I found a nice little spot at Descanso Gardens where the foreground was in shadow and the middle and background was lit. I wanted to frame the warm areas with its cooler surroundings.

In these samples, I was playing around with the shapes of the plants a little more, but not much more. My main goal was to study the silhouette shapes of the plants.

I forced myself to finish this painting in one hour as I wanted to loosen up my mark making.

My Nephew

My bling'n nephew. Oh yeah...

Starbucks Sketch

Eaton Canyon Tree

I found this very cool tree at Eaton Canyon which, by the way, is a very good place to paint rocks and all things dry and flammable. There is also a lot of dog droppings.

Arboretum

I was really pleased with the silhouetting of the leaves and the tree trunks. As with most of my paintings, I had to fight for this one.