Last day of my workshop

Hi again, it's day three of our workshop, the final day.  The weather is perfect and we carpooled to a pond on top of a mountain.  We all had to work from one side as it was almost impossible to get around it.  Mark set up and looked off to his left and his focal point was a white rock.  He blocked everything in thinly and then set about painting that rock, using mostly a palette knife. He doesn't go back and play around once he lays things in. Mark analyzes everything considering light and shadow color. He says hone your skills of observation, see everything and then make decisions about it. Some of his greens are very intense and that threw me a bit as I tend not to use very saturated greens but it works for him. He likes to start with his focal point and

get that right. Also as I mentioned earlier he doesn't normally complete his plein air paintings but he makes sure to complete at least one element in a painting so he has shadow and light conditions correct.  He tries so hard to produce exactly what he sees.  He doesn't use burnt sienna, he doesn't like earth colors as he says they are dead colors. 

After lunch we all set up to paint, I was determined to get a completed painting. I did not work on a oil primed panel, I had brought some linen panels that were acrylic primed and I'm comfortable with those.  With such a small group he was very available to offer help. The sun of course went in so we were dealing with cool light and warm shadows.  I painted this grouping of trees with the fallen tree in the middle, came out ok. I felt a little better about things. You would like the teacher to think you are capable of painting something, anything, lol. 

Thoughts about the workshop.  It was expensive, $900 for three days but with the small group I felt it was worth it. 

Slow down

Paint with purpose

Lay down correct strokes

Start thin and transparent

Be excited about your subject

I plan to review my notes over and over and work on things.  I painted out today and started with transparent colors and told myself to slow down.  No regrets, it was a great experience.