I made this painting recently for the upcoming 2025 Sedona Plein Air Festival. It’s one of my favorite locations in Sedona, Red Rock Crossing. Also known as Crescent Moon, this beautiful area features Arizona sycamore trees and cottonwood trees, all gathered around the clear waters of Oak Creek.
The area is prone to flooding—it’s not a dam-controlled creek—and in any given season, the arrangement of rocks and boulders in the creek varies. So, if you’ve been to Red Rock Crossing and have seen this set of stepping stones, it might have looked different then! I try not to be a literalist, anyway, when it comes to painting. I arrange things for effect.
I didn’t do a voiceover on this video. I want you to simply look at each slide and see what I’ve done in each step. In most cases, it’s obvious. Also, trying to see what I did rather than me simply telling you is good practice to hone your observational skills. (You do know you can pause the video and also flip back and forth between frames?)
I will say I started off by toning the canvas with Gamblin’s Transparent Earth Yellow, and then did the intial drawing with their Portland Grey Medium. From there, I proceeded with the following palette:
Hansa Yellow Light
Permanent Orange
Alizarin Permanent
Quinacridone Magenta
Ultramarine Blue
Sap Green
Payne’s Grey
Van Dyke Brown
Titantium-Zinc White plus all three values of Portland Grey
Brushes used include a pair of large natural bristle flats plus a couple of rounds. For a medium, I used Gamblin’s new 3-in-1 medium throughout. The canvas is a stretched gallery-wrap, and I also painted the edges to match the color adjacent to each area on the front.
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