Around the Bend

This is amazing!!!!

Who needs pizza when you can paint Bob Ross? Smiling here now. Yet another masterpiece from you Dracula. The big trees are about the best I have seen. The water with its great color, shade and reflection, those solemn evergreens, the color variation in the bushes …. sheer poetry of painting!

Dracula, it is truly amazing landscape! I like it. I like these earthy colors, details! everything! Evergreens look great as usual! Dark water is great and those rocks! Orange bush brings it to life as it contrasts with those evergreens!

Top Top Top. Very nice.

I think this is my favorite one of yours yet. Fantastic job here. I really like the natural colors and the striking contrast with the orange autumnal bushes against all those green evergreens. Are you still using the dagger brush for the pine trees? I think it's about time you make a tutorial video and throw that up on Youtube. I'm sure many people would appreciate it! I know I would definitely follow along to it. What is the size of the canvas you used? Congrats once more!

Seeing paintings like this keeps me inspired to continue with my own paintings. Your attention to detail is excellent :) Assuming this is a 18x24, I should really up my regular size from 16x20 to 18x24 and aim for more detail in my work.

Thank you for all the kind words and encouragement; I really appreciate it! I am glad you enjoyed this one. I wasn't so sure about it, but now that I have fresh eyes on, it seems to have mostly worked out.

@AaronR: Yes, this is on an 18x24 canvas. I think given the size of the brushes we're using, I would have a more difficult time going smaller, even though, in some ways it would seem intuitive that a smaller canvas would be easier to manage. When I painted Mountain Summit with my mom a few weeks ago, she did hers on a 9x12 canvas and I think she may have found it confining.

@lightsnow: Yes, I am using the homemade bristle dagger brush here to finish the pine trees. I looked at my local art supply store to find a proper dagger brush, but they didn't really have something that would be a suitable replacement. The search continues...

Also, thank you for your suggestion that I produce a YouTube video tutorial. I think it's been mentioned before and, of course, if it would be helpful to people, I would be happy to do something like that. Let me ask: what kind of information and format would you (or anyone else who would be interested) find useful?

For me - how do you reach realistic colors. They are quite earthy. But i cannot figure out the trick. I think this most probably years of experience and not just a trick ! So will be very happy to learn from you. What do you normally paint outside Bob Ross technique? Is there a website to see your works?

@SunnyLady: Color intensity/chroma is something I think about a lot when I am painting. I am under the impression that Bob opts for such bright, saturated colors because he's compensating for the television cameras. Sometimes he uses Van Dyke Brown or Black to "dull it down" a bit when he's mixing colors. I tend to dull down most everything that's not the sky (and even that sometimes) and save my most intense color for accents and focal areas, like the orange bush in this painting. But you've probably noticed, even my "sparklers" are nowhere near the intensity of color that Bob uses on the TV show. I think traditionally, a lot of the classic landscape painters used a good deal of raw umber in their mixes to keep the colors a little less chromatic and more aligned with the natural colors of a landscape.

The way I figure it, especially with earth-based pigments, what's in the tube is an extremely concentrated version of a natural color and would only show up in pure form under special circumstances. I hope that makes sense.

That said, it's true, experience does help. As you practice seeing and mixing color, it becomes more intuitive. I have been making art for a long time, but nothing really for public consumption for about 10 years or more. I've long since taken down my websites and have just been practicing. Right now I am putting myself through a kind of landscape "curriculum" where I am painting Bob Ross paintings weekly, in one sitting, while concurrently doing studies after Hudson River School and French Barbizon painters over multiple sessions, which allows me to practice glazing and other techniques. At some point, I am hoping everything intersects and then I will strike out and make some of my own landscapes. I have a body of work in mind.

Great advice. I think you are right about Bob and the brighter colors. He mentioned it a few times on the show how he was making things brighter for the cameras. I think that's where the bulk of the criticism comes from, but when you look at his instructional books, the paintings are much more detailed and muted. He also mentioned using red as a "duller" in the shows a lot. I'll try this out! I was never really into those neon green bushes anyways.

I really enjoy your paintings. The way you bring light into your landscapes despite however dark the colors may be is something I hope to master one day. It looks amazingly natural and so realistic! You do a beautiful job of it.

@Dracula, Good job as always. I enjoy your posts. I was wondering: how long do you usually spend on a Ross painting? It takes me around 2 or 3 hours sometimes to complete each painting. Are you able to get your results in a comparable time?

Dracula, thanks for the insight about colors and techniques you learn. Somehow I missed your comment. Now I see where you take inspiration for your own masterpieces!

My first time seeing this dracula, it is amazing!