Tranquil Cove 5 x 7
A December 2024 painting exploring the fundamentals of compositional design and color mixing
Welcome to another exploration of tonal landscape painting. Today I’m sharing “Triangle Cove,” a piece I completed back in December 2024 that demonstrates several key principles I rely on when transforming reference material into compelling paintings. You’ll notice I’m working on a more reddish board here - a departure from my usual deeper earth tones. This warmer ground creates interesting vibrations throughout the painting and requires some adjustments to my typical underpainting approach, which I’ll discuss as we go.
Tranquil Cove 5 x 7
Special Announcement: Live Session Available
I’m doing something different this week. Instead of our usual Thursday live AMA session (I’ll be traveling to Auckland), I’m making the complete live painting session of this piece available to everyone on the channel. This gives you a perfect opportunity to see what’s typically exclusive to the members area - real-time painting with insights, all in 4K resolution. The live session will be available Thursday, June 5th, and covers several important topics that every landscape painter should master.
The Foundation
One of the most important points from the live session involves a common mistake I see repeatedly: hiding tree trunks in compositions. In the original reference for this painting, much of the trunk was obscured. Here’s the thing — if you can’t see at least some trunk, your tree will always look like a bush, no matter how much you work on it. This seems like a small detail, but it makes an enormous difference in the believability and strength of your composition. Always design your painting to show some trunk. It’s one of those simple principles that immediately elevates your work.
Shape Variety and Compositional Strength
Another crucial element we explore in depth is shape variety. You cannot have all big, round, lumpy shapes in your landscape. Your compositions need interesting variety in their shapes to create visual engagement. This applies to everything from cloud formations to tree masses to land forms. The live session covers several central compositional principles that I’ve developed over years of painting. These aren’t arbitrary rules - they’re practical solutions to common problems that can make or break a painting.
Edges are something you truly get better at through constant practice, but there’s an advantage to watching painting demonstrations at a slower pace. In the live session, especially at 4K resolution, you can see exactly what I’m doing with the brush. This visual learning is invaluable for understanding how edges are actually created, not just talked about.
Landscape Painting the Tonalist Way
Speaking of learning resources, I’ve been shipping books worldwide recently - this past week one went to Finland! It’s exciting to think about Tonalist information reaching painters around the globe. My book represents my comprehensive effort to share everything I’ve taught myself about painting in a Tonalist manner. While there aren’t many resources on this approach (Birge Harrison’s book is excellent and available free through Google Books, though I’d recommend buying a printed reprint from Amazon), I believe mine offers a contemporary perspective with color illustrations that complement Harrison’s more text-based approach.
Underpainting on Reddish Grounds
For this painting’s underpainting, I used raw umber, but when working on redder boards like this one, I often enhance the raw umber with a touch of rose madder or alizarin crimson. Raw umber already has reddish tendencies, so pushing it slightly further creates beautiful resonance with the warm ground. This is where understanding your materials becomes crucial. Every color choice should work harmoniously with your surface preparation.
Color Mixing
You’ll see me using my pre-mixed colors - Mike’s Gray and Mike’s Green - throughout this painting. These are colors I mix myself rather than buying from tubes, and they’ve become fundamental to my palette. Mike’s Green deserves special attention. I create it from Hansa Yellow (PY 74) and Ivory Black. While you could use Cadmium Yellow if working with a limited palette, I prefer Hansa Yellow for this mixture because it’s less opaque and gives more flexibility. This base green appears on my palette for every painting session. The beauty of this particular green is its versatility - I can tilt it toward cool tones or push it into warmer, reddish territory. While there are tube colors that seem similar, none perform quite the same job. Recently, I’ve been incorporating Perylene Black/Green (specifically Winsor & Newton’s) into my green mixtures. A friend of the channel sent me a couple tubes, and it’s completely replaced Phthalo Green in my process. While Phthalo Green is wonderful - very cool and strong - it has so much tinting strength that it easily goes off the rails and requires constant adjustment. Payne’s Gray, on the other hand, I can simply add where needed and it does the job beautifully. If you struggle with Phthalo Green’s intensity, definitely look into Payne’s Gray.
Sky Work and Color Transitions
The sky in Tranquil Cove demonstrates another key technique: shifting blue into yellow tones. The secret is using gray as your mediator and moving that gray around to create smooth transitions. Yellow Ochre is particularly valuable for these sky transitions. It mixes beautifully with bluish colors, which is the main reason I keep it on my palette. While I use it throughout the landscape itself, it’s exceptionally handy for sky work. When moving into the lower portions of the sky, I’m working with white, yellow ochre, and my blue mixture (which already contains some white and is typically modified with raw umber or ivory black).
The Painting Process: Drawing vs. Painting
An important concept we explore in the live session is where drawing stops and painting begins. When you see me do the underpainting, I often refer to it as “underpainting slash drawing” because my intention is essentially to draw with one color - but since I’m using paint, technically it’s painting as well. The transition happens when you move into color work. At that point, you’re not drawing so much anymore. The danger is falling into what I call “rendering mode,” which I always caution against. It’s better to stay loose and think in terms of what I call “daubing” or “chunking” - you’ll hear me use these terms frequently in the members area.
Looking Ahead
The complete live session for Tranquil Cove will give you deep insight into all these concepts and more. I’m also working on developing better foundational documents for the members area, including detailed information about my exact palette setup. This painting represents the kind of work I’m constantly creating but don’t always have time to share on the channel. There’s so much more content than I can possibly upload, which is why these live sessions and the members area exist - to give you access to the complete learning experience. Whether you’re just beginning to explore tonal landscape painting or looking to refine your approach, I hope Tranquil Cove and its accompanying live session provide valuable insights for your own artistic journey.
I’ll see you Thursday for the live session, and remember - take care of yourself, stay out of trouble, and God bless you and your family. I really appreciate your support with likes and comments, and I’ll see you next week!
Mike