- Hi, I'm Bob Ross, and for the next 13
weeks, I'll be your host, as we experience The Joy of Painting. I think each of us,
sometime during our life, has wanted to paint a picture. I think there's an artist hidden in the bottom of
every single one of us. And here we will try to show you how to bring that artist out, to put it on canvas. Because you too, can
paint almighty pictures. You know, we have avoided
painting for so long because I think, all of
our lives, we've been told that you have to go to
school half of your life, maybe even have to be blessed
by Michelangelo at birth to ever be able to paint a picture. And here we want to show
you that that's not true. That you can paint a
picture right along with us. Each week we'll use the same colors, we'll use the same equipment, so if you have your brush
and pallet ready next week, you can paint right along with us. I'd like to go over some of the equipment that we'll use before we start. The brushes that we use. I'll be using very large,
two and a half inch, and one inch, natural bristle brushes. Now these are natural bristle. Be sure you don't start
with a nylon brush. We'll use an almighty palette knife. And this is much different than the traditional palette knife. It is not thin and flimsy,
it's a firm palette knife. And with this we can make
fantastic things happen. Let's go over the colors that we'll use. We're gonna start out
here with Titanium white, Phthalo green, Prussian blue, Van Dyke brown, Alizarin crimson, Sap green, Cad yellow, and Permanent red. Now these eight colors, we'll
use each and every week, for every picture that we do. So you don't have to go out and buy 1500 different
kinds of colors and brushes. You need very little
equipment to paint with this. Another thing, we'll do no
tracing of patterns on here. We start with the vision in our heart, and we put it on canvas. And we're here to teach you
to be able to do this too. So, let's do it. Let's paint a picture right here. We're gonna to start with a big brush, and were gonna cover the canvas with a thin layer of magic white. Now this is a wet-on-wet technique, so the first thing were going
to do is get the canvas wet. And all we want is a nice,
even coat of paint here. There we go. Just cover it nice and even. You also need an almighty
easel when you're doing this. You need an easel that will
hold your canvas very firm, and allow you to use these big brushes. Okay. When you're using a large brush like this, it really doesn't take too
long to cover your canvas. And if you get a hair like that, just pop it off with the
corner of your brush, flip it away. Okay. Now after you get your canvas
covered with a magic white, we'll take and make long
strokes back and forth to get a nice even
distribution of paint on here. Okay. Up and down one time. That assures that the magic white's nice and even all the
way across the canvas. Okay, let's wash the brush out here. We wash our brushes with
odorless paint thinner. Okay, we'll wash them out. And I beat the brush
just to dry the bristles. Now let's take a little
bit of Cad yellow here, and I think today we'll
do a picture that's, maybe like were walking through the woods. And so let's start right here with a little bit of Cad yellow, with just the least little
touch of Phalo green in it. And we'll out a little bit
more of the green color, and we'll begin making little X's, just like so. Just work that around. Okay. Now without cleaning the brush, we'll go right into some Prussian blue. Just add it right onto the brush here. We'll just go out here. And were making the crisscross
strokes, little X strokes. There. Already we're beginning
to have a light source in this painting. Okay, now we'll clean the brush again. Once again, this is
odorless paint thinner. We do not use turpentine. Now with a nice clean brush, I'm gonna take and add just a
little bit of Titanium white, right here in the center. Just a little. And we'll begin working outward. There. By now maybe you have recognized some of the equipment we're using as something you've seen before. And I learned this fantastic
technique wonderful man that I think all of us have enjoyed for many many years on TV, Bill Alexander. And Bill taught me this many years ago. It is the most fantastic way to paint that you've ever seen. So join us. Have some fun. And we'll just blend this
out a little bit more here. Until we have a nice blue sky. There we go. Okay, we'll clean the brush one more time. Now let's start putting in
some almighty trees here. We're gonna start with a
little bit of Alizarin crimson, and a touch of Prussian blue. Now the Prussian blue is
100 times stronger than the Crimson, so use just a
little blue and a lot of Crimson. And here we're going to begin
pushing in basic tree shapes. So just bend the brush. Bend the brush. Make those little leaves and branches just pop right out at you. There he comes. These little son of a
guns hide in your brush and you just have to push them out. This is your world, your creation. Let's put a little one right here. And maybe we'll just put
some little grassy areas coming down through here. And right there, there is one. You're pushing quite firm here. This is why I say you
need an almighty easel when you're doing this,
an easel that's strong. Okay. Maybe over here on this side now, we'll add another one. Maybe a bigger one over here. There he is. And there's no secret to
this, anybody can paint. Anybody can paint. All you need is a dream in
your heart, a little practice. There, already we have the
beginning of a beautiful picture. We have the tree shapes, the light source. Looks to me like it's
early in the morning. Okay. Now, let's put some trunks on these trees. And for that will take a
