The Two Towers

Well this took far to long to get finished up but here's another. Thoughts?

A finished piece...

I feel pretty good about how this turned out.  I think I brought a focus to the tank upfront with a little color shift to a greener hue to separate it from the other tanks/objects.  I also tried to up the mark making and strengthen the edges and detail in this tank. Feels like I'm making some strides forward.  Let me know what you think.  I'm excited to get to the next one.

Another underpainting

Here is another one I'm working on.  I tried to get some of the lost edges and softer edges here in the under painting. I left out more of the details for simplification.  I'm having fun doing full values under paintings.  I haven't done them this way before so I guess I'll see how I like it.

Under-painting

Okay my friends this is one of the pieces I'm working on.  I did this under-painting today.  Any initial worries here?  I realize the mountains in the background are not worked much. Any suggestions there?  The sky was just a hazy overcast from all the reference photos this day.  I'll be working on the underpainting for the other piece tomorrow a little so I'll post that once there's more to discuss.

Finished piece

Ok I'm stopping here so I don't fall into my pattern of overdoing it.  Hopefully I stopped soon enough.  Let me know what you think.

quick underpainting

So this is a real quick underpainting although I'm aiming to keep things real loose and thick here.  I'm planning on going in with subtle more green and red spots to play with the color.  Thoughts?  It will also have some solid telephone/power lines crossing the street that cut through the sky.  They'll contrast with the loose and blurred edges that will be in most of the piece.

Study using a straight edge

So I prepped a bunch of surfaces and this had the most extreme surface.  I figured it would be the best thing to test the use of a paint trowel to lay down straight lines wet into wet painting.  It was interesting and worked pretty well. I went back and softened many edges after but I will definitely pull on  this little trick in the future.  You can see the various little ridges that catch the light.  It's hard to have enough light to get a decent shot and not pick it up.

Done and Done

Can I say I don't like this new format?  I don't know what happened, but I really dislike it.

Anywho, it was sunny, so I was able to get these pics.  I still need to clean up speckles, esp. on the bottom one.  The top image will be on the postcard.

I'd like some help choosing a cropping. Please pick your top 3.

Ok so the original shot is on the bottom. I have a 16x40in canvas that I thought would be fun to use for this piece. I'm thinking a cropping of the shot may prove a stronger composition but I'd love some help picking one. I've cut some holes in a paper that help show the proper dimensions for the canvas.  Please select your favorite 3 and if you have an argument for why go ahead and leave that also.  Thanks friends.

Floating shit

Here are some poor, very quick snapshots of 2 of the pieces for the upcoming show.  It gives you an idea for the vein of the work.  I'm working in multiple layers more and more, especially in the background; it gives a nice contrast with the subject.  It may not come across here, but I'm happy with the textural effects.

This one is finished, save final varnish.  Critique it all you want; I'm not touching it again.

This one is in the final tweaking stages.   I'm still working with the front stones, and to some degree, the cast shadows - and of course the frame/border.  The problem area I'm having is the interaction between the cast shadow of the deer skull and the globe.  It's hard for me to get the values correct in this spot to really make the globe come forward as it should.  Perhaps it's unfortunate that the shadow creeps directly behind the globe.  I'm looking for subtle tweaks; it's impossible for me to do significant paint-overs at this point.  any ideas?

Trying to pick up some traction and keep this project moving. Here's another little guy 6x8inches. I have one more of this size then a bunch of 8x10in panels then I'll do some larger pieces.  Let me know what you think. This is tentatively done unless someone helps me see something now or I find something I want to change after being away from it for a while. I hope the image is good enough it's just from my cell phone.

Scotty's grandparents home

This is a commission piece I just finished. It's 16x20in.  I had a bunch of photos from different decades and seasons given to me and was asked to recreate a shot of the home as it looked back in the 70's early 80's.  It was a challenge but I think it turned out okay considering the challenges given.  I'm open to any critiques if you have something that could help it out.

These others are some pieces I've updated.  I did them really quick in the beginning and then I've added some changes. Also the lighting is definitely warmer in the new shots.  Let me know if they were improvements or if I should consider changing more.  These are only 6x8inches.