Adobe WIP

[Deborah Secor]

This is also taken from the last few days of painting on location, although I did it from a photo I took in a small suburb of Albuquerque called Corrales. It's an old, old adobe--had some great old chairs and an abandoned couch on the porch--sort of past its glory days but even more charming as a result. It sits right next to the church that was built in the 1800s, but isn't likely as old as that.

I've had a time with those posts and windows! I have the crookedest eye ever. I finally hung a piece of string with a weight on it to make a plumb line(a suggestion from a friend!) and it really helped. At least I know all of them are at the same angle now--hopefully straight up and down! (Oh--the photo may be wonky. I was losing the light and shot a quick one that was a smidgen crooked.)

As you can see the foreground is still in progress, as are the trees around the adobe. I also have some details to add to the adobe itself, some vigas and canales (which is why there's a dip in the roofline) but those will come last.

I really want to snap the light so I plan to darken the darks in the foliage, as well as lightening the lights. Any suggestions for a visual pathway in the fore?There was a little struggling patch of green grass I liked, which may make the cut, but I like the wildness of the rest--so don't ask me to put in any lawns or civilized paths. Anything that's just jumping out and bugging you?

I'm open for suggestions but I have a vision that I'm heading for already. Thanks....

Deborah

On dark blue-gray La Carte, 18x22"

http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/18-Jun-2004/23609-Old_Corrales_th.jpg

[SweetBabyJ]

I've used the string thing before, too, Deborah- you can tape it top and bottom, too- it'll move a bit out of the way for you as you work around it if you need it to.

Beautiful little piece- tell me, are you gonna spill that hot sunshine all over that yard?? I've been through Corrales a time or two- always at high speed, but that's cause I was anxious to get past White Sands further south, Nice, nice work!

[jackiesimmonds]

Deborah - coming along beautifully, absolutely love the softness of the natural stuff (beautifully-painted trees by the way) against the man-madeness of the building, which is such an interesting shape and colour (cannot wait to get to your part of the world.)

One thing sticks out tho, and bothers me. Here I am wearing my perspective monitor hat again.

Is there a change of plane in the building, despite the straightness of the porch roof....?

Because the far left window/door looks as though it is on a side plane,while the other two windows seem to be parallel to the viewer. It looks odd because I cannot see a corner there. If there is a corner under that porch roof, then it would make sense ...but you might need to have a change of tone there to show it more. I hope you understand this...the pic is a little small, and a little dark on my monitor, so perhaps the tonal change is there all ready.

??

[Kathryn Wilson]

Hi dee! coming along nicely - the foliage is wonderful - have to study how you are doing that.

I think more of the same grass or plants with a stone path peeking through here and there to lead into the painting might work.

As mentioned before, the building has some perspective problems, but you already know that - but is the building really that red or is that the underlying layer for the more softer tones of adobe? or the building may have been painted red over the adobe? It just seems to jump out of the painting and not nestled into its spot. I'm sure this isn't making sense.

[meowmeow]

Beautiful! The colors are gorgeous...interesting how you have sort of diagonal lines in the color planes in the front...leads you right back to the wonderful red building.
I noticed the window thing too but assumed that side of the building curved back a bit. I had the same problem with the ice cream parlor with the bikes in it...one window angle was different but it was not obvious from the roof line that the wall went back.
Coming along really well!


Sandy

[Deborah Secor]

Jackie, we need to name you PERSPECTIVE QUEEN. ;) You're right, of course. One of the problems with these very old adobes is that the walls sag and the old window frames warp, thus making a literal rendering look odd. I can't claim my painting is 100% accurate to the real thing, however, so that left hand window will change! I think two elements are fighting: the angle of the bottom of the middle window and the angle of the casement bar in the middle of the left hand window, which must visually agree more. I also think the angle of the 'reflection' I put in in the left hand window adds to the sense it's on another plane.

My husband (who has worked in the arts for over 20 years too) and I were looking at it last night and agreed that since the middle window is so central to the interest of the painting, as well as nearly in the geographic center, it has to be carefully shaped--not drawn with some squeaky precision, but rendered in such a way that it completes your understanding of the perspective, color and shapes. A challenge...

