#18: The Sentinel

Inspiration: Waaayyy back in January I picked up a book entitled, Secrets of Acrylic Landscapes Start to Finish by Jerry Yarnell. Yarnell demonstrates over a dozen thumbnails, describing and illustrating each step. He suggests trying the thumbnails you might use in a painting on scraps, before beginning your work. I decided to incorporate the thumbnails, as practice pieces, on the same canvas as the painting itself. 

The Sentinel

12" X 16" canvas paper

What I like about the painting:

• I like the details in the painting, such as the grain of the wood fence, the coloring of the leaves and the shaded pebbles.
• I was pleased with the fence, and the way it suggests a hill.
• The shading on the bank by the road made it really look like an eroded bank.
• I designed this painting totally from scratch. I didn't trace anything or use an image I found on the Internet. (However, I did use pictures of my own horses as models.) I liked that I could take something in my mind and make it come out almost as I envisioned it.

What I might do differently:

• Next time I'd paint the thumbnails on scraps and not incorporate them in the corners. I wasn't pleased with how they look in the finished piece.
• I let the thumbnails dictate my painting, and it should have been the other way around. It was difficult to create a composition that I liked with all of the details I tried to include. 

What I learned:

I guess I learned that I can't paint horses! The sketch I used looked great, the painting, especially of the horse on the left, did not come out the way I envisioned it. He does have a certain "Grandma Moses" look, however!

I realize I am becoming more confident in mixing colors and using color to add depth, as I did with the hills. I just read a book that calls this 'aerial perspective'

Yarnell's book gave me a lot of ideas for adding details. I like his step-by-step suggestions, which were easy to follow. He even suggests what colors and brushes to use.