When you can feel the power of a seascape, then you know there's life in your rocks and your cliffs as well.

[piano plays in bright rhythm & tone] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ It's so nice to be back into your homes again on your TV, PBS!

We're going to show you a painting I know you will love.

It's called "Eye of the Tiger."

And if you look very closely at the original, you can see that eye.

These are cliffs down near by where I live.

I don't think there's an eye in it.

I saw a cliff once that had an eye in it, it so appealed to me.

This is a beautiful scene though.

That power of the clouds against the cliff and you come right down through the head of the tiger and you can feel the big wave moving.

So it has a nice composition, flowing right into each other.

Now let me show the canvas that I'm going to work on today.

Part one will be done with acrylics.

This has been primed with one Paynes Gray, one Thalo Blue.

So they're equal, then with white.

That is a very nice value.

The Paynes Gray softens the blue just a little bit.

I quite like that.

So when you put any lights on, they look a little more pure and finished.

So we will, say, let's see, I've said enough on that.

I put the acrylics on, the priming, and then I outlined everything so I'll be able to see it.

I've outlined it with acrylic too.

There was one time where I used a Sharpie pen or something, but it would come through the paint later, and you don't want that to happen.

So we'll go ahead, and we'll start by putting on some cliffs and rocks.

This is Paynes Gray and Quinacridone Rose and white.

I have a brush, I have a lot of paint on it, so we'll come over to this area.

This is just a kind of a, well, you can see almost a middle tone because we'll be able to glaze some darks on that.

That's what I like about the preparation of doing the painting with acrylics, then you can glaze darks and riches into it.

This comes down a little bit behind that splash up foam there.

Oh ho hey!

Where's the eye?

Oof!

almost left him, almost covered him up.

Good eye!

There you are.

Pick up some more some water.

Pick up some more paint.

We'll see uh, we'll kinda leave the cliff area and we'll go to the rocks and that.

Then we'll decide, depending on how much time we have, whether we put lights on the the cliff now or later.

What I would like to do though, and I will use a paper towel and maybe just a little wetness to make sure it happens is, if I wipe slightly, then you can make use of some of that blue as being part of the form and color on the cliff.

Particularly down here too.

There will be other highlights put upon that.

You know, I've said this so many times before that I wonder why I'm not listening to myself, and that's saying when you have a priming or acrylics or whatever underneath, whatever you put on top, it'd be nice to let some of the underneath be a part of the color scheme.

You're a little too strong.

You're too much like two eyes.

Okay, that'll be enough.

Let's go down to the palette, same thing.

But we're now going to do it over on the rocks.

Here's a big rock.

Oh I say one thing, then I realize I need to do it again.

I think the way we did on the cliff was easy enough that I would almost suggest doing it that way where you put it on and you then decide how much you want to wipe off.

Do you see what I did this time on those rocks as compared the cliffs?

I left an opening for the darker darks to go, so let's put some darker darks on.

I need a little more Paynes Gray so I'll put that out.

What're you?

Oh that's purple.

Okay, you can stay over there.

so this is the Paynes Gray, Alizarin Crimson, but I'm now, I'll do it without the extra white in it so see I'll get a real nice dark right early.

So one way, is what we're doing here.

And the above way on the cliffs is where we're considering that we'll come with a glaze with the oil and put our darks on.

Either one, just so that it's done.

And you have again direction of light.

You know the way the way those clouds are being lit, its coming from the left.

And you can see that on the foam below too.

We're going to have where the light is just picking up a little bit, but this basically is in the shadows.

The light's coming by slightly, then very strong up against the cliff.

Do we have another rock?

We don't.

I thought we did.

Okay, let's use some of the same color of the Paynes Gray and Quinacridone Rose and white, which is just not quite as dark as the darkest darks.

It's what we put on the cliff, we'll make this so we have the shore kinda blocked in, and that isn't real dark.

We do have one light light spot and that would be in the path straight down, some of the clouds being reflected straight down.

So let's go ahead and wipe slightly where that will be.

Now, on the wiping, we know we'll have to go lighter there, but it shows us position where we'll want the light.

What I think what I would like to do would be to take some, this is Thalo Blue and I have some of the Paynes Gray and that's just a little dark, so just a touch of white.

when I say a touch of white, this has blue and white in it, but I just using a little bit of that.

Anything that will lighten it slightly.

And after I lighten it and my decision is, should it be a little more grayish?

So I add more Paynes Gray.

I kinda like this, where I mix in front of you.

It shows you the procedure of making decisions.

Okay, this will be for the water, we're putting this as the shadows in the water and as you look at the original, you see a lot of blue down in the trough area, so we can make use of a lot of the priming of the canvas for the trough.

So I'll take and wipe, not in the dark, but at the edge of the dark.

