Rock Studies

From the very beginning of my art journey I have been fascinated with painting rocks.  I've seen some incredible paintings of rock stacking and individual boulders where you seemed to see all the little dimples in a smooth rock.

What I love about it is seeing the rocks appear with just a very few brush strokes.  I start out by basically slopping some paint on where I want rocks and then, once it's dry,  adding the highlights where I think the rocks are.

I decided today I would do rock studies, but when I got started on this 8 x 10 I couldn't just do the rocks for some reason, so this quick little painting showed up.

Then I decided to take a scrap piece of mat board and divide it into fourths, and paint rocks on each section.

This is the first pass through blobbing on the dark color first.

I don't mix the colors I'm using very well and I don't really do any shaping other than get the top outline on and then paint a form that I'm happy with.  

I didn't realize while I was painting that the big rocks are all on the left, guess cause I'm left handed.

In this pass through, I just added lighter shades of the basic rock paint by adding white and some orange or yellow.  The shapes of the rocks just come out when you dry brush the lighter color on.

I think it is the most amazing thing.

I tried to have the sun coming in from different angles, hence the arrows reminding me of the direction.

I highlighted the highlights again, with an even lighter touch.

On this final pass I added some shading to make some rocks stand out from others more.

I put a number 1-4 in each box.  

Please leave me a comment and let me know which of the four you like the best.

Another rock and water painting.  

This one is 18" x 24" and is waiting to be framed.

The clouds are sort of cut off in this photo, but I love them.

This place is just in my head, but it has sort of a tropical feel to it.

It's hard to see here, but the rocks have flowers blooming on them.

OK at this point, I guess you can say I'm a doing rock and water series.

Not sure why this subject intrigues me right now, since I'm no where near either,

but I love painting rocks and water.

Don't forget to leave me a comment about which rock section you like the best.

Thanks for stopping by and have a great Fourth of July.

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