As to the color of the adobe you mention, Kat, it isn't meant to be a literal rendering of the old adobe color. I want it to have an interpretive quality, describing that glow that occurs when sun hits adobe. However the reds are reading a little more saturated on screen, which may be a combination of my digital pic and the usual WC reds. There's something about the color of adobes... they can be soft gold, or pink, or mauve, touched by orange, yet some of them are a deeper hue, which is where this one seems to be. It was a dark reddish-purple color in the shadows. I may do another close-up of it, just because those shadowed areas were so intriguing.

Today I'll be working on the foreground, hopefully drenching the ground with the sunshine you mention, Julie, so if I get anything together on it I'll post it here. I'll tweak the windows (again, and likely again and again!), and start to develop the trees. This is rather a large painting for me, which means putting in more time...I have no patience for that. I always want to go on to the next one.

Thanks for your observations!

Deborah

[Khadres]

Ooooo, I like this ALOT!!! The rich colors and that look of "old"... The little bits of perspective issues should be easy to correct at this stage and what MORE are you going to do to those lovely TREES?!?!

For the foreground, if I read this old place halfway correctly, I'll just bet there's hard-packed earth with bits of dryish weeds and grasses struggling to push through and survive in the summer heat. The path could be nothing more than a clearer, raggedy path through the overgrowth, not entirely clear since no one much walks on it anymore it would have a few bits of grass, etc. trying to move in on it, but nothing formal at all, no real "walk" or anything. I'm remembering my great-gran's old homestead in Texas and the way it looks as if it's dreaming of better days, sort of napping there in the sun. Does that make sense?

This is going to be a quick seller, too, I'll betcha! Great work!

[jackiesimmonds]

Jackie, we need to name you PERSPECTIVE QUEEN. ;) You're right, of course. One of the problems with these very old adobes is that the walls sag and the old window frames warp, thus making a literal rendering look odd. I can't claim my painting is 100% accurate to the real thing, however, so that left hand window will change! I think two elements are fighting: the angle of the bottom of the middle window and the angle of the casement bar in the middle of the left hand window, which must visually agree more. I also think the angle of the 'reflection' I put in in the left hand window adds to the sense it's on another plane.

My husband (who has worked in the arts for over 20 years too) and I were looking at it last night and agreed that since the middle window is so central to the interest of the painting, as well as nearly in the geographic center, it has to be carefully shaped--not drawn with some squeaky precision, but rendered in such a way that it completes your understanding of the perspective, color and shapes. A challenge...


Deborah

Deborah, you have it absolutely right, and I have no doubt you will sort it out.

As for me being"perspective queen", I think"perspective nag" is more like it! It made me wonder whether I was becoming a bit possessed about it.....but in fact, I visited an exhibition yesterday, called "Not the Turner Prize", here in London, a vast exhibition of paintings chosen from over 10,000 entries, showing very literal, figurative works, (as a reaction to the public's general disdain of "The Turner Prize" which has been won by artists doing the out of the ordinary - casting the spaces of a house in concrete for instance. Not always well received!)

Anyway, my point is that I went around 1000 exhibits, and the word perspective did not rear its ugly head in my mind once...and that is, because I did not spot one perspective fault. Every single painting, whether I liked it or not, had no problems in that area.

So ... if I chime in at any point here on WC, it is usually because there is good reason for me to do so! I feel that if someone wants to paint in a representational, literal way, then the perspective needs to be right, so that the viewer doesn't have to think about it at all.

I am sure you will sort this one out, I have total faith.

Jackie

[meowmeow]

I know sometimes in the beginning when Jackie would point out some perspective issue in one of my paintings I was not happy...but every time she turned out to be right and every time I fixed the problem the painting improved overwhelmingly. I have learned to listen...even if I don't like what she says! It's not her fault that perspective is sometimes difficult and that some of us have crooked eyes. :D

And now...back to our regularly scheduled thread...which belongs to Deborah's adobe house...with crooked windows which she has to figure out how to make look right in the painting without ruining the integrity of the old building. :D


s.

[Kathryn Wilson]

Deborah - I know this may sound like cheating or fudging - but how about softening up those edges around the window, or doing lost edges. Since the viewer is not close up to this house, it will keep the integrity, and your integrity in tact. A not-so-sharply defined line will give the window it's shape, but not delineate a sagging window.

Or, you spoke about chairs and a sofa on the porch - a sofa might hide the bottom line.

