LANDSCAPE PAINTING:
ESSENTIAL CONCEPTS AND TECHNIQUES FOR PLEIN AIR AND STUDIO PRACTICE

TABLE of CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER 1: The Special Challenges of Landscape

Simplification and Massing

Selection and Composition

Light and Color

CHAPTER 2: Materials

The Limited Color Palette

Mapping pigments to the spectrum

Transparent, Semitransparent and Opaque Pigments

Greens

Addtional Colors

Choosing Your Medium

Painting Mediums and Solvents

Brushes

Painting Surfaces

Palettes and Easels

Additional supplies

CHAPTER 3: The Outdoor and Indoor Studios

Plein Air: Beginning at the source

The plein air tradition

Slow and steady wins the race

Plein Air Practical

Travel Light and Work Small

Reworking Plein Air Paintings

Plein Air Checklist: Forget Me Not!

Establishing a Consistent Light on Your Palette and Canvas

In the Studio: Deepening Exploration

The Perceptual and Physical Effects of Scale

Studio Practical

Studio Lighting

Managing Paint in the Studio

Color temperature

CHAPTER 4: Value Relationships

Value Before Color

Limited Values, Unlimited Possibilities

The Art of Comparison

Planes

Value Scales

Value Divisions in Landscape

Value Zones

Variations in Local Color

CHAPTER 5: Simplification and Massing

Less is More: Finding Order Through Simplicity

Planes: A Key to Massing

Exercises: Interpreting Shape and Mass

Exercise 1: Line Drawing

Exercise 2: Four-value painting

Exercise 3: Two-Value Painting or Drawing

Trees

Demonstration: Tree Massing in Three Steps

CHAPTER 6: Site Selection

Spatial Cues

Patterns of Light and Shade

Overlap (Interposition) and Scale

Foreground, Middle Ground and Background

Linear perspective

Perspective and Dimension in the Sky

Subjects with diminished cues

Organizing Space with Flat Shapes

Problem subjects

Site Selection Checklist

CHAPTER 7: Composition

Approaching Compostion

Composition Through the Picture Window

Limited Focus Through Selection

The Viewfinder

The Flexible Picture Window

Compositional Considerations

Divisions of the Picture Plane

Movement and Rhythm

Unity and Integration

Balance

Variation

Relating to the Edge

The Foreground Challenge

Compositional Analysis

Russell Chatham

John McCormick

Christopher Martin Hoff

CHAPTER 8: Color

Real Light vs. Painter’s Light: The Limitations of Paint [Read excerpt]

The Use of Color Strategies

Looking at Color

The Color Wheel

Describing Color with Hue, Temperature, Value, and Intensity

Local Color vs. Perceived Color

Color Temperature

Complementary Colors and Neutrals

Color Mixes for Light and Shade

The Challenge of Green

The Spatial Properties of Color

How value affects color identity

Value-Priority and Color-Priority Systems

Harmony, Unification and the “Envelope of Light”

Analogous harmony

The Effect of Reduced Tonal Range on Atmosphere

The Harmony of Neutrals

Atmospheric perspective

Naturalistic and Expressive Color

CHAPTER 9: The Life of a Painting from Start to Finish

Stage 1: Preparatory Work

From the General to the Specific

Thumbnails and studies

Stage 2: Underpainting

Complexity, Drying Time, and Paint Consistency

Selecting a Color for the Underpainting

Demonstration: Underpainting in Oil

Stage 3: Development

First strokes - A Holistic Approach to Paint Application

Working Wet-into-Wet

Color Mixing

Paint Handling: The Poetry of Substance

Edges

Demonstration: Studio Painting

Demonstration: Plein Air Painting

CHAPTER 10: Working from Photographs

Using Photographs like an artist

Shoot Your own Photographs

Photographic Reference Do's and Don'ts

Exploring Options Through Digital Effects

Lighten photographic values with the Shadow/Highligh filter

Simplify shapes with “Artistic”filters

Limit values and reveal value zones with Posterization

Find the underlying abstract value pattern Threshold filter

CHAPTER 11: Abstracting Nature

What is Abstraction?

Flat and ambiguous space

Know Your Reality Before You Detach From It

Inducing abstraction

CHAPTER 12: Style, Inspiration, Style, and Lifelong Learning

Subject and Vision

Style

Style Through Brushwork

Style through interpretation of form

Staying Motivated and Inspired

Negotiating Inspiration

Dealing with Frustration

Self-Evaluation and Lifelong Learning