Looks Like I'm Done...

...dragging the ladder for a while. I've found the angle I want, so now the real photography can begin in earnest.


Methodically over the next ten days (and just in time to catch the full moon), I will catch high tides, low tides, bright light to moonlight.


This photograph represents the scale and scope of this series of paintings.

- jb boyd

After Painting In The Reflections...

...this painting is really coming to life.


There are still a few pink spots (from the tinted base layer) showing through, but as this layer will be covered by another, it is not expedient to worry about every last blade of grass. That's what the final layer is for!


Finally, because numbers to me are simply numbers, this pic should help show the scale of the works in progress. The smallest rectangle is a dollar bill. But if you are a numbers person, from top to bottom and in inches the dimensions are: 2.75 x 6, 2.75 x 16, and 8 x 60.

- jb boyd

After Beginning The Day...

...dragging a ladder through the mud, my day quickly was consumed by my computer.



An overdue website update is complete (so if you want a new screen saver, drag and drop it the "photos" section), more angles of Grey Bay are stitched together, emails answered, and prints ready for shipping. Life is good.



Except for Colin and his parents. They have the very hard choice to pick one of these three images for the saw. Colin photographed some amazing vistas along his Appalachian Trail trek...



Which one would you pick?

- jb boyd

Smaller Gets Bigger...

...when you work background to foreground.


It gets easier because you build a rhythm, even though the brushes don't get appreciably larger.


All shapes follow rules, and the more you understand them, the easier it is to replicate them.


But I am excited that this only the dress rehearsal, and the real show is still around the corner.

- jb boyd

Even By My Standards...

...this painting is coming along slowly.


Perhaps I have been distracted by photographing and photoshopping, hindered by my back being out of whack (minor ladder accident) and having to spend a significant amount of time on the studio floor to pull and pry the discomfort out, or maybe I should just reevaluate my standards.


I am a slow painter. I started numbering my paintings in 1998. Fourteen years later and I am approaching 100 landscapes.


Yup, this painting is right on schedule!

- jb boyd

Over The Past Week...

...I have been scouting out the location for my next series of paintings. The subject is Grey Bay, the body of water surrounded by marsh.


At low tide, the bay is nearly empty, except for the exposed oyster beds, while at high tide (and on a calm day), the bay is a glassy reflection pool.


This series of paintings will mimic the range of these photos, from low to high tide, full sun to moonlit.


But right now is all about finding the right angle, and once that is settled, I can really refine the mood, tide, and overall feel for each reference image.


Tomorrow though will once again be about dragging my ladder through the mud to find that perfect angle...

- jb boyd

Photorealism...

...is an often overused term, but in this case it may be apt. The photorealists of the 70's set out to make paintings that replicated photographs exactly.


I usually use photos to capture the chaos and detail of nature, avoiding the gross generalities of plein air paintings. But this little painting is more of the former and less of the later, as I am using only a photo for reference.


The funny thing is our eyes work like a shallow depth of field camera lens, but our brains are quick to compensate to make whatever we want to focus on be in focus. Here, the focus is the foreground orchid, so I painted the background, stem, and second flower wet so the edges are soft and blurry.


Using a razor I can cut or "erase" the flower on top, and painting it over the dry background the front edges remain sharp. Now all that is left is to let these petals dry and paint the next on top, keeping those sharp edges too.

- jb boyd

I Started This Painting...

...perhaps back in May while I was finishing "ul 98 (so real)." It is the first of the three remaining Grey Bay landscapes. I adored the composition, but the companion piece, a nighttime moonlight view of the same scene, scared me on a technical level.


Instead of making this a centerpiece for my then upcoming show, I hid it in storage to be completed at a later date.


Hello today! And if all lines up right, this may end up being my 100th landscape painting, which, bear with me, I may turn into a very big deal, cause, well, I can! I think?...

- jb boyd

Without Getting Into Details...

...(which you will almost never read me writing here), I almost left Goat Island for good this month. It was time, and I was ready for a landscape change. But there were three landscapes left I still wanted to tackle, and that irked me. Then things changed, and I get to stay!


So with no day like today, I tromped the trusty ladder across the island in search a man made perch to capture a certain view. This is close, and is a great start to tackling one of the remaining three...

- jb boyd

Presently Working On Presents...

...in my studio. The saw is coming along, with a little extra time spent to make sure the edges of the teeth are completely sealed.


In art school people would constantly remark on the edges of my paintings (perhaps because I was the odd realist out in a markedly abstract school and no one knew what to do with the kid who painted photorealistic clouds on deep gallery stretchers) which has served me well in later years.


Conservatorialy speaking, edges and the corners they form are the weakest point of a painting. If not sealed correctly (and sadly 9 out of 10 are not) the paint will slowly eat away at the edges (oil paint gives off heat as it dries over it's lifetime) or in this case, rust can form and eat into the painted areas.


But because I am a stickler for the details and seal each panel (or saw) front and back from sides to sides, hopefully my paintings will last an extra couple of hundred years (big fingers crossed) with a minimum of conservatorial effort.

- jb boyd

To Paraphrase My Favorite...

...cigar smoking A-Teamer, "I love it when a plan comes together!"


And with a lot of little mark making to create a wavy sea (and even better some delayed posting to make it look quick) poof, "us 23 (howl)" is complete.


- jb boyd

The Horizon Line...

...is the most important part of a landscape painting, and I usually devote an entire day to it's creation. It is not a straight line, as the world is not flat, but an ever so subtly curved line.


The trick is to make it curved enough to not be flat, but flat enough to not be noticeably curved, and then the brain will take over and read it as flat. Next time you see a landscape painting and something appears just a little bit off, check the horizon line from the side of the painting.


Chances are it is yard stick straight, or even more nauseating and vertigo inducing, higher on one side or the other.

- jb boyd

Little Paintings...

...require little brushes. And I thought this a fun shot of all the colors that get packed into a sunset.


Because the weather has turned cold, I can manipulate the drying time of my paints, which is helpful when using little brushes, as this sky took almost four days to complete.


But since the drying time is longer, there is no noticeable seam, just one smooth luminous sky.

- jb boyd