It is never dark where I live so although my main project was to paint at least 1 large oil, my secondary project was to attempt to paint moonlight.
Advance preparation is key. For No1 I drew the house view first in daylight from the car, then set out my 4 colours (black , white, naples yellow and prussian blue). As dusk fell I used the red beam on my head torch to light up my kit with brief flicks onto dazzling white to see what actual colour I was using. However although it had stopped raining it was still too cloudy for the moon to show through and once dark everything was just completely black.
Advance preparation is key. For No1 I drew the house view first in daylight from the car, then set out my 4 colours (black , white, naples yellow and prussian blue). As dusk fell I used the red beam on my head torch to light up my kit with brief flicks onto dazzling white to see what actual colour I was using. However although it had stopped raining it was still too cloudy for the moon to show through and once dark everything was just completely black.
Three oil sketches attempting to depict moonlight --1) No moon at Brisons Veor,2) Moon over the Brisons, 3) Moon over the Brisons v2
Next night I had given up thoughts of moonlight, but spotted its reflection in the house window, so quickly did a watercolour postcard of Moonlight over the Brisons. I then launched into No2, a 20x 20 cm oil from the balcony before it clouded over again. I used the palette from the Brisons painting so ended up with french ultramarine by accident rather than prussian blue. The following night the sky cleared again so I did a bit more and an even smaller oil attempt -No 3.
Two nights later the moon was out again, this time over Lands End. This attempt in pastel was a bit more successful. By having a distant lamp on in the room I could just about see my paper.
Final tiny attempt in ink but I need time to study this subject more and how to depict darkness.
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