Susan's horses

Here is Susan's painting of wild horses. She has done a great job of placing them in the environment. I like the way that the distant mountains have character but are still second read and support the horses as the primary focus of the painting.  Susan's treatment of the grasses is excellent and much more interesting than the photo. Her painting as is, is too.




Here is the photo Susan is working from. She's done a great job of making the painting more interesting than the source. Notes are below.

1. In the painting, The area of the grasses between the horses on the left is competing because the value is quite light. By making the grasses darker, the horses pull more focus again.
2. As well as Susan has pushed the mountains back into the distance, she might consider adding a just little more broken blue back into them.
3. The forehead of this colt feels a bit wider and therefore more prominent than it could be.
4. In this one as well, the white of the forehead is larger and brighter than in the photo which makes the shape pulls forward more than it should. Also look here at how, in the photo, the back end of the horse goes towards the background and in the painting it flattens to the picture plane.
5. It feels as if the shapes above and to the side of the eyes has gotten a little large and loose. It undermines the structure of the skull. In the photo it appears as if maybe the forelocks have grown long and are the shape that is to the side of the eyes.
6. Keep an eye on the shape of the rear ends of the horses. I've cleaned them up a bit in the Photoshop notes  but the shapes aren't necessarily totally accurate to the photo.

I know that Susan is kind of over this piece but with a few quick moves with a small brush she can have another really good painting.