Reflections
Buy This Tutorial Here - One of my favourite things to do is go canoeing first thing in the morning. The lake is quiet and the loons and other wildlife are out looking for breakfast, creating optimal photographing opportunities. This painting was inspired by a trip to Grundy Lake Provincial Park where I saw this scene while canoeing the early morning lake and was instantly taken in by its beauty. Strong temperature and value contrast in the scene caught my eye, I knew then that I would end up painting the scene.
In this tutorial we will learn to use our acrylic paints and simple tricks to create soft blends and gradations with nothing more than a brush and sponge. We will learn how to use warm and cool contrast, dark and light contrast and value changes to create depth, focal point and interest in our painting. I will also give a quick demo of how I identified and utilized natural elements in the photographic reference to create a stronger composition using Photoshop. Photoshop is not required, it is only used to illustrate how to identify natural elements in your reference photos.
Run Time: 10Hr 43 Min
Difficulty: Intermediate to Advanced
Board Size: 12 x 28 Inches
Lesson Aids: Line Drawing, Colour Template, Materials List, Reference Photo.
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Reflections Pt.1
In this first part we mix our base colours, go over the compositional changes I made to the original reference photo and block in our board.
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Reflections Pt.2
In this second part we continue to blend our areas and finish off blocking in the main island and tree line.
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Reflections Pt.3
In this part we block in the islands reflection and then move on to building up the upper clouds and sky.
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Reflections Pt.4
In this part we add detail to the upper right sky and clouds and then move on to detailing the edged of the island trees.
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Reflections Pt.5
In this part we continue to detail the islands silhouette and then move on to detailing the background tree line.
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Reflections Pt.6
In this part we add detail to the island foliage. Adding subtle tree branches, rocks and grass to create soft details in dark silhouette.
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Reflections Pt.7
In this part we detail the far right tree line, rocks and foreground trees. We then start to detail the reflective pattern in the water.
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Reflections Pt.8
In this part we learn to create the broken pattern of the reflecting clouds. Subtle colour and directional line changes create the pattern.
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Reflections Pt.9
In this part we finish our cloud reflections and then move on to detailing the island reflection, creating random patterns.
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Reflections Pt.10
In this final part we detail the reflections of the background trees and the foreground trees on the right of the painting.
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79.6 KBreflections-materials-list.pdf
79.6 KB
All colours, brushes, extra materials and colour swatch used in this tutorial.
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2.37 MBreflections-reference.jpg
2.37 MB
This is the original reference shot that inspired Reflections.
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2.4 MBreflections-line-drawing.jpg
2.4 MB
This is a full size drawing template to help transfer the image to your art board.
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3.23 MBreflections-template.jpg
3.23 MB
This is a full size colour template to help transfer the image to your art board.
