- (chuckles) Hi, I'm glad you could join me today.

You ready to do a fantastic little painting?

Well, come on, let's do it.

Let's start out and have them graphically run all the colors across the screen that you need to do this painting with me.

And they'll come across in the same order that I have them on the palette.

Starting with the titanium white and working around.

And I thought today we'd do a beautiful little winter scene.

I'm, you know, partial to winter scenes since I lived in Alaska for so many years.

So, let's go up here and do it.

I've already covered the canvas with a nice, thin, even coat of the liquid white.

It's wet, slick, and ready to go.

Then we'll start out with a little touch of the bright red.

And let me say that again.

Little touch.

It is very strong.

Just tap a little bit into the two inch brush there, just a small amount.

Okay, let's go right up here.

And maybe we'll come, let's go right in here.

And just put in a happy little glow.

Don't wanna set this on fire.

All we wanna do is create a little glow right across here.

Be careful, once again, this bright red can eat up your whole world in just a heartbeat.

There.

Now that's mixing with the liquid white and you get a beautiful warm glow.

And maybe we'll just put a little bit right down in here, what the heck.

Anything we don't like, we just cover up.

And if we like it, it's already there.

Even without cleaning the brush.

Same ol' dirty brush.

I'm going to go right into the least little touch of Indian yellow.

It's very transparent.

And I'm allowing that red that was already in the brush to mix with the yellow.

There we go.

Okay, let's go back up here.

Now right above the red, small amount of the Indian yellow.

And use little crisscross strokes, little Xs, and just blend all of that together.

Just like so, very soft and very quiet.

And we can just take and clean off the brush down here, we don't care.

Whatever.

(brush scraping) Okay, now then.

I have some midnight black going right here.

Take a little black and a little bit of the phthalo blue.

And we just mix it together right on the brush, just tap it.

I still have not cleaned the brush.

I'm lazy, if I can keep from cleaning the brush, boy, I'm all for that.

Okay, just go right up in here.

Still use the little crisscross strokes.

And drop in a happy little sky.

Just back and forth, let it come right down into there like so.

Get a little touch more of the color, it's just black and blue.

I put the black in there just to gray it a little bit.

All right.

Okay, let me clean the ol' brush now.

As you know, that's my favorite part of painting, is cleaning this ol' brush.

Shake off the excess.

(paint brush bangs) (chuckles) Just give it a nice little rap there.

Okay, now with just a clean dry brush, and be sure it's dry, be sure it's dry.

That may be one of the biggest single problem areas we hear people talk about is if the brush is not dry and they watch their painting drip right off on the floor.

Then they get upset with me and I really want this to work for you.

And I want you to be happy with it.

There we go.

Okay.

Very soft and gentle, just so you can blend this to any degree of softness that you want.

Just sort of look at it, make a decision, and go for it.

This is your painting, your world, so you can create any kind of illusion that you want on this piece of canvas.

Let's have some fun.

Take the ol' round brush.

I'm gonna go into a little bit of the Van Dyke brown, little dark sienna, (brush tapping) and just tap it, tap it very firmly.

(brush tapping) And let's go right up here.

Maybe right in here, way back in the distance lives a few happy little trees.

Just like so.

This would've been a good sky to, well, we might put a happy little cloud in there.

We'll go ahead and put these in.

(brush tapping) Just like so, there we go.

These will be far far away.

Okay, I'll tell you what, let's put a little cloud in there.

Just wanna show you how to do that.

We'll use a fan brush today.

Go right into the titanium white, pull it through, load a lot of paint into the bristles, a lot of paint.

Okay, let's go up here.

Maybe right in here lives a happy little cloud.

I use just the corner of the brush, turn it, wiggle it.

Now normally, you should do this before you start putting your background trees in.

I just change my mind decide I wanna put a little cloud in here.

But when you're doing this at home, I would really advise you do it before you put your background trees in.