little bit of Van Dyke brown, and let's just lay in
some basic trunks here. There we go. And maybe we'll put a little
limb right here, like so. Maybe a little something right there. There we are. Okay, now this little fellow over here, he needs a trunk too. So we'll put one right in here. And maybe some limbs up in here. Right through here, there we go. Just some indications here and there, and some little sticks and twigs. Maybe over here. There we are. Okay. Now we'll highlight these, and we'll take a little bit of white, and a touch of brown mixed together. And remember where your light source is. So this tree, we'll highlight right here. Like so. There we are. Now over on this side, the light's coming through here, so we'll highlight this side of it. Maybe a few little
indications up through here. Now comes the fun. Now we can begin putting
all the beautiful leaves and stuff on this, and just
really make it come alive. So here, we'll take a little
bit of the magic white, to thin our paint. One of the golden rules in this, this is a thin paint, we'll
stick to a thick paint. So anytime you're painting
over the top of paint, you need to have a paint that's
just a little bit thinner. We'll take a little bit of Phalo green and a little bit of yellow, and we load the brush full of paint. And out light's coming through here, so we want the side of the tree to be a little brighter
than the other side. All right. And then we begin pushing thousands of little leaves on here. They hide in your brush. There they come. Just a little on this side over here, because not as much light's gonna strike. A little's come through, but not as much. And look at that. In just a matter of a few minutes, we have a beautiful tree. Now maybe, this little tree over here, we'll put a little highlight on him. And once again, we're using a paint that's a little bit
thinner, so that it sticks. First thing that you have
to do when you're doing this is start with an oil paint
that's very, very firm. Your base paint has to be extremely firm. If you start with a thin, loose paint, your gonna become a mud mixer. You have to have a thick
paint on the base coat in order to get this
thinner paint to stick. Now let's begin building some
bushes and stuff in here. All right, look at that. You can do it, I know you can. There, look there. Okay let's move to this
big tree in the front here and let's put some nice
little leaves up here on him. You have to bend that brush. If the brush doesn't bend,
you're not gonna get all these beautiful little leaves, these
little actions that happen. Okay, maybe there's a nice little bush that lives right here. You know if you've ever
walked through the woods early in the morning, all the
little creatures are out here. They're all playing in
the bushes and stuff. This is where they live. In all these bushes. Okay, let's put something
on this side now. Nice little bush here. Just let your imagination run wild. Let your heart be your guide. In the time you sit
around worrying about it, trying to plan out painting, you could have completed
a painting already. Let it happen, let it happen. You know for so many years
I was a traditional painter, and I would spend sometimes
weeks just working on a picture, drawing it out, getting all
the little sketches and stuff. And then I'd go back
and spend maybe a month trying to fill in the blocks. And here, we let it happen. It comes right out of here, it's in you. And you put it on the canvas. Okay, let's see. Let's try this big ole tree here, put some nice little leaves on him. There we go. Yeah. Mmm. Okay, let's try, I've added
a little permanent red with my color now, just to give
us a little different value. Okay, and you know if we're
going to walk through the woods, we need a little path. So let's take a little bit
of Van Dyke brown here, and let's build us a happy little path. We're just gonna take the
knife and let this path sort of just wander
right down through here. There we go, just let it wander
'round, play and have fun. Okay, there we got us a nice little path. Now we need to highlight
that path so I'll take just a little bit of white, and we'll just take it and
barely touch the canvas here. Just enough so we can highlight where the sun's sparkling through here. There, see how easy that is? Let the paint break. And now in order to set the
path down into the painting, we'll add some bushes that
project up over the path here and there. Push 'em in. There we go. And you can see how that
makes it literally drop right into the painting. Okay, let's put some
more land aries in here. Maybe this nice little area's
coming down through here. Just like so. Maybe we'll have some over here. Follow the angle of your land. There we go, there we go. There, now maybe, maybe, maybe, as we're walking through the woods here, maybe it rained last night. Maybe it came a nice little rain. There's little puddles. You know after it rains you
always have little rain puddles. So let's take a little touch
of the Prussian blue here, and we'll just make us a little puddle. And we put some Prussian
blue on the brush, and we take here and pull downward. Just pull downward like so. There we go. Okay, see how easy it is to do? Now. Very gently, we'll come across this way. Just to give it a watery effect. Now if you want to, if you
wanna put highlights in here, maybe you could take just a little touch of the Titanium white on
your brush, and pull down. It'll give it sort of a sheen. There and then once again
just come across just enough to give it a nice watery feel. You can overdo this part very easily. Okay, wash off the ole brush. Okay, now we can take a little
more of the Van Dyke brown and we can just make
