Leah's canal pianting update

 Here is Leah's most recent painting of her canal with trees painting. Notice that she started a new one on a more horizontal 2x1 ratio canvas. I was dubious but Leah made it work really well.I think that there is a lot of really good work here and if she were to stop now it would be a good painting. I particularly like the nice sense of light in the shadow on the rocks. That's really well done. The dark line where the rocks meet the water is also really effective.


If there were a few things I'd consider changing 1. I'd look to the size relationships and the angle of the trees in perspective. I extended Leahs photo a little to show the height of the closer trees to the right.

2. I really like what Leah did with the sky above the trees. It's lighter closer to the horizen and she's show that while still putting a little more color than indicated in the photo. As we've talked about before, the lights in a photo can become a little blown out if the darks and middle tones are the primary focus. The reason the reflection of the sky on the water is darker is because it is reflecting the sky above it which is typically darker, I felt that color in the photo was a little darker and more intense than what we're seeing in the sky above the trees to the point that there is almost no relationship between the two. So Leah can lighten and muddy the water a little which will tie it to the nice sky she painted. It's super close.
3. Maybe hit a few more of the darks in between the rocks in the shadows.

 Here are a few quick Photoshop notes

1. Just to show a few more darks between the rocks. Not everywhere but pick a few spots. I added a few light purple/blue lights on the rocks in shadow to indicate the blue ambient light.
2. Just a little lighter greyer water with a few horizontal lines.
3. I made the trees in the right side a bit taller and the trees to the left a little smaller than in Leah's original without growing them too much. The contrast between light and dark side is less as the trees recede.
4. You can see that the contrast between light side and dark sin the near trees is greater. I didn't push it to the extent you see in the photo reference and it could be pushed more in the painting. I made the light side slightly warmer and varied the edges and interior light and dark shapes in a few places to show how they can be differentiated.
5. Note that the red bushes have shadow sides as well.

Nice job Leah.