So we achieve our gradation that way.

If that's a little dry, just encourage a little bit with a little water to make the water!

That's your cousin-- fresh water!

Out back, I wonder what would happen, Yeah, see, I just have a little paint still on the paper towel.

That makes it so isn't quite as dark, but it tones, tints that distant water just a little bit.

Okay we'll go stronger down below and again, we'll put the darks in and then we'll decide where we want to wipe with the paper towel to soften it.

So there's one spot, here's another one.

Down below we have a little wave splashing into the rocks there so a little dark under that, and then this has, it has a little pitch.

So just a little peak, and that is especially attractive when we put, as you can see on the original, when we put the foam patterns right against that, it has a nice, almost a directional view as it points you back up there.

The contrast and the shape all help.

Okay, so I'll take the paper towel and wipe, or wipe or smooth around a little bit the darks that I just placed on.

See how that extends it out slightly?

Here, just a little bit under there, and then here.

I'm wiping so the dark didn't come down quite as forcefully when it's lower.

Let's just stay down in this area, which means we can do the eye of the wave next.

The eye of the wave, I'll put out a little bit of yellow, and we'll use yellow and white and a touch of blue.

Let's see, we'll put this here.

Okay, I'll take the yellow and white then sort of add a little bit of the blue into it.

It turns it, what you might say, just in the slight greenish flavor.

Here's where the eye will go.

Wiping the brush so I work with very little paint.

You place this on, and you place it right against the line at the top.

The lower edge, you make a sway like that, then you either zigzag or you just brush it down.

I'll zigzag and see if that works.

After you zigzag, you want to wipe out the zigzags so you have more of a blend.

So now I'm thinning it out, lower, lower, lower.

It looks like someone's written somethin' in there.

"Hi buck!

How ya doin'?"

Doin' fine, but you gotta go.

You gotta go.

All right, are there any other ones?

No other eyes.

Oooh!

The minute I said that, I discovered one.

Did you see it?

Over in here.

You tell the truth.

You didn't see it!

I had to tell ya.

But that's all right, you can say "I saw it Buck!"

"When you gonna do that other eye?"

All right, still staying down there, I think it would be fun to put on some of the highlights on this.

And I'm gonna take to take some blue and white.

This is the Thalo Blue and Paynes Gray and a little white.

When I place this on, it'll look a little lighter, but it won't be our final lights.

So we'll have one there, but with the contrast, it's so appealing, it it could almost be the lightest lights until you see what happens when we do use the lightest lights.

Just blending down slightly, always thinking of form, so a lot of this will already be the form.

So we have a light, we have a, as we thin it out, it will be a middle value and this will be our dark.

So you have 3 values and you find that you can say even here you have 3 values.

You have light, a little darker, and dark.

That the 3 values can be very low scale or they can be high scale.

These happen to be high scale, because the dark isn't very dark.

So I'm just blending this down.

We'll call our lightest light number 1, then what I'm thinning out, 2, and what is already on the palette as a priming becomes our 3.

And if you're real good, next time we'll go up to 4!

Often when I was with Claude Buck, my teacher, we'd do a 5 scale for making form in jugs and so on.

If use just 3, it's bolder.

You can still get the refinement.

But a little more refinement when it's at least 5 scales.

I think I told you once before, I went over to Claude's house one day.

I'm just putting the same light down here.

I knew we were going to go out and do a landscape, and we were going to do it in a scale of just one color made from light to dark.

Well, I came over and he had this palette that had 20 values on it.

Yellow and white, very close to white down to Burnt Sienna and a little umber.

So all the values in-between.

20 values!

So we painted the distance, distance, distances-- absolutely gorgeous!

The palette was worth keeping, which I didn't.

'Cause I didn't realize how good it was.

Same color down in the light area and see, all of these will have a stronger light when we come with the oils.

You realize on this, this is the acrylic stage.

we'll complete it in acrylics, then we'll go ahead and put oils on this painting.

So two parts.

Preparation...

I love doing the preparation because it so quickly establishes something and I like the oil stage because you get the refinement, which is so attractive.

Just a little bit of foam out on the back wave.

There's another section over here.

That has a lot of rhythm.

Just the little one.

See how that one kinda helps move it along and this comes over and is very close to the cliff.

So you have everything working together for you.

Did I see it that way?

I saw it that way.

Seems like I had a quote.

Here it is.

"He who cares to teach never ceases to learn."

So if you want to teach, then you get out there and continue to learn.

And you say but you know how to teach.

That's right, but the more acquainted you become with nature and little incidental things that are shown to you as you go along, it's so worth being out there and continuing your education.

Let's go up to the sky.

What I'd like to do on that is, I'll take some water, I'm coming to this Quinacridone Rose and Paynes Gray.

Let's lighten it a little bit with white.

