Snow and Birch Trees

I have been teaching this past month and it has been so enjoyable. We have been dealing with snow by doing paintings of snowy mountains and the birch tree. There were some wonderful paintings done on these themes by the class. The birch tree is always a favorite. It has the contrast of a soccer ball with its black and white color. My demonstration was off balance so I added a small child with a sled to create some informal balance.

Birches and Snow

I attended a presentation by the Daniel Smith Watercolor representative and given the colors to test, I did a birch tree in snow. The Daniel Smith colors are very nice but I wondered how the colors on my palate would compare. One gets used to making colors by mixes so I tried a full scene.That is what you see here. Birches are like soccer balls in terms of contrasting values and easily become a focus. Snow is white paper where the sun hits and shades of blue where shadows or contours occur. I do see a difference in the water. This is a stream and should be very cold, hence, dark blue. I'm not sure that I captured that as well as the Daniel Smith color of Mayan Blue did. I can tweak it some more.

More Snow on the Way

It is always a quick painting when I do a snow painting.  I leave a lot of the paper unpainted (white) and make it look cold with dark blue.  The birches are a good focal point.  They do, however, pop out better when there is more contrasting color surrounding them.  I just came in from outside and it looks like there is more snow on the way.

Frosty Days are Here

We do not usually get snow but it has been cold and overcast. The sun came out yesterday and it reached the mid 60's, which feels warm. I painted this scene to remember how it is to paint snowy scenes. There is nothing like this until you get up in the mountains which are 2-3 hrs away. In painting this you leave a lot of white paper which you texture with streaks of blue and spatter. No yellow snow!