The Three Sisters

"The Three Sisters" 13x20" Acrylic on Canvas by Richard Robinson

If you wait with nature, she always rewards you.

The weather was not great, grey and drizzly and we'd come a long way and waited all day for the low tide to make our pilgrimage.

We walked out with the tide along the slippery estuary, round the corner to this iconic New Zealand spot - The Three Sisters. What greeted us was a smorgasbord of striated cliffs and towering rock columns. 

Then, just minutes before the sun gave up on us, there was a gap in the clouds! Golden God light poured through onto our scene, profound against the backdrop of dark grey. As if it were the last drops from the bottle, the light seemed more concentrated and richer than I'd ever seen it. GLORY!

I've found time and time again that the wait, though sometimes long, is always rewarded. Even if it's purely with the time spent at one with your surroundings. Stay a while!

That moment of light lead you here, now.

Now you can paint it with me!

I'll take you step by step through this whole process. Just a couple of hours and you'll have a beautiful beach painting, know something more about painting and possibly about yourself. 

This demo is in acrylics but it's fine for oils too.

Just 7 steps

I’ll guide you all the way.

Good design

Even great scenes need a little help to bring out their best. Spot the differences between the original scene above and the design made from it. Why does it work better? 

Be very clear about what it is you value most in the painting, in order of importance. Let your design decisions always refer to that.

Firstly, crop out parts that don't matter so much to you.

Prepare

Choosing the right base layer for your painting can make all the difference. In this one I knew the light would be sandwiched in the middle so I added that into the base too. The orange tone brings warmth and unity to the whole painting. This layer was sealed with gloss medium so that the sketch and subsequent layers would not interfere with it. You could use this same base coat for an oil painting as well, speeding the process along.

Back to front

Working from the background forwards works well for this scene. The sky wanted to be simple and smooth to contrast the chunky texture in the rocks. That called for a large soft synthetic brush creating soft edges and large gradations from cool dark to warm light, all mirrored in the foreground sand.

Contrast

Using thick 'impasto' paint with the palette knife and various brush techniques gives a wonderfully textured contrast to the smooth background. Just like life, variety is the key.

Finishing touches

The few crisp details of the waves and gulls help to give scale to the whole scene. Finally, you get to use your little brush!

I'll take you step by step through this whole rich process and you can choose which parts you'd like to try out in your own work.

“Art is not what you see, but what you make others see.” – Edgar Degas.

Enjoy!