Save you a lot of trouble.

There.

Now then, let's take (brush tapping) a nice, clean, dry brush.

And I'm using just the top corner of the two inch brush to blend the bottom of the clouds out, barely touching, tiny little circles, tiniest little circles.

See there?

Now lift it upward, this is big circle, big, grab it, lift it upward.

You're still just barely touching the canvas.

And then very lightly blend the entire sky.

See there?

And right here you can drop in a happy little cloud.

Clouds used to drive me crazy when I was a traditional painter.

I'd work for days trying to put in a little cloud.

Going back to my round brush, the dark sienna, the Van Dyke brown.

See, just really tap it in there.

Get tough with it, tap it hard.

Okay, let's go back up here.

I'll tell you, I'm having so much fun these little trees.

(brush tapping) There's one.

He lives right there, (brush tapping) right there.

Okay.

We don't want him to get lonely, let's give him a friend.

His friend lives there.

(brush tapping) Okay.

And where we're going down here.

We really don't have to worry about down here yet.

Little bit later we'll begin to worry about such things.

But right now, all we're doing is applying some very, very basic little shapes.

(brush tapping) See, maybe I just want that pinkish glow to be really shinning through the trees.

Look at that.

Maybe there's a nice tree that lives there.

Think about the shape of a tree.

Just think about it.

Make up little stories about trees.

This one's a little taller.

(brush tapping) There.

You can get carried away with these.

I like to do trees.

You know, we travel all over the country doing demonstrations for PBS stations and other fantastic groups all over the country.

And it's unreal some of the fantastic new modern equipment they've come out with.

Recently, I was doing a demonstration in a small town, and there was probably about, oh, I don't know, 150, 200 people had showed up.

And they gave me a fantastic new microphone and it was wireless.

(chuckles) I didn't have any wires or anything on it and I forgot it was on.

So, just before the show I went to the bathroom.

Needless to say with a wireless mic when I came back everybody knew where I'd been.

And even worse, what I'd been doing.

(brush tapping) I have to learn to be careful sometimes.

All right, there we go.

We got a basic tree line in here, if we wanna call it that.

(brush tapping) All we're doing is just tapping.

Now then, let's take the ol' script liner brush and I'll dip it in a small amount of paint thinner.

And I want this paint to be just like water, a liquid.

Turn that brush, that pulls it to a nice sharp point.

See how sharp it is?

And it has long bristles on it.

Okay, let's go up here.

Now, here and there put in a happy little tree trunk.

Just drop them in wherever you want 'em.

Maybe there's one that lives right there.

And let these ol' trunks just sort of wiggle and jiggle and carry on.

We don't want them all to be future telephone poles.

Keep 'em moving.

If you have trouble making your paint stick, add a little more of the paint thinner.

Okay, maybe up in this ol' tree there's a big one that lives there.

Turn that brush as you're pulling this down.

Turn it.

Allow it to pick up all the color that's underneath.

There we go.

And we're gonna cover up most of that.

We're not really looking for a lot of detail right here.

Just some basic shapes.

Let's go over in this one, I don't want him to be left out.

Give him a little trunk.

And maybe here's one sticking out through there like that.

One right there, maybe it goes right off the canvas.

We don't know where it goes.

All right.

(water sloshing) Now then, I wanna take another round brush and I wanna begin highlighting some of these things and really making them stand out.

So, start off with a touch, this is titanium white and then I'm gonna pick up a little bit of the phthalo blue.

And maybe I should say that a little stronger.

A little bit.

Whew.

It's like the red, it is very, very strong, very powerful.

It'll eat up all the white in the world in just a matter of a second.

Let's see, tap that brush.

You really wanna get a lot of paint in there.

Lot of paint.

Just go up to the canvas.

Now, I want this painting to have both some cool colors in it and some nice warm colors.

So, let's go right up here and I'm just gonna use a top corner of the brush and begin tapping all kinds of little things like that.

