- (laughing) I'm so glad
you could join me today. I've got a couple of
my little friends here, a couple of little baby squirrels. Today I have a little
Gray Squirrel, right here, this is a little Gray
Squirrel can and the other one is a Fox Squirrel. They are just little babies,
three or four weeks old. Aren't they precious? I adore these little critters. I thought I'd share them with
you before we get started. Hi, guy, how are you fellas doing today? They are something else. They are absolutely precious. Notice that the Fox
Squirrel is much larger then the little Gray Squirrel,
and that's the same way they will be when they grow up. Okay, I guess we have to go to work, guys. Hey, you ready to go to work? Let's start out and have them run all of the colors across the screen that you need to paint along with me. While they're doing that, I'll
set these little fellas down. Come on, are you ready to go? Isn't he precious? Yeah, you've got to go now. Time for me to go to work. Let's go right up here and let me show you what I've already done on the canvas. Will do a fantastic little painting today. I have my standard old
pre-stretched double primed canvas and I've covered the entire
with a very thin coat of the Liquid White. It's wet, it's all slick
and it's ready to go. Let's just have fun today. Let's start out today with a
little bit of Indian Yellow. Let's do a painting that is fun. Going to take a little Indian Yellow and go up here and make
little crisscross strokes. Start like so. The Indian Yellow, as
with every color we use, is mixing with the liquid
white and it allows us to literally blend colors
right on the canvas. Maybe a little yellow
ocher right on top of that. Right in there, something like that, that's all there is to it. These little crisscrossed
strokes make it much easier to blend color together
than making stripes, use little crisscross strokes. Maybe we'll use a little Alizarin Crimson. We'll use some warm colors
back here in the background. Alizarin Crimson, it's a beautiful, beautiful warm reddish color. There, about like that. We'll let that blend right in. Allow the colors to blend together. All right. I think we can get away with it, let's go into a little bit of Thalo Blue. The Thalo Blue is so much
stronger than the Crimson that we won't even have
to clean the brush, we can just go right into it. Let's go up in here, let's
start on the very top, making little crisscross
strokes again, little X's, and will paint the entire
remainder of the sky with a little bit of blue, just
bring it down to the Crimson and stop. Once again, the blue is so
much stronger than the Crimson, it will just eat up all of
the Crimson in your world. Maybe in our world here and there, here's a little stringy
cloud that lives out here, tap in a little cloud
shape wherever you want it. It doesn't much matter. Little clouds are free, they just float around and have a good time. Maybe there's a little one right there. I don't know, you make the decision. We will take a clean dry brush and we'll blend all of this together, very gently. Three hairs and some air. Blended together. That easy, we have a fantastic little sky. While we have that brush,
it's got a little blue on it, let's just take, maybe will
have a little water down here. Then again, maybe we won't. Let's put a little blue
to see what happens, because we don't care. As you know, we don't make mistakes. We have happy accidents. Anything that happens
here, we can live with it. We don't care. That's the beauty of
this, or the joy of it. There, about like that. That's all we are looking for. All right, now I get to clean a brush. That's the most fun part
of the whole technique. Shake off the excess and beat the devil out of it. That really is fun. I have people that write and say they have no desire to ever paint, but they've just went
out and bought a brush so they can beat it because
it makes them feel better. There's nothing wrong with that. Let's take a little black,
a little bit of blue and, be right back, get a little white. Mix them together. I'm looking for a light
color predominantly blue, maybe even a little lighter. It's our world so we can make it any shade we want. Cut off a little roll of
paint, about like that, and maybe, yep, way back in here lives a little hill, a little mountain far away, a quiet little mountain. He hangs around back here
and has a good time all day. There, about like that. We can take a two inch
brush and grab that color and pull it, pull it, because that canvas is wet,
you can move color here. You can make it move. Tap it, I want to mist the base of this. Add a little white to it. I wanted to be very soft, very, very soft. Like it's floating around
in the mist far away. There. That's about all we are
looking for on that one. Maybe there are several different planes. I like a lot of distance and paintings so I have a lot of
planes in the paintings. Let's take Prussian Blue,
some black, Alizarin Crimson, put a little Van Dyke in their
too, a little Van Dyke Brown, it doesn't matter. About like that, pull it out flat, get our little roll of paint, and maybe right under here somewhere, maybe there's a little mountain
that lives right there. A nice little mountain,
a little friendly guy. I did a basic shape. We are only concerned with the top edge. We could care less what's
happening anywhere else in this mountain. Once again, grab a two
inch brush and pull that. I want it to disappear
over there in the mist. We don't even know where it goes. I don't think we care. It doesn't matter in
our world where it goes. Let's take a little Titanium White. I'm going to put the least
little touch of bright red in it. Since there's pink in the sky,
maybe there's a hint of pink in our mountain color,
a little roll of paint. Let's go up in here, touch, no pressure. No pressure, no pressure at all. Let it float, let it float
and play very gently. A little bit of white
