Courthouse Butte

In March 2013 we spent a day hiking around Bell Rock and courthouse Butte in Sedona Arizona. I took about 80 photos that day.  I didn't sketch or paint on location, but I did sketch latter that day and more the following days.

These are a few of the photos from that day. Mostly I use a small inexpensive digital camera. Its simple to use, and fits in my pocket.  If I hope to keep up with my 2 sons I cant speed too much time planning the shots.  I know I'm going to use the photos as a jumping off point, not as reference to copy.

I like to work in Photoshop, digitally creating color and composition. Sometimes painting 20 different roughs.  Then I'll do an 11x14 color sketch in my sketchbook. Once all that is worked thru, I have a relatively clear vision of the final painting.

Here's a group of color ideas for a different painting.

This shows the painting in progress. At this stage the drawing is complete, and I've started the under painting.

This is the final painting framed. Once it was framed and on the wall for a couple of days, I went back to the reference photos and realized that the right hand side of the rock formation didn't look right. If you compare this to the earlier image you can see the changes.

A section of detail.