Maybe I'll add a little more white to my colors so you can see it a little better.

There you go, there, see?

Just all kinds of little, little frosty things.

And if you have trouble making your paint stick, add a small amount of the liquid white.

See, you just sorta dip it right down into a little liquid white and then go back through it.

And because this is a little thinner, then this will stick very easily.

Takes very little pressure on the brush.

There we go.

Now then, right here maybe lives a happy little bush, see?

See, there he is.

This is what keeps a little rabbit warm in the winter.

He's got to have a place to cuddle up and be cozy.

We don't want him out here in this cold.

We're gonna have snow down here.

(brush tapping) Now then I'm going back to my other round brush and with that I'm going to do a little bit of yellow to the bright red, a little yellow ochre, cad yellow and into the red, okay?

Let's go back up here.

Now right here, where this nice glow is I wanna use some nice warm colors.

Just let them sort of bounce through.

Just let them bounce through, add a little more.

Look at there, look at there.

See 'em?

Just let all those little things happen and work in layers.

Maybe on this tree here, see the light's playing through there?

Look at there, all those little colors.

Beautiful little things happen.

This is all the yellows with a little bright red.

Now since our light's coming through there, over here too, we'll sparkle these up with a little color.

Still working in layers.

(brush tapping) Indian yellow, little bit of the red.

Let's go right up here, put a little bit out in here.

There.

This ol' round brush makes a fantastic little leaf effects for distant trees.

I really like it for distant trees.

There we go.

Don't wanna get too much, about like that.

Now I'm going back to my round brush that has the blue and the white on it.

And let's begin playing some of those colors right into it.

So it just looks like a light striking over there on the side.

Every once in a while I'm gonna add a little bit more of the liquid white so it sticks easy.

Okay, right here we just sorta let these come together.

Look at that, all the little warm colors and the cool colors are all playing together there.

Okay, let's go back over here.

Maybe there's a happy little tree.

And we can just quickly draw upon a few little things here and there.

Think about some basic patterns.

Just don't throw things on at random.

There's one right there.

Wherever you want 'em.

And you can put as many or as few in your world as you want.

And if you want to look like they're hanging down, use more of the brush and just tap downward.

It's also a super way if you're painting weeping willows.

They're beautiful trees.

And they're probably one of the easiest trees there are to paint.

(brush tapping) There we go.

See all kinds of little hangy downs.

Okay.

Now while I got this ol' dirty brush going here, I'm just going to pull a little bit of this color just like so.

I begin thinking about the lay of the land out here.

And all we're doing here is just putting in some base color.

We're not really concerned about what it is at this point.

There, just some happy little things.

(brush scraping) And it's picking up some of those browns and all the colors that we have in the trees and pulling all that out too.

But it gives you a feeling of the lay of the land.

It gives you a starting point, something to work with.

Okay, let me find my fan brush here, we'll get him.

And let's begin putting in some details.

We'll go right into titanium white.

A touch, just a touch of the bright red, okay?

Now then you have to make some big decisions.

Where's the snow?

Let it begin playing, pulling it across.

See, use very little pressure and the colors underneath shows through.

And it automatically will make beautiful shadows for you.

There's all these little bumps and stuff.

See there, just create all kinds of happy little things.

There comes one, I see one right there.

See, then blend it out a little, just like so and come right on across.

And you just keep going with 'em, however many you want.

There's another one.

Just layer after layer after layer.

(brush scraping) Okay, now then let's have some fun, make some big decisions.

What else do we want in here?

Maybe we will have a happy little cabin.

You know me, I'm crazy about little cabins.

So, let's try that.

I'll tell you what, we'll paint the cabin, let's use ol' big brush today.

We'll take the two inch brush, pull it through the paint.

Now I'm using the dark sienna and the Van Dyke brown, and just mix them on the brush.

See when you pull it, wiggle it.