and blue mixed together. I'm using a little bit
of Thalo Blue in there with a little black and it,
a little tiny roll of paint. Go back in here put the
indication of a few little shadows on these little mountains
that lived back here. That's about all we are looking for. Make sure our brushes clean, dry, now we want to create the
mist down at the base, so tap, tap the mountain
following the angles, most important that
you follow those angles that you put in there. Over here, follow this direction. Very lightly just graze it, lift it. That takes out all of
the little tap marks, blends everything together. That easy, that easy. Let's have some fun. I'm going to take the fan brush and put the same blue
color on it, just a little. Back up in here maybe at
the base of our mountain touch like that, we don't know where it goes. Snap it up. By that touch, give it a
quick little upward lift and a little downward pull. I started to say a downward
lift, but I guess that's a contradiction of words. Very lightly go across the bottom. I'll make it a little bit
darker right at the base so it stands out. Oh yeah, that's better, that's better. A little Liquid White on
the knife, pull it out flat. I'm going to put a little
bright red and that too, just enough to give it
a little pinkish hue, if you look really close. You have to really look for it though. Now we want a little water line far away. Far, far away. Something about like that. There. All right. Let's build a big mountain, shoot. Going back to that dark color we had, pull the paint out flat, once again, our little roll of paint
lives right on the edge, and let's come right up in here. This is your bravery test. What the heck, this is a big mountain. Maybe he's got an old jagged
arm that sticks out like that. Mountains grow every which way. Have fun with them. They are one of the most
interesting and fun things to paint I think, in this whole technique. I painted hundreds of
mountains and the many shows we have made and people
still write and say, "Do more mountains, Bob." I like the mountains, my favorite. Any of these paintings that we do, if you don't want the mountains in them, leave them out. You can do the painting without having the mountain in it. It's no big deal. You can do anything here. Anything that you want to do. Right here. This truly is your world, right here. I'm just blending that out again, like so. Let's get crazy. Why not? Use that mountain color, maybe that comes right across and there's a little lake that
lives way back over there, somewhere, lift up make it look like little trees right there, see? Easy, you can do this. You can do this. You do not have to be blessed
by Michelangelo at birth to be a pretty good painter. You can do this. Let's get crazier. In our world, maybe there's
another little pond here. A little lake, if you
want something like that, all you have to do is pull straight down with a little bit of
color and then go across, just enough to give it a watery sheen. Sometimes you can take
a little bit of white, don't do this too much
though, just a little, put a little shine on the water. Easy, not too much, just enough to give it a nice shimmer. You can overdo, easy, because it gets good and you don't want to stop. A little water line right there. We will have to decide where
all of these things live. We need some highlights on this mountain. It doesn't matter, we
will use whatever color we have got going here. There, big mountain. Strong mountain. We want him to have a lot of character. We don't like wimpy little mountains, we like big mountains. Of course, sometimes we
paint little wimpy mountains. That's all right. Any kind that you want in your world, you can do them here. No pressure, I know you get tired of hearing me say that but over and over and over again, I get letters from people saying that I'm having
trouble making the snow break on the mountain. Normally, it's one of two things. You are applying too much pressure or you are using a paint
that's not thick enough. Let's have a little shadow back here. You need a very dry, dry paint. I can't say that enough times either. It's most important, it
really does make a difference. Look here, look here, watch. Maybe there's a little ... right there. I don't know, you decide. A little place for the mountain goat to walk around the mountain, right there. He needs a little place
like that, don't laugh. He likes to go on a little Sunday hike, come around the mountain and
see what's on the other side. Begin playing with highlights and shadows and adding them in wherever. Wherever you think they should be. There's one, right there. By putting the shadow in, it pops that up. Makes it look big, strong. Let's take a two inch
brush and once again, once again I want to create
the illusion of mist down here, by tapping. There we go. Maybe there is a little
tree the lives down here. A whole little forest lives right at the edge of this mountain. Do this in layers. Little tree ranges and then maybe it comes right on down like that. Whatever. Come back and put another range in. See, you can just go on and on and on and create all kinds of depth
and distance in your world. That's what makes it so fantastic. There are no limits to this. Absolutely no limits. You're limited only by your imagination and your willingness to practice. Recently in Daytona Beach Florida, we had a reunion of
all of our instructors. Over 150 instructors came
from all over the world, even my first certified
Japanese instructor, Mitsuko, came all the way from Japan to be with us. We have people from Puerto Rico, Canada, the joy of painting is
universal, isn't it? We spent a whole week in Daytona Beach, we painted together
and we had a good time. We had a lot of fun. We went to New Smyrna Beach and all of our instructors
went out and painted. The public was invited. We spent a whole day in the park painting. We all got sunburned, even my bald spot on the top of my head got burned. We had a lot of fun. I'm wiping the knife on a paper towel. Let's take Prussian Blue, black, brown, Alizarin Crimson and