little puddles out of this. Maybe it comes down like
so, right through there. There we are. Okay, little puddle. And we just make this a little
separate puddle back here. Just like that. Okay, now we take a little
bit of brown and white, and we'll lay a little highlight on there. There we go. And in your world, you can do anything that your heart desires. My home is in Fairbanks, Alaska,
and I spend a lot of time walking around the woods
and talking to trees and squirrels and little
rabbits and stuff. And I look at a lot of nature. And if painting teaches you
nothing else, it'll teach you to look at nature with different eyes. It'll teach you to see
things that have been there all your life, and you've never noticed. And if it does nothing else
but make you enjoy nature, it's worthwhile. So look around, look at what we have. Beauty is everywhere. You only have to look to see it. Okay, I talk too much sometimes so we'll go back to painting here. Take a little bit of the
thin white paint here, and we'll put some little
water lines back in here. Okay, just like so. There we go. There, and maybe some little
water lines right here. This is just a thin white paint
and you literally just cut right into the canvas with it. And let's smooth that out. There we go. Okay, now while I have the
knife here, I'm gonna take it and just cut a few little
sticks here and there. And all we're doing is
just literally cutting right through the paint. So the canvas shows through and it makes a multitude of little sticks, and these little sticks
help create the illusion of distance in a painting. All different planes. Okay, now then, let's
put some bushes and stuff right down here on the
grass, on this soil area. There we go. There they are, there they are. They just live right here in your brush. And you just drop 'em right in. There. Okay, now let's take and do this. Let's put some land
right down through here. Back to the Van Dyke
brown, little bit of white. There we go. We'll add a little highlight on here. There. And we'll put a few little
bushes and stuff right out here. See how easy that is? Okay, a few more little
water lines in there. Just let 'em happen. Each week, we'll try to do
paintings that are designed to teach you something
different, something new, something exciting. Just to keep your interest going. Okay now let's play a little bit here. Let's have a happy little
tree right in here. So we'll start with the Van
Dyke brown, and we'll make his little trunk here. There he goes. Straight Van Dyke brown to start with. There and we just turn him
out to give him little foots to stand on. There. And maybe he needs another
little arm out here. So we'll just give him one. This is your creation,
you can do anything here that you want to do. Just let it happen. There. Now, and we'll give
him some little leaves, and we'll use some more
of the Alizarin crimson, a touch of Prussian blue. Okay, and we need dark
in order to show light. So first we'll put some dark on here. I'll put some happy little
leaves here and there. When we see you next
week I hope you have your almighty easels set up, the colors ready, your big brushes all
primed and ready to go, and do an almighty painting with us here. Very quickly while I'm
finishing this up I'll go over the colors, one more time, that we use. Titanium white, Phthalo
green, Prussian blue, Van Dyke brown, Alizarin
crimson, Sap green, Cad yellow, and Permanent red. Only eight colors that you need. Okay now let's put some highlights on this pretty little tree right here. Mmm, I used just a little
touch more of the Permanent red on this one so he'll
stand out a little more. See how easy it is to create a tree right here in your world? There we go. And maybe down here, maybe
there's some nice little bushes and stuff happening right in here. There we go. All right, maybe right there another one. Okay, here and there I'm gonna put just a few little sticks and stuff. Like that. Just, once again, to build
some distance in here. We want this to have a lot of depth in it. Maybe we'll cut in a few
little sticks here and there, like so. You gettin' excited yet? You ready to paint with us? You can do it. Okay, and I think this
painting's far enough along, we'll just sign this rascal. And I sign the painting
with a script liner brush, a little bit of oil, and I
use red paint, but whatever color you prefer. Okay, and we'll just sign that rascal. I hope you've enjoyed this painting. Next week we're looking
forward to seeing you. I hope you have your brush ready. A dream in your heart that
you want to put on canvas. And join us, right here,
at The Joy of Painting, and you too can build fantastic pictures. You can take 'em from
here, and put 'em on there. Until next week, happy
painting, from all of us here. (slow acoustic guitar)
Its awesome how encouraging he is. Hell, I feel like I can paint after watching that.
if I click that I'll be trapped. The man was some kind of wizard. You can be flipping channels, "hey, Bob Ross", and then you're trapped for the entire time watching him paint a place you'd like to live in.
It's 5 AM and i've decided to paint
"TITANIUM WHITE"
I wish I could manage to be as calm and cool as he was, he makes me hate the angry side I can't seem to shake.
These videos get me ape shit pumped for bed time
Now I really want to watch all of the episodes and paint along. Or start some sort of paint club where we watch bob ross episodes and paint along.
I was cracking up over all the commotion in the background. People talking, moving stuff, closing doors. Such an awesome cable access vibe!
If you were in a bad mood, who would do a better job of cheering you up: Bob Ross or Fred Rogers?