Wiggle it, both sides and then sharpen it, just like you would a knife.

Just pull it right through there.

And look at the sharp edge, look at that.

Comes to a very sharp chiseled edge.

Okay, let's go right up here.

Now you got to make a big decision.

Where's your little cabin live?

Or maybe today we'll have a big ol' cabin.

Now I'm gonna do the back eave first.

So, we just paint it on like so.

Load a little more paint and then we pull it straight down.

All we're doing here is applying a base color.

Okay, we need other side of the house.

See there, just pull it down.

And a lot of paint, lot of paint on that.

We want that to be very strong.

Then another side right here, straight down.

Like that.

Now since our light source is coming from here, we want this side of the cabin to be lighter than over here.

So, over here be sure this side is good and dark, real dark so it stands out nice.

Okay, now same ol' dirty brush.

I'm gonna go right into a little bit of the white, a little blue, and just tap a little bit on the brush.

See, just little on the brush here.

(brush tapping) Do both sides and you can see it a little better maybe.

See there?

Okay, let's go back up here.

Now then I want this to look like old weathered wood.

So, all I'm gonna do is just start touching and letting it bounce and come right down.

Can you see that?

It looks like it's old, old, old.

Looks like my house.

Okay, now I'm gonna do the same thing, only I'm gonna make it darker.

Once again, add a little black to it.

Once again, we want the side over here to be darker, so load a lot of paint.

Let's go back up here.

Now then over here we want the same basic thing.

See, just barely touching and let it work down so that it looks old.

You're sorta touching and pushing at the same time.

Put a little bit on this side, like that, come right on down.

Well, that ol' house is about to fall over.

Now then we can take the knife and work on our perspective here a little bit.

See here, you can just cut it off wherever you want it, just like so.

And we need a roof on that cabin.

So, we'll take some of the titanium white, we'll use a knife and just go right up here and lay in a little snow-covered roof.

It's that simple, just let it work right down.

And you can take and clean this edge up, make it nice and smooth.

Let it overhang a little bit.

Then grab it and pull.

There you go, see how easy it is to make a happy little cabin?

Put a little snow on this side, like that.

(knife scraping) Now the least, least little touch of the phthalo blue.

I wanna make it look like there's an edge on here.

A little blue over here.

Just phthalo blue with white, tiniest, tiniest little amount.

All righty, I'll tell you what let's do, let's take the Van Dyke brown and pull it out, very flat, cut across and get just the smallest little roll of paint right on the edge of the knife.

Now then, right along here we'll just touch and make the indication of all kind of little boards, old weathered boards.

There we go, doodle, doodle-doo, doo, doo, doo, doo.

See and you can put as many boards in your cabin as you want.

Put some out here, like so.

And we can take our liner brush with just a little liquid white on it and we'll put the indication of some happy little icicles hanging off here.

There we go.

There we go, few over on this side.

However many, whatever.

(water sloshing) That give us a little icicle.

And this ol' guy he's probably like me, ran out of storage space.

I'm a junk-saver.

So, maybe he had to build him a little shed that lives right there.

Here's the side, (whistles) like so.

Gotta put a roof on his shed, don't want his shed to get full of snow.

There, just a happy little roof.

Little touch of some highlight out here, just barely touching.

And we need some boards on that, too.

Okay, then we, once again, cut it off like that.

Tell you what let's do, let's just put in a window right here.

There's one and there's one.

Looks like two big eyes.

We'll take a little bit of cad yellow.

We'll just make the indication that maybe somebody's home and the lights are on.

There.

That easy.

We'll take a little touch of the liquid black and just go right around these that easy and make 'em stand out.

There we go.

Now we know somebody's home.

Okay, let's go back to our fan brush.

And we can begin coming right in here and bringing all this together.

If you pick up a little bit of that brownish color, don't worry about it, don't worry about it.

It makes beautiful shadows, beautiful little shadow.