The Hollow Shadow

Painting 'o the Day

2012-01-26T19:30:00.000-08:00

Overlooking Marsh creek in Brentwood, around 2-3pm

Painting of the Day

2012-01-25T23:01:00.000-08:00

Painting this morning from Round Valley park. 1pm in the afternoon.

Painting of the Day

2012-01-24T23:02:00.000-08:00

Painting for the day. 9am to 10am on a clear, but moist morning.

Painting of the Day

2012-01-23T23:04:00.000-08:00

Did this one at Pyramid lake. Lots of fog and great atmosphere, but it was super cold and the paint wouldn't dry. Eh...

Not too happy with this one either. Did this off Hwy 198.

Painting of the Day

2012-01-22T23:07:00.000-08:00

Coffee shop painting with a little digital touch up after the fact. Done at Crave Cafe in Northridge.

Painting of the Day

2012-01-18T23:13:00.000-08:00

View of the Calaveras Hills, 10am to 11am.

Evening paint off Vasco Rd, 4:30ish.

Painting of the Day

2012-01-16T23:09:00.000-08:00

Early morning paint. 8am to 9am East of Mt. Diablo.

Painting of the Day

2012-01-12T15:34:00.001-08:00

Afternoon paint. Did this one around noon off Hwy 84 near Sunol.

2012-01-10T20:34:00.001-08:00

Another early morning. This one was ok, but wish I had done a better drawing in the beginning. Might try again tomorrow morning if I get up early enough.

2012-01-09T08:00:00.000-08:00

First day back at home and I got my day off to a great start with an early morning and a coffee. Wish I could say the same about the painting.

2012-01-07T22:52:00.000-08:00

Went painting with my buddy Matt Pugnetti, of Beastlore fame, at Vasona park. It was a beautiful day out there and it was nice to take some time and sit down for a painting. Each one took about 45 minutes to complete.

2012-01-06T18:21:00.001-08:00

Two hour painting on a cloudy day, overlooking the Alameda in SJ. Peet's Coffee!

2012-01-04T01:32:00.000-08:00

A sketch from the window at Rebberry Coffee, looking out at City Hall and Lee's Sandwiches. About one and a half hours.

2012-01-03T00:39:00.000-08:00

Was lucky enough to make it to San Luis reservoir off highway 152 before sunset. Both were difficult to paint as I had the sun shining in my eyes each time I looked up to see the landscape. Each one took about 25 minutes.

2012-01-02T00:35:00.000-08:00

I took a trip down to the LA area for the weekend. The above painting is from the Griffith Observatory and the bottom painting was done at a park in downtown Pasadena at sunset. The air pollution really makes for some great colors at sunset.

These last set of images were photos from the observatory stitched together in Photoshop.

2011-12-21T17:41:00.000-08:00

Hour long painting on the Winter Soltice at the Friendship Garden.

2011-12-20T13:07:00.001-08:00

Fooling around in Ps.

2011-12-18T17:44:00.000-08:00

Quick sketch at the Stanford sculpture garden. One of the three shades.

2011-12-14T23:09:00.001-08:00

Watercolor sketch in the afternoon. Done on brown recycled paper at the Japanese Friendship Gardens.

Weekly Figure Drawing

2011-12-13T23:24:00.000-08:00

2011-12-07T21:33:00.000-08:00

A quick sketch before sunset. I think this one did a decent job of capturing the evening colors.

2011-12-01T23:58:00.000-08:00

2011-11-28T23:59:00.000-08:00

Black Friday Watercolors

2011-11-26T00:01:00.000-08:00

Black Friday Drive

2011-11-25T13:43:00.000-08:00

Two weeks ago I took a slow, meandering drive through the Tejon Pass area just north of LA on my way back to the Bay. Here are a few of the photos. Photoshop automated photomerge tool is AMAZING!

All photos were shot with a Pentax DSLR and a fixed 50mm lens.

2011-11-23T23:57:00.000-08:00

Watercolors

2011-11-22T23:10:00.000-08:00

Took a break from work to get some light and do a quick painting. This one's got a few digital touch-ups.

Watercolors

2011-11-21T23:05:00.000-08:00

SJSU tower in the late afternoon.

Rodin!

2011-11-18T23:10:00.000-08:00

A quick study done at the Stanford sculpture garden. Where you can find a copy of Rodin's Gates of Hell.

Watercolors

2011-11-16T23:08:00.000-08:00

Painted at the Guadalupe River Rose Garden

Evening Light

2011-11-15T23:07:00.000-08:00

Today's Watercolor

2011-11-14T02:20:00.000-08:00

Cold out today, but I took a walk over to the Japanese Friendship Garden in San Jose to get quick painting in. Whew! The scenery may be great for calm meditation, but it's tough to paint!