Just some thoughts -

[bnoonan]

Deborah - I know this may sound like cheating or fudging - but how about softening up those edges around the window, or doing lost edges. Since the viewer is not close up to this house, it will keep the integrity, and your integrity in tact. A not-so-sharply defined line will give the window it's shape, but not delineate a sagging window.

Or, you spoke about chairs and a sofa on the porch - a sofa might hide the bottom line.

Just some thoughts -

Kat - not sure if the couch close up will help at all... but you decide.

Oh - nice painting Dee :angel: :evil: :angel: B

[jackiesimmonds]

. One of the problems with these very old adobes is that the walls sag and the old window frames warp, thus making a literal rendering look odd.
Deborah

sorry ....but if the walls sag, then the roof line would sag too!!! Then you could get away with sagging windows. This does not look like a saggy old adobe, it actually looks quite newish because that roofline is quite crisp and horizontal.

The sofa idea wont be enough either ... as Deborah so rightly says, it is the central bar of the left hand window which is the main problem. In fact, if that was made more horizontal, that might be enough. Try it, Deborah, and see.

Jackie

[Deborah Secor]

Well, here it is after another bit of work yesterday. I straightened the casement bars and measured everything to a fare-thee-well, until I'm so tired of looking I can't see it. So you have to tell me, oh perspective queen (or nag--both needed and wanted!), and any others with an opinion, if it looks better, worse or just as bad for another reason.

Oh, and trust me when I tell you that the verticals are vertical. I simply seemed unable to make them so when I shot the photo. (As a photographer I make a great painter.)

I feel I still need to do a little tweaking in the immediate foreground, as I interrupted the visual pathway with some yellow grasses in the middle. Now I wonder if I couldn't get a bit more of that look you mentioned seeing at your grandma's house, Sooz, struggling, dried weeds. Then again I've made it more garden-ish so maybe I should stick with grass... At any rate, I feel it needs further consideration.

I have a vision of this and know where I'm headed, but would welcome any and all comments still! I think I'll let it simmer for a bit and then come back to it, so have at it. Many thanks!

http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/20-Jun-2004/23609-Old_Corrales_WC.jpg
(Version 2--Old Corrales)

Deborah

[bnoonan]

Ah = now I see those timbers that support the adobe roof. Well done.

I see the horizon line shifting down to the left but that's most likely a result of your photograph. Other than that I like what you've done. I'm especially fond of the way you rendered the tree on the far right - it's light and whispy.

Well done!!! Everytime I look at this I'm right back in that heat.

Barb

[meowmeow]

I have one hting to say now:

YES!!!!

It looks wonderful now Deborah! It looks old but it looks right...the trees are wonderful and I like the foreground. All in all a terrific painting!


Sandy

[jackiesimmonds]

as you are expecting me to leap out from behind the bushes, I might as well do so!

given the parallax problems I have with MY digital photos, (I have a totally curved horizon on one of my beach transparencies, quite hopeless, and yet it is straight as a ruler on the painting) I understand the problem you have, so instead of commenting on your digital image, can I simply show you the correct perspective in a drawing, and then you can check your painting, and if the angles are more or less the same as mine, then all is well!

There is a gentle bit of perspective going on here. If you had been looking straight at the building, you would not have seen that corner angle top left, and the roof line would not be sloping. Given that the roof slopes, and is sloping DOWN, I have assumed that your eye level is below the roof, and given that the bottom of the central window is quite horizontal, I reckon that is your eye level. Your vanishing points therefore are well off the paper, which is perfectly reasonable. What is important, however, is that all angles ABOVE the eye level slope DOWN towards the eye level line, and all angles BELOW eye level, slope UP towards the eye level line....so the bottom of the doorway to the right needs to slope up ever so slightly.

Here ya go. Yours is probably just like this

http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/20-Jun-2004/1805-adobepersp.jpg

It has a lovely atmosphere and the MOST beautiful light and colour. ( And a very tidy garden. From a purely subjective point of view, I rather wish it was more tangly and overgrown!! I keep telling my gardener not to manicure my garden...I do so love a more natural look. He ignores me. )

Jackie

[Redsy333]

Oh wowzers..this is rich and vibrant..I love your use of colors
I say carry on!!!!
Lovin it,
Redsy

[Tom Christopher]

Wonderful lighting, Deborah. Beautiful technique --the colors work well together-great art! --thank You Tom

[Deborah Secor]

Jackie, you are the QUEEN of perspective...I had to just slightly adjust that bottom line of the far right window--or doorway, whatever it is. It was just a breath but it made a difference all right. I think I'll run all my paintings of adobes past you for a vetting, so you can help me see this stuff! ;)

Barb, it wasn't that hot that day! We were in the lovely shade...well, you were. I was walking around to all my students in the sun! But I'm glad ya like it. Go have a tall cool iced tea now.

