The Beginning of the Beginning - part 3 the finished piece

My Belgian artist friend Franklin offered up this terrific sun lit cafe photo from his travels. My painting class was a little scared of it so I broke down how I was going to go about creating the painting in last weeks blog. This week we get down and dirty and slap some paint around with my painting class.

Here is Franklins wonderful photo that we are working

            Franklin's original photo                            The photo with a few changes  for the painting.                            

Here's where we left off last week. Floor and chairs all in and waiting on the windows and people to show up.

Ah a room with a view finally, still waiting on the people though. 

The buildings outside the windows is painted in the same manor as the inside if not looser. the color of the sky and buildings is a bit darker i=than in the photo. I didn't want the contrast between the inside and the out to fight for attention, so knocking down the outsides color value helps do that. Also the paint edges are soft.

Alright end of class and for this painting I still have a few minor touch ups to do, but this is about it. 

The people have finally arrived. I teated them the same way as I treated a chair. (That sounds kind of rude doesn't it)

And here they are! These are some of the finished paintings from the class. They are all pretty good size too. The smallest one is a 16" x 12". This is always a real fun part of class seeing what everyone else has been up to.

And here is the class results on this painting!

Don and his painting. Very Homer like.

Karen and hers. She follows instruction very well.

Sabrina's painting. Holds together real well.

Ron's painting. Can feel the light in his. 

And Ellen, well she doesn't take directions well :)) She was out sick and felt to far behind so painting this scene in the 2 1/2 hr class.

"The Lonely Cafe"
24" x 18" Oil
By James Swanson  and Traveler Franklin

 Alright then off to our next challenge. Thanks agin to our good friend and Traveler Franklin for the painting inspiration. And a big thanks to my painting class for putting up with me and that floor in this one.

Check out more paintings from this painting project at www.theartistandthetraveler.org 

I'm always looking for new travelers for this project contact me at the website and maybe we can paint something together. See everyone on down the road!

 

The Beginning of the Beginning - Part 2

My Belgian artist friend Franklin offered up this terrific sun lit cafe photo from his travels. My painting class was a little scared of it so I broke down how I was going to go about creating the painting in last weeks blog. This week we get down and dirty and slap some paint around with my painting class.

Here is Franklins wonderful photo that we are working with and a few changes that I made to it for the painting.

                 Franklin's original photo                            The photo with a few changes  for the painting.                              

This where we all started. On a 24 x18 oil primed linen canvas panel we rubbed in our first color. I did decide to go with the Burnt Sienna this time. I quickly brushed in the color and then rubbed out the areas where the shafts of light where.This is going to be a loose painting so I'm not trying to nail everything down in space yet. Just a quick rough in of color.

Next we painted in our darkest colors. That being the lower walls and chairs. Again real loose no need to tighten up yet. The left side of the dark area is much warmer than the right side. it doesn't real show in the wet paint but that is what we did. I also put a lot of extra Cad Red in my warmer darks and was able to get the curtains out of it.

The next step was to start placing the tables and chairs. They are the first key to this painting.  

After softening the darks into the floor transition, I went about laying out where the table top were going to be.

These need to be put in cleanly and simplify.

 After those were in I started to place chairs.

 The thing about the chairs is they needed to be put in in the simplest way there is, 

 in one perfect stroke.

This where the class ended. 2 1/2 hours in.  We worked on the chairs a bit more and while in everything was still wet and gooey I mixed up some greens and put scraped in the plants around the windows.

So this is where I left the painting with my students. 

The next day in my studio I looked at the painting and had to make some corrections and these changes couldn't wait until the next class. They had to be made while it was still wet.

Here is what I did. Basically I reworked the chairs straighten out the tables and laid out the floor. the light on the chair legs made me take on the floor painting. I was hoping to leave it for next weeks class, but duty called.

I knew this was going to take all my concentration to make look right so I scouted ahead of the class to see what needed  to be done. Mixing up all the different values of orange and browns was key to getting the floor to pay down right.

