Summer Above Los Olivos

"Summer Above Los Olivos"

8" X 10" oil on panel
I finished this one just now while enjoying the Pacific storm that rolled in yesterday starting as light drizzle but was pouring all night and this morning. Hopefully Lake Cachuma will fill to it's top with this good chunk of rain we're getting. This hillside is just north of the tiny town of Los Olivos, CA. I drive up there a lot in summer to check out the colors and see what nature has created for artists to have fun with....nature never lets us down.
I had to run down to take Linda Christmas shopping down in Goleta yesterday and was only too happy to find out they now have a Hawaiin BBQ restaraunt there. Yummy! Guess where I'll be stopping on my way down to Pasadena in the future???

Christmas is almost here so in case I don't post anything before then I want to wish everyone who reads this blog a very Happy Christmas and a much better New Years than last year, hahaha.

Nipomo Meadow

"Nipomo Meadow"

30" X 40" Oil on Canvas

This meadow had such a nice bit of sunlight splashed across it when I was up here at the eucalyptus stands in Nipomo off of Hwy 101. I tried to catch that light and still get a nice sense of the darks in the foreground. There were a lot of greens in this painting so it was nice to work on variations of that. You can never get enough practice with greens in landscape work.

I like the large size on this one too and am finding myself really building much more confidence at larger works. This would have taken me forever to paint a few years ago but now it is much faster. Really concentrating on my grasses the last two years has really paid off. It's hard to see most of the detail in the grasses here but on the actual painting they look pretty cool.

I'm still using the Utrecht Artist Oils and really enjoying the process of dialing my mixes in with them. To me the Utrecht paints are very similar to Winsor & Newton Artist Oils. So far so good with the Utrecht's.