Thanks all for your comments and help. I love being able to put things up here and get such a lot of good ideas and enthusiasm. You're great!

Deborah

[Deborah Secor]

Hi again. I had to shoot some good digitals of this painting so I thought I'd show you the final, finished image.

Old Corrales, 18x24"

http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/30-Jul-2004/23609-Old_Corrales_2_WC.jpg

Thanks for everyone's help on this one!

Deborah

[meowmeow]

Yummy! This came out beautifully, Deborah! This is one I would love to see in person and just get to get up close and study it. You did such a wonderful job. REally nice...makes me want to be there...with my hat and sweatband of course!


Sandy

[Rose Baggs]

Terrific painting Deborah! I love it! :clap:

[Deborah Secor]

Thanks, Sandy--wish you could see it in person! Maybe close-ups? I know they aren't the same...

And thanks to you, too, Rose. :)

Deborah

[SweetBabyJ]

Lovely work, Deborah- I bet it's stunning large, too.

[DGrau]

This has a lush, but quiet peaceful look to it..I like it
David

[Kathryn Wilson]

Hi Deborah! Glad to see this one finished up . . . great job on the building . . . the colors really speak to me now.

[Deborah Secor]

Thanks Julie and David and Kat! Okay, everyone has given me such confidence in this one, now the question is whether it should go directly to the gallery or be saved to enter in the PSNM national show. I usually put my best into the gallery, naturally, as it's supporting others that way (gallery owners work hard and deserve my best, I believe) but they have one of an adobe wall and shadows that's a bit more generic than this, which may be more suitable for their needs--and space is limited there. Hmmmmm, decisions, decisions!

Thanks again to all for your support, enthusiasm and help. :cool:

Deborah

[Kathryn Wilson]

I'm not sure how this works, Dee, but can you put it into the Gallery then take it out for the show and if it sells, they get their percentage?? On the other hand, it might last one day in the Gallery and then you would have to put another in the show - and do you have another painting in mind for the show?

[Deborah Secor]

Well, Kat, that wouldn't work, because PSNM has a strict rule that if a painting is accepted and not shown you pay a 30% commission on the sale and get blackballed from showing there for 13 months! So, I wouldn't take that chance. :eek: It's a little hard to hold back a good painting for a show, but at least they don't jury it 6 months in advance! The entries are due in August, and the show is in November. On the other hand, I could put it into the gallery in Santa Fe and have a check in hand any day. You see the dilemma!?

I'll figure it out before August 20th!

Deborah

[Kathryn Wilson]

OIC - difficult choice. Depends on finances then, doesn't it.

[judwal]

Just beautiful..as usual!

[Mikki Petersen]

What a very lovely painting! It has such a sense of peace and history to it. I think if it goes into a gallery, it will be snatched up fast...on the other hand, it has all the makings of a winner for a juried show. Guess you have to decide whether a check or a ribbon is more important to you at this stage. I should have such dilemmas :rolleyes: .

[Deborah Secor]

Thanks Judy--you're sweet to say that! (Wish it was always true! LOL)

Mikki, both of those are calculated risks--it may not sell or get a ribbon! But I've been there before, in both cases. Still, you all are bolstering my confidence. Thanks a lot!

Deborah

[prestonsega]

I've had a time with those posts and windows! I have the crookedest eye ever. I finally hung a piece of string with a weight on it to make a plumb line(a suggestion from a friend!) and it really helped. At least I know all of them are at the same angle now--hopefully straight up and down...

I have found a 2' carpenters level to be an invaluable tool. I start out by making sure the support is level and that the easel leans slightly forward for the dust to drop missing the painting. Knowing that I am working with an accurate horizontals insures that with the help of the level my verticals are plum. Also gives a straight edge if needed and at times doubles as a maul stick.

now for your magnificent painting!!!!!! all I can say is :clap: :clap: