Landscape Scene

[Hortense Malovich]

Istart by working directly onto the white gessoed board without applying a tonal ground. The initial sketch is with a Neutral Grey acrylic marker and I can establish the motif of the tree and branches on the right-hand side.

I then use Mars Black (Ivory Black or Carbon Black would also work fine) and a Neutral Grey N4. I paint both of these with the flat synthetic brush straight from the tube, just diluted slightly with water using the edge of the brush and lifting the pressure off as I get towards the end of the branches.

Hey Cynthia, yes for sure, using oils with the method is a great way to practice making strong brushstrokes and keeping your colours clean. Resisting the temptation to blend will also help to think through the layers of which colour to apply first.

Will, I have learned so much from your painting examples and instruction! Your advice on color choices has really been helpful especially on mixing greens. I am basically a landscape painter and understanding greens and understanding the atmospheric changes in a landscape have helped me create more depth in my paintings. Thanks so much for all of your help!

Hi Will. What a wonderful lesson! I have recently become much more interested in abstract art, but have no idea how to go about creating it. This step by step shows exactly that. I have never heart of poster painting, so that opens up a whole new area for me. The color grouping does indeed make me think of color as value, an area that I struggle with. I am mainly a watercolor artist and am not as comfortable or confident using acrylics. Colorado, USA, is a high dry desert with extremely low humidity, so the drying time is very short and I struggle to keep mixes fresh and workable. I took up acrylics several years ago so that I could follow your lessons and now have a beautiful gallery of work on my home from your lessons. So much of what you teach is applicable to any media! This lesson looks wonderful and simple enough that I am confident I could do it. I must get my acrylics out now and start this painting! Thanks for this inspiring post! Hope you and Vanessa are keeping well.

Will, this is one of the best tutorials I have seen to help sort through a busy landscape scene. Picking 2 of each basic color is so helpful! In a previous post or lesson you demonstrated a color string and that has helped so much too. I have only been painting a year and had the goal of producing one painting per week so that I would keep practicing no matter what. Discovering your site and your classes has added excitement and clarity to the learning process. Thanks!

Thank you for the tutorial. I have been try to loosen up my painting. This was invaluable in seeing step by step the process and how you simplified, shapes and color palette. Looking forward to experimenting, painting this study, then applying it further. Might you consider doing an expanded class with the same focus?

Hi Carolina, You can leave it as a painting in its own right. Use it as a preparatory study or sketch to make a larger piece from. Or work on top of it, use this poster study as a colour block-in for a more refined, detailed painting.

Cheers,

Will

Hey Terri, so pleased you enjoyed it, Au Premier Coup, (the first shot/stroke)is similar to Alla Prima or Direct Painting, where you paint in one sitting rather than building up in layers, with the aim of trying to get the expression or mark with one brustroke. Working in this method of pre-mixing for a poster study is great practice to paint in that style.

Hi Will,

I was recently in the national gallery and your poster study is making me think of a Cezanne I was gazing at, his use of blocks of colour to create a really interesting abstract painting.

Intimate landscapes typically include a small part of or a detail within a grander scene such as a small segment of a creek instead of the whole forest or maybe a section of the scene that is affected by some atmospheric conditions, think fog and sunlight as it filters through the forest, or maybe sunlight illuminating a curtain of moss that is draped across the limbs of the trees. I also look for designs and patterns within the scene, such as patterns or colors on rocks. An intimate landscape can include a part of the scene that, when extracted from the larger view and seen separate from the context of the larger scene, stands alone and on its own merits. Put the wide-angle lens away and use your zoom or even your macro lens. Get closer to the scene.

The mention of landscape photography likely conjures up thoughts of vast ocean scenes, mountain ranges towering over treed valleys or beautiful images of lush forests. The absence of the human element is, in my opinion, what defines a landscape image.

Although the infusion of the human element within landscape scenes moves away from the purity of landscape photography and fits more with the definition for environmental portraiture, the inclusion of the human element within a landscape setting is a beautiful way to mix up your approach to a landscape scene.

Although photography has always been a part of my life, my present passion evolved mostly from my quest to capture the everyday moments of my children. Photographing my children within a landscape scene occurred well before I turned my camera toward landscape scenes void of the human element.

