Weekly BobBlast Issue 399 - Best of BobBlast

Weekly BobBlast Issue 399

Best of BobBlast - Quick and Easy Figures

Welcome Back to Another BobBlast!

In this BobBlast I demonstrate some fun exercises about how to quickly suggest the figure in your landscape painting. The addition of figures is a simple way to help heighten interest. It helps to suggest the narrative and may also explain the title of the painting.

As you can see in this week’s video, I practice a whole row of sketchy “figures” that may have started out as “carrots” - I practice in black and white. I start off with a small, round dot (the head) then move the brush down to the bottom of the carrot, giving yourself creative freedom to wiggle the brush a little to suggest shoulders or hips. The last stroke anchors the carrot figure to the ground and gives it a shadow.

Use a large brush - no skinny handled two-hair brushes - ever! Besides, you’ll poke your eye out with that thing. Practice these carrot figures for several rows. The full sheet (22x30 inches) looks like a crowd of people. Don’t spend a long time on each, or make them perfect - they are sketches at this point.

Next - add clothes to these figures! Use color to give them different combinations - top of the carrot may appear as a colorful shirt, the bottom could be pants… you might even have a row of golfers!

You can also use Rembrandt-style lighting technique for your carrot exercises - remember with this style of lighting the top of the background is gradated dark at the top, to light at the bottom. The figure is light at the top, at the head and dark towards the bottom, at the feet. The mantra you hear me saying constantly is "Dark against Light... Dark against Light…"

These carrot people are ready to make an appearance in your landscapes! Pretty soon you’ll start seeing figures in all your loose abstracts!

Add a Figure. It adds life to your work!

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We Have Zooms:

Thursday, February 24 - 5:30pm PT

Wednesday, March 2 - 4:30pm PT

Friday, March 4 - 6:00pm PT

Monday, March 7 - 9:00am PT

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Online Workshops - Broadcast from Burridge Studio!

•Non-Objective Abstract Painting - April 1-2, 2022

•Paint the Effects of Light - April 21, 2022

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Something New - ASK BOB!

Special Q&A Session plus a Demo

March 29 • 10:00am PT

"Bob's Favorite Brushes & Other Tools"

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Online Abstract Figure Workshops