windows in 1st study
ABOVE: This is how the windows came out in the initial study I did for the Empire State Building painting I am working on. These buildings are medium depth between some close up street signals and the far away Empire State Building. In my photo there are a lot of reflections and details including black around the panes of glass etc. In this study I didn’t worry too much about them, concentrating more on the colors of the buildings. I thought they were ok, but wanted to improve for the final painting.
windows study
ABOVE: On this one I was actually trying on the windows. I did different things here and there to see what would work. But nothing really worked. Putting the dark around the windows made them look like cartoons. Plus that level of detail is more detail than the street signals have, and those are a lot closer. This seemed a mess, plus how am I agoing to get any suggestion of the various facades and shadows on the buildings?
Back to the windows, I thought I could get a China marker to blot them out and then paint over them to preserve their whiteness. I had decided against frisket because I could just as easy paint around them like I did in the first picture, plus I don’t like how frisket gives odd edges on smaller areas.
So this is what happened with the China marker:
windows with china marker
An interesting effect, but it’ll completely be out of place with those blotty edges ( I went in with a dark color around the china marker after the initial wash). Plus it looks kind of frantic and cartoon like and will be out of place with the rest of the painting.
I think I have to do another study similar to the first – not too much detail.
Anyway, here is where I am at with the painting so far; The ONE WAY sign is pointing to where these buildings are in the painting.
Empire State Building watercolor in progress
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: art, art theory, cityscape, empire state building, painting, shadows, Sketches, tonal values, Watercolor, watercolour, window
Hi Chris,
I usually leave my windows for last because most of the time they have darks in them during the day. Night windows with lights on, I do first. I would try working your buildings and larger shadows first and deal with the windows last. This way you will have a better idea what you need to do to balance the detail with the traffic light in front. What do you think about that idea?
That’s a good suggestion. I was just trying a few other things and I came to the conclusion for this one that I need to forget about all the little details and reflections in each window and just go with one or two tones for each window. Once I put in the main values for the building I can better judge the values for each of the windows. I think the interesting thing is that the building has three sections, each a different value, and each section has windows that are a mix of different values as well, some above and some below the value of each section
Just saying, “Hi” and watching for the the return of Chris.