When I started oil painting on March 8, 2006, I first drew out the painting in pencil on the canvas. Now I simply scribble with a paintbrush. One thing I do that is similar to drawing is to turn the canvas upside down.
What is this mess?
It is Crescent Meadow in Sequoia National Park on a large (for me) 18×36″ canvas.
This is one more large oil painting toward the show that is coming at a Visalia gallery in January 2022.
With each painting, I eventually. . .
I skipped showing you all the in-between steps. They were this: snow on the ground, tree details, more snow on the trees, details on the few upper branches, more detailing on the trees, sign, and then. . .
. . . I flipped it upside down! Why?
Because the bottom needed painting.
Then I moved it into the dining room to dry.
When it was dry, I carried it outside to photograph in the daylight.
Hi Tucker. Thanks for stopping by.
Wowsa. I feel mighty proud (and relieved).
Trail Guy and I spent an hour building a make-shift, patchworked, DBO box to protect it on its journey.
This is the fancy pick-em-up truck, not the Botmobile.
Today I will deliver the giant commissioned oil painting of Sequoia trees in snow, and it will feel great to hand it over.
I couldn’t figure out why the giant oil painting of sequoias in snow was taking so long. The answer is that I had a math accident.
The customer decided on 18×36″, and I agreed that I could finish it in the time needed, although it would be quite tight.
I painted and painted, each morning before heading to work on the mural in the afternoon, some mornings before teaching drawing lessons in Exeter, mornings before my business referral group Zoom meeting. It seemed that I wasn’t making much progress in each session. Although I got areas finished, they were a smaller percentage of the entire painting than I expected to cover.
One day, I was looking over my inventory list, adding and numbering new jobs (have I mentioned how much work I have?) and I noticed that the canvas of sunny sequoias, which I converted to the snowy sequoia painting, was listed as being 24×48″.
I got the tape measure out, and sure enough, instead of painting 18×36″, I am painting 24×48″.
Yeppers.
Ridiculous math accident.
And that is why I have to stand on a ladder to paint the top edge.
My customer was extraordinarily gracious and understanding. We spent a fair amount of time laughing together on the phone about the situation, and then he told me to adjust my price to reflect the true value of the painting!
His company has plans to reproduce it in several formats, and it will still work because the proportions are the same as 18×36. Because it is larger, I am able to achieve tighter and better detail. So, it is all turning out better than planned or imagined.
November is the busiest month in my business. This year is busier than ever, and there aren’t even any boutiques or festivals. It is so fun to have more projects than I can even show you. Here is the progress on the snowy sequoia oil painting commission. It is several days worth of painting.
The background will only need one more pass of detailing. There is still quite a bit of work left, which was puzzling to me. Why is this painting taking me so long? It feels as if I should be covering more territory in each painting session, but instead, I am inching along.
I’ll tell you why this is on Friday after a bit more time to process the ridiculousness of this situation.
At the beginning of the painting session, it felt daunting. When this happens, I think about the basics. Start in the background. Since the white paint was still quite wet, this was good advice to myself.
When it was time to move to the mural project, I didn’t want to stop oil painting. It is hard to shift gears. At least the subject matter of the mural is the same, with the added bonus of the light coming at the trees from the same direction.
A friend from down south (that means Southern California or “Socal”) called to see if I could paint sequoias in snow for his company to use for their holiday card this year. (Companies aren’t allowed to send Christmas cards anymore.) We discussed sizes, timelines, and designs. After those preliminary decisions were made, I sent this sketch for approval.
The sketch vanished into the atmosphere, and another sketch of different proportions was requested. I sent this, but knew it wasn’t as good as the 18×36″ proportioned one, so I sent the first one again. (Did it vanish because I had the audacity to write the words “Merry Christmas”? Don’t be a conspiracist!!)
Then the requested time frame to receive the finished painting shrunk. People who don’t paint don’t know how long it takes for oil to dry; people who do paint don’t really know either but realize it isn’t an overnight situation. People who live in cities don’t know how long it takes for giant blank canvases to get shipped; people who don’t live in cities don’t really know either, but understand that time must be built in for snafus.
So, I looked at the 18×36″ painting of sequoias on the easel that was set aside because I have commissions, which always take precedence over the paintings I do to build up my inventory.
Necessity is the mother of invention and being innovative is part of living rurally. I decided that this unfinished summer scene could be converted to winter, because there isn’t enough time to wait for a new canvas to arrive.
White is the slowest drying oil paint color, so this will need a few days before the detail begins.
Yippee skippee, I can do this!! (Why didn’t I think to add on a rush charge? Does anyone out there want to be my business manager? secretary? coach?)
A customer/friend bought a painting off my website. She requested that I paint in an animal so the size of the trees is truly evident.
OH NO! It already sold, and I didn’t take it off my website!
I can’t find the original photo so have to work off the photo of the sold painting. It is always best to start with the original, but sometimes stuff just can’t be helped.
Dry enough, scanned, heading to the Post Office today!
and Crescent Meadow.
The top painting shows the Mineral King valley from up on the Monarch Lake Trail as it appeared last September.
If I am hiking to Monarch Lake, it is the Monarch Lake Trail. If I am hiking to Crystal Lake, it is the Crystal Lake Trail. If I am walking to Timber Gap (walking because that one can be done without a pack, lunch or water if you hustle your bustle), it is called the Timber Gap Trail. If I am hiking to Sawtooth. . .
Never mind. I don’t hike to Sawtooth. But, I got off track there a bit (or off trail?)
The painting might be finished. I thought maybe I could get away with a quickly done painting as long as I used juiced up colors.
But Noooooo, I had to detail it to pieces.
Same with Crescent Meadow. This is how it looks after a second pass over the canvas:
Crescent Meadow is in Sequoia National Park, near Giant Forest and Moro Rock. The painting looks a little weird because it is wet and reflective. When it is detailed to pieces, dry and scanned, it’ll not only be not weird, it will be beautiful.
I hope.