I purchased a DJI Mavic Pro drone about a year ago and having a blast ever since! The Mavic is a ‘prosumer’ level drone, that is, marketed to consumers but has many professional level features.
I originally hadn’t considered doing much painting from it, but can’t resist doing some. First, enjoy the very best video segments of a year droning all over the beautiful California coast, painting with art groups, the high Sierras, deep blue Lake Tahoe, spectacular Big Sur, quaint Carmel, Horse Shoe Bend AZ, Springdale (Zion), and maybe a few biker shots!
I was recently honored once again to be judged into the 34th Yosemite Renaissance show. More about that later. Coincidently the next day, Plein Air Magazine just included a bit about the same painting in their latest weekly email you can read about here —
About the show, I have entered from time to time, including winning an award at their inaugural event 34 years ago. The best part is having a painting hanging in the Yosemite Museum for a number of months! It’s also a good excuse to visit the valley…as if I ever need one!
The show is very eclectic with photography, sculpture, and paintings from traditional to modern interpretations. Yosemite Renaissance 34 will open February 22, 2019 and will run to May 5, 2019. The exhibit will then travel to several other California art centers.
As the summer morning fog clears along the California coast, many times the crashing waves, spray, wind, and lingering fog create an ethereal atmosphere of a misty soft landscape, or should I say seascape. I live within an hours drive of the coast, and visit often to paint, camp, and ride my Harley.
I was recently painting with the California Art Club along the coast near Davenport CA and produced a short video, you can see here–
Many of you know I purchased a drone earlier this year. I bought it mainly for fun and to give a different perspective to my painting, motorcycle, and other adventures. Although my main intent was not to do paintings from a drone’s perspective, I did do a plein air drone selfie you can read about here.
Reviewing the drone footage around Davenport, however, I couldn’t resist painting a scene far above the coast. The video frame I painted from is at about 0:47 on the above video. I wanted to create an atmosphere of morning mist still lingering around the coast and the sun starting to highlight parts of the coastal bluffs. I did sharpen and saturate the colors a bit from the video, and highlighted parts of the cliff more. Here is the frame I extracted and enhanced in Photoshop as my study:
Above Davenport study photo
As you can see, I painted it pretty much ‘as-is’. In the distance is the coastal hamlet of Davenport, about ten miles north of Santa Cruz. The drone was 176 feet above the bluff, so probably 250 feet above the ocean.
Perhaps I’ll look at my drone videos again, and maybe produce a drone painting series?!? Stay tuned!
Perhaps I should have confessed it up front to Elizabeth, but I had had never been in an art classroom in an institution of higher learning. I have been in art classrooms at art schools, but never a college or university. Being primarily self taught the last 45 years of painting, my art comes from what I love. The only ‘formal’ instruction I have had is various workshops from artists I admire the last 15 years.
It was a class of about 10 students, all pursuing different disciplines. After a short talk about “The Creeks and Rivers of Silicon Valley”, we launched into a demonstration painting. I chose a seascape in Garrapata State Park for my study. I really enjoyed the intimate setting where students scooted up right around my easel to watch me paint.
Here are some photos during my demo, some courtesy of Elizabeth. (Click on the thumbnails to see larger versions)–
Here is the painting about where I left it in class…
The painting about where I left it in class.
I touched up the painting a bit after returning to my studio which can be seen at the top of this weblog entry.
One of the prominent man made features on the San Mateo Coast of California, along the Pacific Ocean, is the Pigeon Point Lighthouse. Built in 1871, it is the tallest lighthouse on the western coast of the United States. It is still used for Coast Guard navigation, and a small overnight hostel is now housed in the old light keeper’s housing.
AKA How Not to Transport a Painting
AKA A New Type of Street Art
AKA Society of Western Artists Demo
The story starts at a demo I did for the Society of Western Artists in San Bruno, CA, last Saturday. I never thought in a few hours I would discover a new painting technique not heard of before.
It was a great two hours of demoing, technique, and jokes with a lively crowd constantly peppering me with questions. Here’s a few pictures during the demo– Click on the thumbnails for a larger picture
SWA Demo
SWA Demo
SWA Demo
I am usually not crazy about my demo paintings, but this one was turning out well, even though it was only half done, so I was anxious to complete it back in the studio. Here is a picture of the piece as I was nearing the end of the demo–
Original painting near end of the demo (courtesy John Barrow)
After loading up, and heading out for the hour drive home, as soon as I entered the freeway, realized I had left the wet demo painting on top of the car! I pulled over, and it was gone! So, I turned around, went back, and found the painting face down in the middle of El Camino Real, the busy main boulevard. It was in the middle of the lane and didn’t look run over, but one corner was damaged. Here is a recreation of the scene with the painting in the road.
Recreation of my painting face down on El Camino Real
…and the painting now looked like this:
My demo painting was now a snowstorm!
