Making "Haze" a Little Clearer

Quiet Stream at Sunrise, 12 x 14

This week I finished this painting in one of my classes, demonstrating how to depict hazy atmospheric conditions.  This particular scene captures early mornng haze.  I normally start my demos during the first hour of class, and often finish the painting later in the week to show to students at the next week's class.  For this painting, though, I thought it was important to do a two-part demonstration and show the completion as well.  Capturing hazy conditions in a painting relies heavily on getting those very subtle value differences dead-on accurate, and I find it important to make small adjustments all the way up until the end, comparing value to value in all areas of the painting.  Starting the painting with a monochromatic Turpenoid underpainting also helped to establish accurate values early on in the process.

I was very fortunate to have seen Elizabeth Mowry demonstrate recently one of her classic hazy atmospheric landscapes at the IAPS convention.  Quite a helpful demonstration to watch just prior to painting mine!