I think he has a glass plate (or something like that) over the wood for his palette.

[JeffX99]

Thanks everyone...

So Syle...I usually recommend a half box french easel as the most verstile for getting started. You can use it in studio, outdoors, in a class, etc. The Julian is probablyworth paying the extra for...teh Mabef brand is also solid. Stay away from anyting by Richeson though and I would be skeptical of the cheaper units. You'll have this piece of gear for, well, the rest of your life most likely...so get a decent rig.

Whitesock is right that on my larger palette, called a French Companion (which I would super highly recommend as well) I have a sheet of tempered glass. I don't backpack with that rig. My pochade is just bare wood. The wood does soak up the oil a bit at first, and usually you should oil it anyway. Eventually it gets a nice patina and is glass smooth anyway. It doesn't hold any color that invades the mixtures. Just clean it with a palette knife and paper towel.

[Syle]

Jeff, thanks for the informative reply. I've got my eye on a few Jullian easels, will probably end up getting one some time next week.

Another question: how do you take multiple canvases out in the field? How do you store them as you go?

EDIT: Is there a particular French Companion brand that you recommend? I've spotted this one on DickBlick: http://www.dickblick.com/products/fr...stress/#photos

I notice that your Companion folds out on the handle side as well. I can't tell from the pictures in that Dick Blick link if those do.

[JeffX99]

Sure Syle - that one looks like a Richeson...not worth burning in my opinion. Definitely keep searching...you want one that the end/handle edge folds down. I put a couple cup hooks inside there to hold my trash bag.

Here's the deal for carrying wet panels: http://www.artworkessentials.com/pro...port/index.htm

You can get more expensive ones that are crafted a bit nicer...but this one is super functional. Artwork Essentials is a great outfit to work with. If you'r ereally handy you can modify the dividers and hold a ton of various sizes.

[Syle]

Awesome, Jeff. Thanks so much for the good and trusted advice.

I'm going to save up for a couple of weeks and then purchase the easel, companion, panel box, and also some lidded pallet cups.

I've already got my panels, paint and brushes, so I think I'll be ready to go!!!

Very excited.

[Pavel Sokov]

The fishing spot is gorgeous! Fantastic stuff

[Saracen]

Jeff: great paintings, man. Well done!

[JeffX99]

Hey - thanks for the comment Sean. Not to get too personal but are you physically not able to get outside? You have some decent studies from just around your neighborhood it looks like. This is a hard thing when you're learning or starting out to understand - because you want to find interesting scenes that inspire you...but you're better off just getting outside and studying whatever scenes happen to be handy. You're trying to understand light and shadow, how they work, how they affect color, etc.

So yeah, photos, for understanding light and color in nature are really such a poor substitute that they actually waste your time...time you could spend just painting out on your front porch even. Basically you won't find anyone, who is worth paying attention to, that learned from and relies much on photos.

Don't get me wrong...it's some hard as hell work and training...took me two years roughly, three really good workshops, and a few hundred paintings to feel I was even starting to get it...and even then that felt like the first toe-hold, not like I had reached some nice plateau.

The sort of ironic thing is once you start to feel comfortable, you can work fairly well from a photo...but you won't want to. That's when you start to see what is lacking. When I was really focused on learning those first few years I worked either from life or from slides I projected into a big rear projection box I made. Slides are way better to work from thatn prints...the slide film itself is much more accurate. If I was to set that up now I would do something similar but I would project my digital shots after correcting them to be as accurate as possible. When I say project I mean in a rear projection box, at least 18x24 so it is nice and large and I can respond to it as if I'm outdoors.

Not familiar with Dice's blog but yeah, he might do that for any number of reasons. Personally I design and edit and move things around plenty...as do most artists I know.

Hope that answers your questions - and yeah, Watts would be an excellent place to study! Wish I could too!