As the weather warms and I venture out into the great outdoors more often with my children, I'm looking forward to opportunities to capture the human element within a landscape scene. Perhaps you are looking forward to these opportunities as well and, if not with children, perhaps with a friend, loved one or even yourself in self-portraiture.

There are many different ways in which humans in a landscape scene can be captured with impact. However, one consideration should never be overlooked if you're intention is to showcase a landscape scene and the human element together. This important consideration is balance.

Within traditional portraiture, a photographer emphasizes showcasing the main human subject. All additional elements within a scene fall in at second place. However, if the photographer's goal is to showcase the human element within a landscape scene, equal visual weight should be given to the human and landscape setting. It's hard to find this balance, though, because humans are visually high attractants in a landscape scene and often hold stronger visual weight alongside other elements like landscape features. Equating balance between a landscape scene and the human element isn't always easy, but here are a few ways that goal can be acquired.

2. Do not forget about your landscape composition, and be sure to compose your image as you usually would. Also, think about your subject's placement in the frame and try and compose your subject while considering placement within The Rule of Thirds.

3. Consider using a creative landscape technique like long exposure to infuse visually dynamic interest into a landscape scene, as this will draw attention to the landscape in addition to the human element.

Don't be afraid to infuse a human element into your landscape scenes from time to time. Attempting something new and different from your usual approach will often aid in your photography journey learning. Infusing a favourite human into your landscape scenes is also a fantastic way to capture an image filled with sentiment. Those captures are likely the ones that will be printed and displayed in your home.

I've helped many now happy photographers leave behind their frustration and disappointment with their photos. My proven step-by-step systems will have you creating better landscape images too!

My first sunsets were a mess of orange and black. The warm colors from sunsets certainly get noticed, but there was something wrong with the photos. The rest of the landscape, the trees, and the mountains were completely black, with no details.

I could not figure out which camera settings to use to get the whole scene evenly lit. So, I started the search for the magical exposure setting. As I experimented with aperture and shutter speed, I believed there had to be a magic combination of the two that would give me a good exposure.

Those who are old enough remember back in the film days the film sensitivity was given as ASA (like ISO in digital). But with film, there were only two settings to play with (aperture and shutter speed). When I loaded a film into my camera, the ASA was set for that entire roll of film.

When you start to learn photography exposure, you will soon hear the term Exposure Triangle. The triangle is essential to understand, but it doesn't take into consideration the limitations of your camera. The Exposure Triangle explains how aperture, shutter speed, and ISO are linked together. By combining the three parameters, you can decide which exposure is right for your particular scene.

You will find more information about aperture and shutter speed in the two articles below.

What is aperture and how does it affect your photos

What is shutter speed

When you adjust any of the three parameters in the Exposure Triangle, you will brighten or darken the whole image. No combination will darken the highlights and brighten the shadows separately. So, unfortunately, the magic is not found in the Exposure Triangle.

I continued to learn and found no matter what aperture or shutter speed I used I could not get my sunsets evenly lit. Could there be other settings on my camera I was overlooking? I started to experiment with the exposure meter settings. As you might know, more advanced cameras have several ways to set how to measure light. The three most common are:

Matrix/Evaluative:

The camera meters the light from a wide area of the frame in an attempt to expose all parts of the scene evenly.

Center-weighted:

The camera measures the entire frame but assigns more value to the center area. Center-weighted can be a good choice if you place the main subject near or in the center of the composition.

Spot:

The camera measures the light from a very small area (spot) in the frame. You can move the spot to the area you want to measure the light. Spot metering is best when you want to make sure a given part of the scene is exposed right. When I photograph and expose landscapes, I use the spot metering most of the time. Spot metering gives me the most control, and I can measure the light exactly where I want.

For a while, I thought the Exposure Modes was the solution to my failed exposures. As I tried the different settings I found if I measured the brighter areas of the photo, the highlights were exposed correctly while the dark areas became way too dark. When I metered the dark areas, the shadows were nicely exposed, but the highlights became way too bright. I lost details in the highlights.

After some trials and error, I realized I could not get an evenly lit exposure no matter how I changed aperture, shutter speed or exposure modes. There had to be a way to deal with this because other photographers got the exposure right, also with sunsets.

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