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Lesson 7 - '[Series 3] Learn to Enjoy Painting in Sketching Pastels with Paul Taggart'

The PLOUGH is a highly detailed object, although a heavy farming implement, it is nevertheless ‘delicate’, in that aspects such as the handles are narrow – so how to paint this? How to achieve that spindly framework when working with pastels, rather than a pointed brush? Work-along with Artist & Author Paul Taggart and you will soon discover the benefits of blending and working with an erasing knife. You will also discover that yet again, it is important to work through the values, from dark to light. This is the way in which to create volume and form – no different than any other painting medium. After all, this element is as important as any other in bringing this scene to life. So Paul gives it the attention it deserves and slowly the plough emerges from a flat looking cut-out; you can feel the ploughman’s hands gripping the handles, the plough cutting through the soil, turning the sods over as it does so. And yet, the treatment is suggestive, relying on the application of yellow-biased light and blue-biased shade to sculpt it into shape.

On to the PLOUGHING HORSES and now is the time to make any refinements to the structure and form of this element, through redrawing. But the redrawing here has two functions – now it not only serves to reshape and change and modify as required, it also serves to establish the darkest of accents which are necessary to create those underlying darkest of darks.

This stage is essential in another way too – it helps you to properly look at the subject, to find those rhythms in the structure of the animals. Many are afraid to approach horses as a subject, but as you will hear Paul say in this episode – “painting horses is no more difficult than painting a teapot”, for as he stresses, it is not about seeing these as horses, it is about looking at these elements as a series of interlocking shapes. Do this and you will find that you are able to approach any subject without feeling threatened by the subject itself.

As ever this episode is packed-full of useful and interesting hints, tips and techniques – just the redrawing section alone will help you, as you listen to Paul’s gently reassuring and descriptive commentary.

Then it’s on to the first stage of this second layer on the horses and first off, the blue-biased reflected lights, which are very strongly present on these creatures and are in themselves an interesting complementary contrast to the russet/auburn orange-biased local colour of the animals. Miss these and you will be reducing the richness of their glossy coats.

As you work-along with Paul, you will be doing so in gradual, measured stages; gently, gently working through to those mid-values. In this episode Paul works through the coats, manes and white-socked legs and hooves. You will learn the value of negative painting and blending. Most importantly, you will learn not to be intimidated by any subject, Paul’s gentle work-through will give you the confidence to do so.

Because you are working with a limited palette, you don’t have the luxury of being able to work through varying values of an extensive range of colours – WHAT YOU WILL LEARN throughout this series, is how to surface colour mix, how to exploit a limited palette – which will prove invaluable in extending your painting with pastels repertoire.

Because you are working with sketching pastels, you don’t have the opportunity to apply too many layers. BUT ….. this need not restrict you from exploiting techniques borrowed from Paul’s traditional method of painting. In so doing you will be able to achieve far richer results than you might suppose when working with sketching pastels. Results gained through the use of layers and correctly identified values of colour.

MORE USEFUL BOX-SETS

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Lesson 6 - '[Series 3] Learn to Enjoy Painting in Sketching Pastels with Paul Taggart'

You join Artist & Author Paul Taggart as he continues work on the second layer of pastel; in which you will be creating not only volume, but also introducing sunlight into the composition. As ever you will be working from the top of the composition downwards and having completed the trees and the first reflected lights on the ‘ground’ you now follow Paul as he works these blue-biased reflected lights throughout the middle ‘ground’ and onward to the fore ‘ground’.

This first process is not merely about getting those refleted lights in position, it is about manipulating the pastel with scuffs and different strokes to portray the ‘texture’ of the ground, which is made up of multitude textures of stubble, ploughed soil and so on.

Through this process you will also understand how to allow for upcoming strokes of ‘sunlight’ – those yellow-biased lights that act as the dramatic counterfoil to the underlying reflected lights.

This working of cool blue-biased reflected lights against warm yellow-biased sunlit areas is essential for the overall composition to work – it is how we view volume and depth in our surroundings, which are structured in light and shade.

Once the reflected lights are placed, it is on with those warm colours – warm greens, warm reds, warm yellows – with surface colour mixing coming into play. From the dullest of starts, the ground in this lesson now springs to life, as you worm through to the carefully placed sparkling pure-white highlights.

The second section of this lesson sees work start again on the two figures in the composition. Firstly, redrawing, to establish the correct postures and proportions; before moving back to the layering process, working through middle values up to the yellow-llight highlights – the finishing touches being reserved for a future lesson, in which the entire painitng will be brought together as a balanced composition.

Because you are working with a limited palette, you don’t have the luxury of being able to work through varying values of an extensive range of colours. Because you are working with sketching pastels, you don’t have the opportunity to apply too many layers.

BUT ….. this need not restrict you from exploiting techniques borrowed from Paul’s traditional method of painting. In so doing you will be able to achieve far richer results than you might suppose when working with sketching pastels. Results gained through the use of layers and correctly identified values of colour.

