Bottle Light

All done!

I learn so much from every painting.

The more bottles I do the more confident I feel with the subject.

And that's good because I am slightly obsessed with them right now.

©Carmella Tuliszewski

Watercolor, 15" x 30"

No title yet.  This will go up on my board to study and deciede if I need to play with it more.

It looks more rich in person.  I need to play with my camera as well to get the best photograph.

Here is where it began with a detailed drawing.

That is after the scene lived in my head for a few days.

I took my objects out on the driveway early one sunny morning to get the best warm elongated shadows.  And to get the best sparkle from the glass.

You can see here that I saturated the color somewhat from my reference.

I found this vintage Laura Ashely cloth in a little shop while on vacation this summer.

Laying in a shadow over a complex background works as long as you have a light touch with that first pass over.  Also I've found that watercolor becomes more set in the paper the longer it is there.

So I wait a day or two to work on the shadows.

My shadow colors here are Shadow Violet and Colbalt Violet.

Since the scene is overall a warm color scheme, adding a violet shadow as a complement to the yellows sets off the sun exposed areas even more.

This gives you a better idea of scale.

There is much to consider when painting tinted glass as in value shapes, reflections both inside and outside of the bottles, reflections the bottles gives to each other and the lighted cast shadows.

Careful planning and working one area at a time works well for me.

I need that instant gratification of seeing each completed area as I go.

We are having amazing and beautiful weather here!

I need a few days off to run errands and clean out my gardens for winter.

But the whole time I'll be thinking about the next painting.

Like I said, an obsession!

Have a good week.