Just one thing

If you have ever gone outdoors to paint en plein air, or if you are using a photo for your reference, I am sure you will recognise the feeling of being overwhelmed by detail. There is just too much of it! And the tendency can be to try and paint it all in.

The only problem with this is that the resulting painting can look messy and without a focus. The viewer doesn’t know what the painting is about because we have confused them with too many points of interest.

What I am learning is that it is much better to hone in on just one focal point, one centre of interest, one main player, and let the rest of the painting support that one thing.

Let me show you what I mean.

I painted the snow-scene above a couple of years ago on a freezing day in the hills. What attracted my attention and made me want to paint it was the light on the distant snow-capped mountains. Yes, the buildings were interesting as well, and I added the foreground tree because it was there.

Big mistake number 1. You don’t need to paint things just because they are there!

This tree became a problem. Where does your eye go when you look at the painting? To the light on the far hills (my intention), or to the tree in the foreground? There is a conflict of interest here.

So I decided to see what I could do to rectify the situation and save the painting. I opened up a copy of it on my tablet in a free app called Infinite Painter, and began to play around with it, first removing the tree, (1), and then adding in a bit more shadow on the snow in the foreground to draw the eye into the distance, (2). This is a good trick!

1

2

Then I added some twigs in the foreground snow and the odd rock as well to try and create a path to lead the eye backwards, (3), but abandoned these in the final new studio painting (4). I chose not to paint them because they weren’t really necessary as I made the light on the mountains stronger so your eye is lead there anyway.

3

4 final painting

I hope I’ve made a better painting second time around by simplifying the scene, highlighting (literally) the focal point, and leading the eye there by the tonal values. The foreground distraction has gone, so we now know what the painting is about. It tells a story.

the original plein air painting

the studio painting

What do you think? Let me know in the comments below. Thanks for reading this – please give a thumbs up if you have found it helpful.

#centreofinterest #enpleinair #learningtopaint #snowscene #oilpainting #focalpoint