Silver Creamer

Along the lines of one of my earlier demonstrations, I thought it might be fun to create another page with a sequence of photos of a painting in progress, with some comments about the process itself.

I start by choosing a model, which in this case is a small silver creamer with some interesting tarnish patterns on the surface:

The first step is to create a simple drawing using thin paint. In many ways this is the most important step in the painting.

The next several images show the "color wash" stage of the painting. Extremely thin washes of paint are applied to work out the basic color/value relationships. It also serves to tone the canvas in the final colors or the painting, which is superior to toning with a single color. Here I am laying the shadow under the creamer, which is the darkest area of the painting.

Some of the larger color masses are then laid in. The paint is so thin and transparent, it essentially becomes a watercolor technique.

The laying in of tones on the object is essentially completed now.

At this point, I "smeared up" the paint on the creamer, essentially to cover any of the white areas that were still showing though. While seeing toned areas of the canvas showing through in a final painting can often be a beautiful effect (some of the impressionists exploited this very well), I never want to see any of the white of the canvas. It invariably looks amateurish.

I now apply some paint for the board the creamer is sitting on. I was concerned with conveying some of the sense of the flow of the light across the board. While this application of the paint achieves that, it is too dark.

The paint is now applied to the remaining area, and generally lightened up.

I now begin working with full, opaque paint. Here the board is painted in...

..and the darker areas of the creamer.

The lighter areas are painted in, and the surface is modeled some more. To me, the most interesting feature of the creamer is the years of tarnish that have built up, so I spend a fair amount of time simulating that effect.

I now apply the highlights which really bring the metal to life.

With a few more adjustments to the edges of the shadows, the painting is complete.