August 11, 2026
I’m showing you my process for developing ideas for paintings.
When I'm on a gallery delivery trip, I spend as much time as possible exploring the area with my camera at my favorite times of day when the light is to my liking. Sometimes it's overcast or the wrong time of day and I have to return another time. For me, it takes planning to be in the right place at the right time.
Once I'm back home, I use Photoshop to examine my raw photos for possible painting ideas. Sometimes it takes a long time of gestation before an image is just right, and I make many changes to the composition, color, etc. I usually wind up combining bits and pieces from other reference photos.
The first photo is one of the raw images I took while exploring Cannon's Point Preserve on Saint Simons Island, Georgia. I had many wonderfully-lit captures from this visit that were the more obvious choices for paintings. So now, about three years later, I have come back to this image and started developing it into a better composition. The second photo shows my finished working photo that I printed to work from. It is in the same proportions as the canvas size I chose which makes it easier to upscale the design onto my canvas.
After deciding what my colors are going to be, I chose a raw umber and raw sienna wash to tone the canvas and then wiped out the light areas with a rag to give me the basic design. When this dried, I sketched a few lines to indicate the trees and palmettos.
In stage two, I had planned on a block-in of color, but it became hard to determine if I was getting the color and values I wanted. I wound up painting much of this alla prima—all at once. Stage 3 shows the results by the end of the same day. The white areas are still raw canvas at this point. I will let this dry for several days before finishing.