throw in some Sap Green. We've got a conglomeration going there. All of the dark colors, basically, let me wipe off the old
knife and, you know me, I like them trees, let's do a tree. Use a fan brush, loaded full
of color, a lot of paint, my little squirrels have
to have a tree to live in. Let's give them one. Right there. There comes a tree, it
lives in your fan brush. There they are, let them pop out. Let them pop out, a little more paint. When you are going over, like here, where there's a lot of
paint already on the canvas, you may have to put a little, not much, a little bit of paint
thinner on your brush and go through the paint,
because our Golden Rule, a thin paint will stick to a thick paint. If you then this you can
go right over the top of the other without it
mixing totally together. If it all mixes together, you end up being a mud mixer and all of
us that have painted have mixed a little bit of mud. Boy, I'm covering up
most of my mountain here. I didn't mean to do all
that but it doesn't matter. One more, one more little tree. He lives right out here. Whatever. I know, I know, I know, sometimes we get crazy here. Maybe we are up high looking down. Let's take some of that and pull it over. Maybe it comes all the way around, I don't know, just pick up
some of that tree color. Let's fill this in, you could do this with a paint roller, it doesn't matter. It really doesn't matter. It's a super way to practice. Do it this way and you
get a little practice. Don't waste your strokes. There we are. Let's take that brush
we made the trees with, the color is still on it,
I'm going to go right through Cad Yellow, yellow ocher,
a little Indian Yellow and because it has blue
and black, when we touch that yellow we get green. Let's go back up in here and
let's put some highlights right on our trees, there they go. They got to make the little noises. Some over here, just a few. Big tree need some too. Big old tree need some. A little bit back in here too, just some indications. I know, I change my mind. You can do that. It's your world. Take a little Dark Siena,
a little Van Dyke Brown and mix them together. We need some big rocks
that live back in here. We'll put some little
doers in here like that, wherever we want them. Take a little white and a
little bit of that brown that we were using, mix it together and make a highlight
color and barely touch. Barely touch it, white and brown or brown and white. This will put grass over the top some of these will show through and it will look like
little rocks live out here. Use a two inch brush tapped
into that same color, Sap Green, yellow all of those colors. Let's begin tapping in the
indication of all kinds of little land areas,
have them come hanging over these rocks. If we are to have rocks
here, let them hang over. Have them hang right over. This is where you create
the lay of the land or the way the land flows. See, maybe it comes right
on down, about like that. It creates a whole different plane. Now a little rabbit can hide down in there and look over at us. Just tap though, don't
let the brush slide. Just tap, just tap. Isn't that a super way
of making grassy areas? I like that a lot. I like that a lot. It comes right over. A little touch of the bright red, I'm adding in too, not much bright red, just enough to dull
the color a little bit. Red and green make brown so it dulls. See there, all kinds of little doers. The little rocks still look
like they are in there. That's all there is to it. You can put little highlights,
sometimes I dip the brush into a very small amount of Liquid White because it brightens the
color and it makes it thinner so it will stick right over the top. See that little ridge of paint right there we are pushing, there is one
just like it on the brush. Try to get that. We will go up here and use
that little ridge of paint, maybe our light is coming through here and we want to sparkle that edge. You can sparkle little parts of it, but don't sparkle it all. If you sparkle it all, then it loses its sharpness too much, just a little. Think where light wood zing
through there and play. Sometimes I even take a
little bit of pure white and put on there, just to brighten it not very often. If light is zinging through
there, maybe over here would be a little brighter too. Just play with it like that. This is a very nice little painting. It's very easy. It gives you a lot of
practice with just about all of the equipment. You get to do mountains, you get to do all of the little foothills
and if there's a secret to the style of painting
or any style of painting, it doesn't matter, it's just practice. That's all, just practice. The more you practice
the easier it becomes. You can lift up and make it
look like some grassy areas back in there, wherever you want. Shoot, I think that's about it. That makes a pretty nice little painting. Let's sign this one. Let's take a little paint
thinner, I use bright red but you use any color you want. See how thin that is. It's almost like ink. Turn the bristles, I'm still
getting a lot of letters saying, I'm having trouble
signing the painting. Making the paint thin,
it's almost like ink. A lot of paint, let's go up in here, decide where you want to sign the painting and all you have to do then,
if the paint is thin enough, it will literally just flow right over the top of the other paint. I'm lucky I have a very short name, so it doesn't take but a second. That's about all you have to do. I really hope you've enjoyed,
not only this painting but seeing my little squirrels. I had a little Gray
Squirrel and a Fox Squirrel, so you could see the
difference between them. So from my little squirrel
friends and everybody here at the studio, we'd like
to wish you happy painting and God bless, my friend. (light slow rock music)
