- When I'm headed out to paint,
I am looking for contrast.
I'm always trying to build my paintings in terms of contrast.
When I observed the landscape,
I actually put on these red lens glasses.
And so, when I'm looking at a backlit barn
with a shadow coming towards me,
I see it only in terms of shape and contrast.
In order to paint the light, it's really important
to think about it in terms of a black and white photograph.
And then, I create an actual black and white sketch
to give me those shapes of dark and light,
and to create those contrasts.
Looks to be about a 10% value.
I mix my colors according to a value palette,
which I came up with myself just to make it easier
to teach other people what I'm doing.
As I hold my knife up to the actual subject matter,
I can see that it just needs to cool slightly.
Once I have the painting laid in,
I look at the painting and the subject matter
backwards in a mirror,
and that just shows me if I've screwed anything up.
Our eyes are just get so used to looking at an image
that it gets burnt into our memory somehow
and when you look at something backwards in a mirror,
it just gives you that fresh take on it
so I can see, "Oh, my gosh,
I'm totally wrong in this area,
and then, I have to redo it.
So, those three things
are kind of key to doing what I do.