My parent's took me to Cook's Restaurant in Deland, Florida. Then we
went to Blue Springs to watch the manatees! Manatees need to come up for air.
They are vegetarians.
Manatees love the springs because the water is a warmer temperature.
I would have painted this view.
My Mom took this photo of me in front of the Thursby house.
As promised here are a few things I learned at the Jeffrey Lawson workshop.
1. He prefers to start with the brightest highlight. He puts down a white painted area where
the highlight should be. Then he asks himself, is it warm? Yes? Then he adds a small amount
of yellow to that white area.
Is it cool? Then he would add a small cool color to the white.
2. He wears a baseball cap when he is painting inside his studio. He says he likes to lower the
amount of light that gets into his eyes even inside.
3. He loves Permanent Rose oil paint as a compliment.
4. He uses sight size method for still lifes.
Sight size is where he sets up a still life, then sets up his still life panel right next to it.
He chooses a panel the same size as the still life.
He stands back, finds a note, makes the note, puts it in the right place.
He can check his work right next to the still life and compare the two.
John Singer Sargent did the same thing.
5. He paints the brightest highlight first.
He paints around this highlight. Every note needs to be right.
He stands back to make sure it is right.
He scrapes it off with a palette knife if he doesn't get the note right
after three or four tries because other wise it is impossible or more difficult to work
with the accumulating painting building up.
6. If you put down a whole bunch of notes, and one is wrong, it is more difficult to figure out which
one is wrong. So he checks each note he paints.
7. When painting a still life he paints the whole background first.
He makes sure it is not sloppily done or it could be distracting.
Painting the background allows him to finish a lot of the painting.
He can judge further notes against the value and color of the background.
8. He will paint the brightest chroma soon because he can judge all over colors from this area in the painting.
He calls this brightest bright an anchor. For example: He painted the red pepper in the foreground very bright.
All other reds were more brown in comparison. He uses the brightest bright as a checking tool.
9. He held up a 9x9 mirror up to his forehead with the mirror facing the floor.
He looked up into the mirror to see his painting and still life upside down.
This was an objective way to view the painting. He could see the mistakes he made and correct the notes.
I will share more things I learned from the workshop tomorrow! Thank you. Good night.