What I would feel this will work for would be over in this area.

You're establishing a little bit of the color for the clouds.

And as we talked earlier about on the cliff, when we glaze and put other things on these, then we'll have the more closely matched colors.

Right now, I just know that that's going to be a nice under base for the dark clouds.

If you have something like this, if you have vitality underneath, then when you put a dark on, it's not gonna feel flat and dead.

It's gonna have the vitality and that's certainly what you want to consider.

Up in here too, just slightly.

It's such a mistake to think that, oh I'll just put down some white-- that'll give me my foam, and dark-- that'll give my clouds.

It's subtle little colors.

And you know what on colors, this is Dr. Buck talking to you, in our eyes, we have cones.

We have--I don't even remember what it was!

It's either-- we have rods and cones!

One of them sees colors, and the one that sees color, you can have a variety in people.

The one that sees dark and light, we have the same number.

I think it's cones that's the color.

You say C and color, both Cs.

Yeah.

So that's why we have a variety of colors.

Some people will say oh, I don't like that color or oh, I like that, or I see that in it.

That's the reason-- it's the cones.

[soft scraping] Okay, let's let's put some clouds in there, then before we leave, we'll want to kind of put a little bit of tree in there too.

So for on the clouds, we'll build to them.

Here's yellow ochre.

Yellow ochre and white.

And as I mix it over here, I have no problem with it touching a little bit into the blue.

In fact, I'm going to encourage it to come on over and be in the blue.

Therefore, you always have a chance to go a little lighter, because you've taken it down a little bit with the blue.

Okay, this is-- do you wanna use this brush?

No, you sit in the water, you just sauna.

And we'll use, this is your cousin, also a bristle brush, it's just a little stiffer or a little more hair with it.

Okay, this is where our strong lights will be and of course, when they come in oils, they'll be even stronger.

I'm not quite sure how we're going to progress with the oils, so you come back and you see.

You'll be surprised.

Oh let's put just a little teeny eye in the tiger.

Oh, ho-ho!

You make use of that acrylic outline to show you where you should be, but at the same time, it will cover quite easily.

It won't show through.

And a couple lower clouds right along there.

I'm going to take a little bit of that light color and our dark cloud color, so this will give me there-- it will separate it.

Oops, I guess you're pretty close to that cloud color, but anyway, it will separate it from that little distant cliff that's over here.

By thinning it out which I'm doing as I push hard, you can see it's not as light as that that we put in the light clouds.

I'll go across there with the idea of coming back and making those little light clouds again.

Let's just blend this, just a little softer.

Okay, a little bit lighter again on those again clouds that we took away right in here and right in there.

I need to have some pink clouds, so we'll borrow.

White, come over to our friend Quinacridone Rose.

You notice I'm mixing it where it has some of the Paynes Gray still in it so it won't be quite as pink.

Just kinda holds back a little.

Let me see what that looks like.

Just right-- you knew I was gonna say that, didn't you?

Pushing this on, and you do as I suggested earlier.

You come up and touch against the line that was there.

Lions and tigers!

We got lions up here!

You know, it's so fun to tell a joke and no one laughs.

We got a camera crew here.

That didn't go over, they just...

They're good people.

It reminds me of a quote where it said "Soldiers win battles and generals get the medals."

"Soldiers win the battles and generals get the medals."

It's just like you say oh Buck that's just so great, that's great.

I get the praise.

And the camera crew and the director, the floor director and the big boss in the other room, they do the work.

This is, this is quite nice, because as you put it on, you find that you get what you want with the pink, then you further are benefited by practically no paint on the brush, and see how it just pushes in and softens without being the dominant edge.

Okay, let's go up above.

We'll take again this pinkish tone that we've just been using, and we come along here, then you work it away back over this way.

I'll put a little more light, this is the yellow and white with a touch of blue right in there.

Now, I have a chance to put little trees up there.

You've been in the sauna long enough.

Come on out.

This is the yellow and what else?

Blue and Paynes Gray.

That's just about equal, I guess that's two Paynes Gray and one blue and one yellow.

This will give us a tree up there that will be jutting out against the sky.

And we have a little teeny segment of that that comes out into the sky.

Right in here.

And a little twigs on that, we have just a little time left, and this, please realize, this is stage one.

This is part one of a two part series.

Next week, we put on the oils, refinement, and love.

And we'll wake that tiger.

I think that's just where I want to go with this.

Let's see if there's any time left, we might put just a little bit of this yellow and white, kind of as a going away present, put it right down at the edge of the shore.

Okay, that's stage one of "The Eye of the Tiger."

We'll see you next time.

Thank you for being there.

You be sure and return, because we want to put quality into this cage!

See you later, bye-bye.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ (woman) Funding for "Painting With Paulson" is made possible by...