Here the floor is in a good place for the next class. I put in some of the glare and reflections , but there is still some magic to be put in yet. Next week we start the windows and the people.

A student in the class did a couple little videos of me while I was working. They are from the end of the first class and I am putting in the plants in the background in one and I'm putting in the wall candle holders in the other.

 Here are the painting class paintings in the different stages of progress.

Ellen's

Don's

Ron's

Karen's

Nancy's

Charlotte's

Ellen's at the end of class.

Don working on his

Ron working away.

Sabrina at work.

Ron's a work in progress

Karen's

Charlotte's at the end of class.

Well there is where we left off.  I will post the next classes progress next week. Hopefully we will be close to finishing this one up in the next couple of classes. Thanks for looking in and see you on down the road!

See more of the paintings of this award winning series at www.theartistandthetraveler.org

The Beginning of the Beginning.

In this painting series I usually show how I go about a painting, but for this one I am adding a bonus section.  I'm going to show you a behind the scenes look at how I go about making a scene ready to paint. And then I will paint it.

The Cafe photo that I'm working with comes from Traveler and Artist friend Franklin of Morlanwelz, Belgium. Franklin and I have known each other for a few years and swapped photo reference before. This photo is of a cafe bar in Antwerp Belgium.

"Would have loved to see more people in here ....But look at those reflections of light and the shadows."
- Franklin

This is Franklin's Antwerp Theater bar scene. It does have wonderful lighting and a dynamic feel to it. I loved it when I first saw it and had it in the back of my mind to paint for a while now. Happy to finally get to it!

Here is my first step in starting this painting.

I'm flipping it. The girl sitting works much better facing left than she did facing right. It lead the eye off the image- which is never a good thing. I am also lighting the image. I need to see in the shadows a bit more. Even if I don't paint in all the details I need to know what everything is so my strokes can be more meaningful.

While I'm lighting the image I also push the saturation a bit, just enough to see the color in the shadows and highlight.

Here is how I am going to attack this painting. Like always I will tone the canvas. Thinking ahead it will probably be a mix of Venetian Red and Burnt Umber. Or I might swing back and use some Burnt Sienna. either way I will rub it in and then rub off the highlight areas and draw in where everything goes. 

After mixing up the colors for this painting, I will start painting in the structure of it. I work from dark to light, so I will paint in all my dark areas- curtains wall and chairs. Making sure that even being my darkest darks that they read as a color.

This photo montage is sort of how it will look when I get this part done.

Next I will attack the floor and walls and start to give the chairs I choose life. 

It's a beautiful floor and the reflection with the light coming across it is so cool and interesting.

This photo montage is sort of how it will look when I get this part done.

When the floor is done I will paint in the refection and sun light. The people in the scene I'm not even going to think about until after I get the windows started.

This photo montage is sort of how it will look when I get this part done.

The next step is to paint the windows in. They are the lightest things in the scene and are 

painted in last.

The people in the scene at this point will look pretty much like this.

And finally I will get to the people. I know they have been waiting, but first things first. To paint the people in sooner would tighten up the whole painting process. Since the people are small they have to feel as if they were painted with the same brush as everything else or they will stand out like a sore thumb.

With a plan I am making for this painting I will start the real painting process and post the results here as I finish them. I will be painting this with my painting class and will share their take on this great photo reference as we move along. As always a big thanks goes out to my friend and Traveler Franklin, see you all on down the road.

To see more of the Artist and the Traveler painting project go to www.theartistandthetraveler.org

My old friend and traveler Fran Kras sent me this photo to paint for a good cause. This is how it was made. Take a look.

Oil painting by James Swanson Fran's Cats 9"x12" Linen panel
Inspired by Fran Kras's photo of her 2 cats. This painting is going up for auction for a cat shelter in LaGrange Park IL called Cat Nap from the Heart. If you are interested in this painting contact them and maybe you can win it. If you need a great copy writer visit Fran's website she's as good as they get!

Details from painting

Thanks Fran again for the photo inspiration hopefully we can feed some cats.

Check out the "The artist and the traveler" website to see other painting adventures from this series or to start your own.