‘A Quiet Place’ – A two part painting

My ‘time lapse painting’ videos usually feature a single session work completed in 1 or 2 hours. This is more to facilitate the video process than preferring this method. This single session painting method (sometimes referred to as ‘All Prima’) has several limitations and can be frustrating for a beginner.

If you use these YouTube videos as a guide to your own painting, remember there are several settings in YouTube which can make the video more helpful, eg changing the speed – slower or faster, pausing, or turning off the background sound (YouTube supplied ambient soundtrack). Also, developing your painting over several days, allowing the painting to dry between sessions makes it easier, and of course more relaxing.

The sky and horizon in this painting were allowed to dry completely before the mid and fore ground were overpainted. Some of the paints I use are Alkyd Fast Drying Oils. These are the same pigments as standard oils but formulated with a medium like ‘Liquin’ and not the usual Linseed/Poppy oils. They can be mixed with standard oils but painting in layers can cause issues – Alkyds dry very fast so should not be painted on top of slow drying standard oils.

Alkyd colours gives me the fast drying time without using a fast drying medium. Not using a medium is a personal preference, I just don’t like the ‘slushy’ effect it produces. When I want the paint to flow (as in thin lines over a wet layer) I use a solvent which then evaporates quickly. Trying to apply fine details with an oily paint on an oily wet under layer is a pain. Allowing the under layer to dry eliminates all this grief.

Titanium White is a notorious slow dryer. I would say most of the paint used in my sky mixes is Titanium White and I always overpaint the sky with foreground items like trees and foliage. So my Titanium White is Alkyd. Even after an hour the Alkyd is beginning to get ‘tacky’ which means overpainting is manageable. Allowing the sky to completely dry will only take a day or two as opposed to a week or two with standard oils.

I paint a complete sky, regardless of what I plan to put on top in later stages. This allows endless possibilities in the final stages of painting. The paint applied over this dry layer can be wiped off if needed – great if you are a beginner. And also remember, wiping off can be as creative as applying paint (see the videos of Stuart Davies – https://www.youtube.com/user/stuartdaviesart).

I hope you are all well and keeping safe in this crazy time. If you have any questions or queries while creating you’re own ‘Quiet Place’ please comment below. I have plenty of time to answer you at the moment 🙂

Here is the YouTube video of the painting.

To view in realtime change setting to .25. Quality can also be set up to 1080HD. This painting uses 3 colours (Yellow Ochre, Alizarin Crimson, Cobalt Blue) plus black and white. There is no medium used, only White Spirits. 2 brushes used – No. 12 Filbert bristle & a Nylon liner. Ground is Fredrix Canvas Pad 16″x10″.