The background on this painting is taking a very long time to come together but I think it's nearly there now. Now the foreground will get some more attention. It will be challenging as there are rocks visible under the water and I really want that to be a feature of the painting. Basically it's a matter of painting what you see, rather than what you think you would see.

I painted this little 8 x 16" sheep painting when I was feeling bogged down with the background on the beach scene. It was fun to do and totally different. It's on board so quite a different surface to work on than canvas.  Every brushmark really shows so it's good for texture.

Here's the start to a 24 x 36" painting of one of the Salt Spring Island beaches. I'm painting over top of an earlier piece that didn't make it out of the studio so I had to use a strong colour to cover up the old image. Could have gone black or red, but I decided on purple this time.

I finished this 24 x 24" acrylic today. The reference photo was from Whistler. I have 6 finished paintings for the October show now- 4 to go.

Liz Wiltzen & me

Me, Rick McDiarmid, Alan, John Salminen, Liz & Stephen Quiller

Alan and I just returned from a glorious week, painting on Salt Spring Island with the Federation of Canadian Artist's Plein Air painting workshop. The weather was amazing and I came home with a ton of subject matter. I also was happy to note some improvement in my outdoor painting skills. I should have photographed my efforts but ended up selling them all at the final show.

Our instructors were Stephen Quiller, John Salminen, Carla O'Connor and my good buddy, Liz Wiltzen. Being able to paint and hang out with these amazing artists was truly a gift.

The two landscape photos posted here are ones that I plan to paint from for my upcoming show at the Federation Gallery. It opens Oct 30th and is a group show with Liz, Gaye Adams, Sarah Kidner, Jean Pederson and my sister Suzanne Northcott.

I will be hitting the studio hard as the show is right around the corner.