Painting Fog That Really Looks Like Fog December 23, 2000
First have a plan for your composition. Whatever is in the foreground will not be in the fog and will need to be masked out either with frisket or professional grade masking tape. Your background will need to be painted with staining pigments. Sharon and I use Payne’s Gray changing its hue a little with the addition of Sap Green, Sepia or Alizarin Crimson as the subject requires. Remember your value recession. Each plane becomes lighter and bluer as it recedes. The value of your nearest plane should not exceed 3 or 3.5. Subsequent planes will go back to as light as 1.5. Some non-staining colors may be used in the sky areas because their moving some later won’t present a problem. Once your background has been painted and dried completely, you are ready for the fun part.
For the fun part, you will need Winsor Newton’s Titanium White Opaque, and a large flat or slant brush. (1” to 1.5” depending on the size of your painting). This pigment will need to be quite thick. Squeeze it out of the tube fresh and add water with a dropper. If you don’t want streaks in your fog, avoid having lumps in the pigment when you pick it up in your brush. Remember fog sometimes has streaks of thicker fog. Now load your brush full and begin to paint right over the top of your middle and background. Be sure you have mixed enough pigment to not run out. If your consistency is correct, the image of your middle and backgrounds will disappear totally. A weird feeling. If this doesn’t happen, your white won’t cover enough and your fog won’t be effective. Your image will begin to come back in about 20-25 minutes. Air dry, no hair dryer.
If you have questions email us at rlwatercolor71@aol.com.
Enjoy painting!
Robert and Sharon
Robert Long Watercolors
12273 Emerald Coast Parkway, Unit 120 • Destin, FL 32550
Phone (850) 837-3220 • Fax (850) 837-3770
E-mail us: rlwatercolor71@aol.com
http://www.robertlongwatercolors.com