Afternoon Watercolor

2011-11-10T00:13:00.000-08:00

Great light shining through the water. Hopefully I did alright to get it. The atmospheric perspective is always so much more apparent in colder weather.

Lunch Break Watercolor

2011-11-09T00:11:00.000-08:00

Beginning my work-from home term of employment. Here's a watercolor I did when I slipped out to run some errands and grab some lunch. Done at the Japanese Friendship Garden at Kelly Park.

Tuesday Night Figure Drawing

2011-11-08T02:10:00.000-08:00

I was having a difficult time focusing tonight, so I wonder if that shows through. Though, I do like the way the light is coming through on the last two.

Rainy Day Watercolor in Berkeley

2011-11-05T18:55:00.000-07:00

Painted this from Cafe Zoe in Oakland, looking across the street at a church. Totally rainy and gloomy, but I tried to make the most of the light.

Friday Watercolor Break

2011-11-04T19:33:00.000-07:00

I'm usually at home on Friday's, but I slipped out for a bit to do some watercolors. The rain was clearing up and the clouds were casting some beautiful shadows on the East hills.

Lunchtime Watercolor

2011-11-03T19:19:00.000-07:00

Lunchtime sketch with digital touch-ups on the bottom image.

Lunchtime Watercolor

2011-11-02T19:17:00.001-07:00

Lunchtime watercolor with digital touch-ups on the above image.

Tuesday Night Figure Drawing

2011-11-01T19:11:00.000-07:00

Lunchtime Watercolor

2011-10-31T23:52:00.000-07:00

Semi-Satisfied with this one. Finally felt I was able to organize the values the way I wanted to.

Weekend Watercolors

2011-10-29T23:49:00.000-07:00

Another great day for painting! These two were done at the Japanese Friendship garden in SJ.

Water Colors

2011-10-28T23:47:00.000-07:00

It was a nice day this Friday and I was able to get TWO paintings in. Both need a little more work but I'm happy for an hours work.

Tuesday Night Figure Drawing

2011-10-25T09:03:00.000-07:00

Did my best to capture the orange reflected light coming off of the bright orange cloth the model posed on.

Morning Sketch

2011-10-21T10:16:00.002-07:00

Repaint of a street scene two weeks after. The above image is from this morning, when it was colder and clouded over.

Lunchtime Watercolor

2011-10-19T10:15:00.000-07:00

Eh, not my favorite, but just another step closer to a good painting.

Lunchtime Watercolor

2011-10-17T10:11:00.000-07:00

Picture looks kinda dingy, should use more saturate, brighter colors.

Morning Sketch

2011-10-14T10:13:00.000-07:00

Sunlight coming over the east hills.

Figure Drawings

2011-10-12T01:27:00.000-07:00

Lunchtime Watercolor Redux

2011-10-12T01:26:00.000-07:00

minor touch-ups

Lunchtime Watercolor

2011-10-12T01:23:00.000-07:00

Mission peak viewed from the office.

Sketchbook Watercolor at Crissy Field

2011-10-09T08:22:00.000-07:00

Went up to the city for the evening and stopped to do a painting at sunset.

Morning Sketch

2011-10-07T17:09:00.000-07:00

Got up early to go out and paint but realized the best view was from my windshield mirror.

Lunchtime Watercolor

2011-10-05T17:12:00.000-07:00

A grey day.

30 Rock!

2011-10-04T23:49:00.000-07:00

I love this show. For this year's APE, my first time participating, I did a series of caricatures. Can you place the names with the faces?

-Tina Fey

-Alec Baldwin

-Jane Krakowski

-Tracy Morgan

Tuesday Night Figure Drawings

2011-10-04T23:46:00.001-07:00

It's been a while, but I'm happy with the second painting.

Lunchtime Watercolor

2011-10-03T23:13:00.000-07:00

Summer's over. APE wrapped up this last weekend. Now I can finally get back to my lunchtime painting!

Here's the first in a long while. It was raining out so I did this from inside, looking out.

Tracy Jordan Warm-Up

2011-09-22T21:42:00.000-07:00

In preparation for the APE caricature line-up, I did a 20min portrait sketch from a photo.

Saturday Morning at the Japanese Friendship Garden

2011-08-13T14:38:00.000-07:00

One hour value study.

Hwy 17

2011-08-12T14:34:00.000-07:00

Did this on the way home from the boardwalk off highway 17.

Lunchtime Watercolor

2011-08-02T14:32:00.000-07:00

The fountain in front of our building. Done in two sittings.

Birthday Sketches

2011-07-31T00:14:00.000-07:00

Went for a drive along the coast and stopped at a few places to paint. All on my birthday!

Lunchtime Watercolor on the Solstice

2011-07-21T14:22:00.000-07:00

Two lunchtime sketches from different days. The colored image was painted on the summer solitice. The more monochromatic image is an attempt at a limited yellow/purple palette.

