Painting Winter Scene–Part Deux

Today we’re going to paint the snow-covered trees. In this painting, I did two different kinds.

But just pick one.

Your painting will look much better.

With the same light blue paint, paint an outline of a tree. Or two. Or three.

Or more.

Think triangles. That’s all they are.

I start at the bottom and work my way up.

The tree on the left is just a bunch one triangle, then a smaller, then a smaller, until you get to the top.

The tree on the right is more like feathers – loose paint strokes. Or maybe little arrow points. It doesn’t matter. Just throw them on there – not lining them up or matching them. It’s just a tree, you know.

Now paint over the entire tree with white paint. Starting at the bottom. Row by row.

Could you just use white paint and not put the blue on first? Sure!

But the blue underpainting adds just a bit more dimension.

It does take more coats, though.

Any time you paint a lighter coat over a darker coat, you’ll have to do multiple coats.

But I like this. It adds texture.

For the tree on the left, you’ll want to have a little horizontal ridge for each branch level.

I used tube acrylic paint, which is thicker. But craft paint will work too.

For the tree on the right, start painting at the bottom too.

After you’ve added ‘snow’ to the bottom branches, take your brush and smooth out the ‘snow on the ground.

Just swipe the brush across the bottom!

That’ll smooth out the ‘ground’.

This is after two coats of white paint.

See the horizontal ridges? Simple stuff.

See all the brush strokes on this tree?

Here’s the thing – you need a ton, loads, lots and lots, of paint on your brush. Then start at the bottom of a ‘branch’, push and move your brush upward.

Paint will always be thickest/heaviest where you first touch the brush to the canvas. So for the tree, use this.

Resist the temptation to smooth it out.

Resist, I say!

Just kidding. It’ll seem really goopy (more artistic terminology), but that’s what you want.

If you don’t believe me, stand back a couple of feet and look at the goopiness. You’ll see what I mean.

Otherwise you’ll just have a white triangle – which is okay – but when I think of snow on trees, I think of heaviness, texture, poufs. . . goopy paint.

That’s it for part deux.

Tomorrow will paint the border and the ‘snowflakes’.

Actually, it might be this afternoon, because Passion for Paint starts tonight and I want to link this up.

Do you have a paint project to link up?

Even if you don’t, stop by this weekend and see everyone’s stuff. So much fun to see what people come up with!