The asphalt had gouged out spots all over the surface and my misty Yosemite painting had turned into a snowstorm! I just accidentally discovered a new way to paint snowstorms! What a great new technique! Just do your painting, then go out and rub it on the road! Asphalt probably works best, but maybe I can try cement streets also!
To top it off, a copy of a Neff original, even though half done, is now in the asphalt of San Bruno, albeit a reverse image. Maybe I should charge them?!?
All tongue in cheek of course, and I actually don’t recommend you transport paintings this way!
So now, the decision is: 1) pick out a few pieces of asphalt, trim the bad corner off, leave it as is and finish it; 2) paint back over it; or 3) start a new painting. The corner was damaged enough I started a new painting since at most a couple hours painting time was lost during the demo. Here is the new painting at about the same development as the demo was before the snowstorm–
The new painting at about the same completion as the demo.
I spent the next few days finishing the painting —
Misty Sentinel,16×20,oil on board
So now, what do I do with the original snow storm painting? Any suggestions?
BTW, we are planning on producing a short video of the demo as SWA videoed much of it, so stay tuned!
This is just a little 5×5 painting, and didn’t take long to do, but brought back a flood of memories. It could be on almost any coastline on any continent in the world, but it is actually in Baja California, Mexico.
In 1978, I had recently moved back to Pasadena, California after spending my teens and twenties growing up in East Texas. A friend, Bob Ellsworth, invited me to go down to Mexico with some other friends (forgot who) to go snorkeling. We rented a motorhome, wetsuits, snorkeling gear etc. and headed south of the border to Puerto Kennedy on a peninsula about 20 miles south of Ensenada, Mexico. Here’s a map of where it is in relation to Ensenada”
Puerto Kennedy
It was the middle of nowhere with dirt roads, no facilities, no other people, etc. We camped right above Puerto Kennedy, and at night we could only see one light many miles down the coast. It was an ‘iffy’ area, and I wouldn’t go there today. Even back then Bob was ‘packing’.
The others took to the water and soon were hauling up fish on their spearguns. Well, I wasn’t much of a snorkeler as it was my first true snorkeling adventure in the ocean, but the water, fish, coral, and surroundings were absolutely beautiful. After getting woozy bobbing up and down in the incoming swells, shivering in the cold water (even with a wetsuit on), loosing a swimfin, which Bob had to go dive for, I decided to spend the rest the of weekend sketching the area.
When we got back to Pasadena, I soon painted several paintings from the trip, including a large painting, similar to this mini, and it won second place in a local art competition.
It was certainly a fun adventure!
By the way, in case you missed them on social media, here are a few more miniatures of Lake Tahoe just completed.
East Side View, 7×5 miniature, oil on panelEast Side Squall, 6×4 miniature, oil on panel
Continuing my seasonal miniature paintings, here are three more, all in Yosemite National Park. I have already sold a number of miniatures this season and am departing slightly the 6×6 square format to other sizes.
Dropping a total of 2,425 feet, Yosemite Falls is the highest waterfall in Yosemite National Park, and one of the highest on the globe.
Misty Yosemite Falls, 5×7 miniature, oil on panel
Here’s another 6×6 in Yosemite National Park. This is one of the falls or cataracts as the Merced River tumbles out of Yosemite Valley.
Turgid Merced, 6×6 miniature, oil on linen panel
Built in 1922, Yosemite Creek Bridge is the oldest stone bridge in Yosemite Valley, spanning Yosemite Creek below Yosemite Falls (shown above). Yosemite Creek Bridge, 4×6 miniature, oil on canvas board
Here’s three more 6×6 mini’s. I started with the Elkhorne piece, then decided to do a few more misty moods. Maybe I should have named them Mystic Moods, after the orchestra popular in the 60’s and 70’s. You have to be pretty old to remember them!
Elkhorn Slough is a tidal slough and estuary on Monterey Bay. It is the largest tract of tidal salt marsh in California outside of the San Francisco Bay.
Misty Elkhorne, 6×6, oil on panel
Garrapate State Park is just south of Carmel, CA, and my favorite place to paint on the Pacific Coastline. I actually took a scene in full daylight and changed it to a foggy day…they call it artistic license.
Misty Garrapata, 6×6, oil on panel
What can I say about Yosemite? I did this painting almost exactly from a photo I took in 2010. This might make a good subject for a larger painting…what do you think?
Around this time of year I paint a number of miniatures. They make great holiday gifts, or anytime gift for that matter, and they usually sell fairly quickly. I also paint them for both gallery and juried miniature shows this time of year. Many times, these are miniatures of larger paintings I have done, or studies for possible new larger paintings later on.
I am starting off with a trio of 6×6 pieces. Some experienced artists can probably guess which juried show I might enter these!
These are currently available directly from me, but some destined to gallery/juried shows. On a regular PC browser, they should show life-size…
El Dorado, 6×6, oil on panelTahoe Squall, 6×6, oil on panelTruckee Thaw, 6×6, oil on panel
Thats it for now…more on the easel. The next batch, a little more ‘moodier’ are on the way.