Evening Watercolor Sketch on the Boardwalk

2011-07-01T10:11:00.000-07:00

Lunchtime Watercolor

2011-06-30T10:46:00.000-07:00

Lunchtime watercolor at the neighboring office complex. It was a grey day and their fountain waw running.

4 Value Test/Levels Crush Test

2011-06-11T15:07:00.000-07:00

Here's a test you can use in Ps to check the integrity of a paintings value structure.

First, you'll need a basic understanding of a Histogram and the 'Levels' tool in Photoshop.

An Histogram is a visual representation of the data in an image. In the image above, you can see a gradient from black to white and the histogram to represent this data.

Photoshop's 'Levels' tool (cmd+L) represents the graphic data of the pixels in a value scale of 255 steps from Black to White. In the Histogram above, you can see that there are more pixels towards the ends of the spectrum, i.e. there are more white and black pixels in the gradient than gray pixels.

By using the sliders at the bottom of the graph, you can adjust the number of black or white pixels in a given area, and the midpoint between the two. See the example below:

By adjusting the sliders between the range of 0-255 shades of gray, you can adjust the quantity of black and white pixels in an image. Henceforth called 'crushing' an image.

See the examples below:

By using the sliders to divide the histograms 255 steps in to 4 equal parts, you can find the value ranges of a selected area.

Here's the histogram divided in to 4 equal parts:

0=Black
0~63=Dark Dark Gray (4/4)
63~127= Dark Gray (3/4)
127~191=Light Gray (2/4)
191~255 =Light Light Gray (3/4)
255=White

See example below:

When applied to a color painting, you can use this breakdown to see the 4 Value structure of a painting.

Let's take a look at a painting by Nathan Fowkes to see how he smartly groups the elements in to 4 main values.

Here's the original:

Here I've adjusted the sliders in the Levels tool to find the parts of the images that correspond to the 4 value ranges listed above.

By doing so, I can see how all of the foreground elements are confined to the bottom 1/4 of the value scale. The opposite is true for the focal point and distant objects in the painting. They are painted using only the top 1/4 of the value range. Elements in between are neatly confined to the middle 3/4 and 2/4 ranges of the value scale.

The Levels tool allows you to break down the value structure of a painting and check the integrity of the design of your 4 basic values. Of course you can use the sliders to set the range for any number of steps in a given image.

Here's how to do it.

Watercolors at Stanford

2011-06-04T00:01:00.000-07:00

Went out for a drive one overcast Saturday afternoon. I sat in my car in the overflow parking lot at Stanford and painted the eucalyptus trees.

Breakfast Sketch

2011-05-25T01:04:00.000-07:00

Typical breakfast of tea, fruit and a bit of protein.

Figure Drawings

2011-05-24T01:35:00.000-07:00

Finally felt like I was getting somewhere with the values and color, especially with the last one.

Figure Drawing

2011-05-17T01:33:00.000-07:00

Chuck's silvery hair really helped create some interesting lighting patterns.

30 Days of Watercolor #26

2011-05-15T12:31:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #25

2011-05-14T12:16:00.000-07:00

Quick sketch from the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk after closing.

30 Days of Watercolor #24

2011-05-13T11:41:00.000-07:00

First image from the next door offices. Images 2 and 3 done from photos of recent trip to LA.

30 Days of Watercolor #23

2011-05-10T09:32:00.000-07:00

Repaint of initial pencil sketch.

30 Days of Watercolor #23

2011-05-10T00:55:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #22

2011-05-09T09:31:00.000-07:00

Painting done at home from pencil sketch.

30 Days of Watercolor #21

2011-05-06T09:27:00.000-07:00

Sketches and paintings from recent road trip to L.A.

30 Days of Watercolor #20

2011-05-05T09:25:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #19

2011-05-03T09:57:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #18

2011-05-01T09:55:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #17

2011-04-30T09:53:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #16

2011-04-28T09:40:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #15

2011-04-26T09:37:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #14

2011-04-25T09:33:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #13

2011-04-23T09:31:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #12

2011-04-22T15:25:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #11

2011-04-21T09:39:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #10

2011-04-20T09:36:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #9

2011-04-19T09:32:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #8

2011-04-18T09:30:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #7

2011-04-17T09:27:00.000-07:00

Watercolor sketch off Hwy 17

2011-04-16T23:45:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #6

2011-04-15T09:24:00.000-07:00

Figure Drawing

2011-04-12T01:00:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #5

2011-04-10T20:32:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #4

2011-04-09T20:30:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #3

2011-04-07T20:27:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #2

2011-04-05T20:26:00.000-07:00

30 Days of Watercolor #1

2011-04-04T20:24:00.000-07:00

Sunday Morning Watercolor

2011-02-21T14:33:00.000-08:00

At the Campbell Farmer's Market on the first pleasant Sunday of 2011.