MORE USEFUL BOX-SETS from Artist & Author Paul Taggart…

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Lesson 3 - '[Series 3] Learn to Enjoy Painting in Sketching Pastels with Paul Taggart'

Because you are working with a limited palette, you don’t have the luxury of being able to work through varying values of an extensive range of colours. Because you are working with sketching pastels, you don’t have the opportunity to apply too many layers.

Which is where this method and the techniques demonstrated really will prove invaluable – for they afford you the opportunity to exploit as many techniques as possible to manipulate your pastels.

Lesson 3 and Artist & Author Paul Taggart continues with the first layer of pastels, now turning his attention to the trees. You will find that the strokes of colour seem almost indiscernible and this is deliberate, for Paul intends that the underlying watercolour layer is seen through the pastel. As with the sky, this layer is then blended; which is when the colour becomes more evident.

The effect of blending is to also knock back the colour, softening it as Paul goes along. The previously revealed texture of the pastel paper is also flattened out, as the pastel is pushed between the raised surface of the texture. Directional strokes of the blender mimic directional strokes of a brush and also the technique of ‘losing edges’ which you would use in painting with a brush. Colour is also picked up by the blender and helps to ‘pull’ colour across the surface as strokes in their own right – so you are in effect, painting with the blender, every bit as much as you are blending.

Then it is on to the white building in the background. Paul explains that having decided at the very outset that this building would not be as dominant as it appears in the photograph, it is now time to knock this back.

Negative painting also comes into its own at this stage, for in painting the roof, Paul is effectively describing the trees that overlay this building. You will come to understand how to exploit varying pressure when applying the pastel to achieve graduated colour on the surface, even though you will be working with one colour for the roof and the addition of white for the walls.

Blending is crucial on this element – all of which is revealed in close-up filming, Observe how the roof comes into being, from its light bottom edge to the darks of the roof line; working with just one colour, blending upwards, so that the colour and blending interact with the underlying dark painting to create the graduated appearance of the roof.

MORE USEFUL BOX-SETS from Artist & Author Paul Taggart…

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Lesson 5 - '[Series 3] Learn to Enjoy Painting in Sketching Pastels with Paul Taggart'

Because you are working with a limited palette, you don’t have the luxury of being able to work through varying values of an extensive range of colours. Because you are working with sketching pastels, you don’t have the opportunity to apply too many layers.

BUT ….. this need not restrict you from exploiting techniques borrowed from Paul’s traditional method of painting. In so doing you will be able to achieve far richer results than you might suppose when working with sketching pastels. Results gained through the use of layers and correctly identified values of colour.

Which is why each of the lessons in this series can be viewed as stand-alone tutorials in their own right; as here in Lesson 5, which you will find to be AN INVALUABLE LESSON IN EFFECTIVELY DESCRIBING THE VARYING CHARACTERISTICS in DIFFERENT SPECIES OF TREES.

You will find this AN INVALUABLE LESSON IN ACHIEVING A VARIETY OF COLOURS by EXPLOITING SURFACE COLOUR MIXING. You will also learn about the importance of rendering the correct values and how to go about achieving those.

You join Artist & Author Paul Taggart as he embarks on the second layer of pastel; in which you will be creating not only volume, but also introducing sunlight into the composition. As ever you will be working from the top of the composition downwards and as such, the trees are the first elements to get your attention.

Firstly, however, Paul needs to work up the reflected lights, which are the blue-biased cool colours throughout the trees. This he does either by using the available colours of pastels in the particular set of pastels, OR by surface colour mixing.

As ever this lesson is packed full of hints, tips and techniques, shared not only in what you can see through close-up shots and real-time filming, but just as importantly via Paul’s running commentary throughout. He shares with you reasons and consequences; such as where and when to apply highlights, where and when to apply yellow and hold back on the colour.

You will understand the function of blending and how to selectively manipulate blending to create volume and form. Paul explains how painting with a brush is emulated in the way in which you exploit the blender to enhance the structural qualities of the various trees.

Having completed the first pass through these trees in working up the reflected lights and creating the denser, softer darks and mid dark values you are then ready to move on to the sunlit, warmer sections.

As with any painting, you do need to pay attention when working through to the lightest highlights – patience in gradually doing so being the way to approach this. It is tempting to get those highlights applied, but pay particular attention to how Paul approaches this.

You will learn how to exploit varying pressures as you apply the pastel to the surface, how to exploit the piece of pastel in your grasp, how to exploit directional strokes and so much more.

In working through the section of trees, you will naturally work on the distant building and in so doing will also be negatively painting the trees that wrap around it.

Now work continues down the composition and the first eflected lights are placed across the ploughed field – this is about aerial perspective, vanishing points, perspective and so on – none of it is difficult, as you will soon discover through Paul’s simplification of the process.

MORE USEFUL BOX-SETS from Artist & Author Paul Taggart…