Imagination can be a great tool in your paintbox but only if you use it!

[piano plays in bright rhythm & tone] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ Come on to my house.

Come on, because this Mission Creek is just 3 miles from us.

And I've gone there many times.

Let me show you the finished product, which we'll finish next week.

This is "Mission Creek;" love the area.

In fact, one of my TV men, Bob Dambach, came out to Santa Barbara and filmed me at the park.

This is a pochade, this is what I use to paint the large one.

I absolutely love it.

It has all that energy and strength, and you try to match that with the painting that you do from it.

Okay, now here is what we have on the easel.

We have a canvas that has been primed with Alizarin Crimson, Payne's Gray.

So it would be 2 Alizarin, 1 Payne's Gray, and about 6 White.

Put the drawing on, and then over to the left, a little something different is an acrylic stage.

So you know what we're doing today?

We are doing acrylic for quite aways, but we may have time to put a little oil on it too.

That would be great.

So we have a very simple palette for the acrylics.

And I have a Alizarin Crimson, I have Ultramarine Blue, and I have white.

We'll start, let's take some of the Blue and White.

Let's see, that looks like it's about 6 White, 1 Blue.

We better go a little more, so this is going to be 3 White and 1 Blue.

Perfect!

This goes up in the sky.

And it doesn't matter where you start, but it would be easier for me to start in the sky, then to sort of push into it with the edge of the foliage.

But you're going to find that this is pretty much unblended as we do this.

Down to there.

Then I'll let some of this show under the bridge.

Boy, that song keeps going through my mind.

♪ Cross over the bridge.

♪ I've crossed over that bridge, I've crossed under it, and you find that there's certain times of the year it's dry!

There's no water in that beautiful creek, and there's other times it comes gushing down.

In the winter more is when the rains come.

Okay, let's see.

Should we go maybe just a touch darker in the water?

I'm going to take just a little extra Blue.

So that makes that, yeah.

So whatever the formula I gave you, you add one more Blue to you the do the water.

I'm using a large fan brush, and it does quite well.

It's so nice to do this; I just love doing it.

Now I have not put anything on the canvas as far as water or anything.

I'm just putting this on.

And I really haven't used any water yet.

Have I?

Now I need to put some in.

You're too clean.

Some water just to make it flow just a little faster and more free.

On this, the way I'm doing it now, there's not a lot of the underneath showing through, but there will be as we go with the dark.

Actually even on the priming, I look at the middle tone here, I kind of like it, so if you use the Cadmium Red Light, and some white, it would be about 6 White, 1 Red Light, and prime the canvas, then a lot of that can show through.

However, there's quite a bit of coverage as you do this.

Let's see, there's a little showing through here.

This is not water, that's a bush.

But I'll put a little bit of this on the rock.

And down here, almost like a staircase to the scene.

Dum, dum, dum, dum, dum.

A little on this side... and we'll stop there with that color, clean the brush.

Let's take our Ultramarine Blue, you're up here.

I'll put you down there.

Let's take some White.

Okay, so that's, right now it's 5 White, 1 Blue-- don't write that down yet because I'm not sure that's what I want.

That's what I want!

And when I put this on some of it will be a little less wet, and it will look a little darker, then when I want it a little thinned out, that will make it a little lighter.

So it's just a timesaver.

Okay, I dipped into the water.

You know, I found a great truth.

An artist maybe can't make the sun stand still, but I can move it on my painting!

Does that make me great?

Mmm.

That over on this side.

[Buck hums] That little humming you hear-- nothing wrong with your TV, that's just me.

Okay, In here, this brush is so good-- it covers a lot of territory quickly, then when you turn it on its, use its point, you can sort of draw with it.

That's why I like that brush so much.

I remember a friend of mine went to a workshop down in Texas, and this famous artist, he was saying all those TV artists, all they use is a fan brush.

And I thought well, I wonder what you could do in 24 minutes with your regular brushes?

We don't criticize people, but just do the best you can, let them do the best they can, and there you are.

Gee, there's sure a lot of good coverage with just a couple simple colors.

How come you're not dark enough?

There, that's better.

[Buck hums] Over here, there.

We'll take, I keep using some water because it just makes it flow a little freeler.

"Freeler," that's a new word.

Freer.

Okay I'm going to take just some straight Ultramarine Blue and see what happens with that.

I'll go under the bridge just a little bit so it's a little darker there.

Then when I go over to the side, I'll want to have just a little darker.

Good job!

The distant trees here-- I'm back to my one that has some white in it... so it isn't quite as dark.

You're not supposed to be quite as dark I'll put a little-- there, that's good.

It helps with a little sky color in it.

And let's see, let's come down, pure Blue again.

Gosh, it responds!

I love the response when I need you, I need you, I need you.

And you think, what in the world do you have, Buck?

Anybody could do that.

Great!

That's what I say.

Anybody can do it.

Let you be one of those anybody's.

I want to put some-- I changed brushes-- I'm sorry, fan brush.

Here's a nice bristle brush.

And let's put this on the bridge.

A little water will make it flow a little freer.

That's kind of a general value, then we'll add a little dark and light into it.

Okay, now I'll add the dark, so we'll take pure Ultramarine Blue.

That's the top railing.

A little pole support, these are with the Ultramarine Blue.

There's a couple on this side.

Then there is a little line, and I'm going to lean on my arm and make a very thin little line going across.

Good, good, good!

And let's give a bottom to that bridge.

What helps a little bit on this is showing initially some little light, so I'm using the blue and white that we used up in the sky.

This is where the sun is showing through.

The sun will be up there, and you'll see it show through there.

Okay, we better get a little bit of blue on the trees.

Water makes it flow more freely.

[Buck hums] All right, what do we have?

Just a little of a branch coming out there, a branch coming out here, another tree over there.

And on the other side we've got a couple trunks.

Perfect... perfect.

Okay, we got a little bit of dark to put on here.

This is Ultramarine Blue.

The side of the step-- this can be done a little more carefully than I'm doing it.

Because at any stage, whatever you can do to help yourself, the better, to help your painting.

I think, let's see, maybe a little light.

We'll take some White.

I'm going to take this and put it on with a knife right in here and down in the water.

And a little bit on the side of that tree.

And that will give me a great help towards going on with the painting.

So we'll stop there with the acrylics.

Welcome to the oil stage of "Mission Creek."

I want to show you the final project in color, then I want to show you the pochade, and I love that pochade.

It's got the vitality and richness that you try to match when you paint from it.

Over on the right we have the completed acrylic stage, and it is dry, it needs to be dry.

I will take and put some Walnut Oil on it.

This is going to be so much fun.

I'm glad we had the opportunity to kind of speed dial with the acrylics being on, and then we can work with a little start of color because we want to be sure that we can complete that painting.

Okay, as far as where to start, I'd like a lot to put in the sky so that when we put in the distant foliage it will soften against the sky.

So to do that, we're taking a White, and I want some of the Unbleached White, equal parts.

That's just to mix into.

So now we have Azo Nickel, Nickel Azo Yellow.

How much of this do you want?

Just a little bit; it's very powerful.

Oo, let's do a little more.

Then it's so nice to have that there.

We can hold that up and say that works.

I'll take a fan brush, let's take a smaller fan brush, and we'll push this around.

Did I already tell you I put Walnut Oil on this?

I think I did.

The amount of Walnut Oil should be very little, I think I'll have more control if I don't have it too generous.

I'll keep this paper towel in my hand, push this around, and if you accidentally hit the bridge, we'll wipe it.

See, as I push over there, this will give us a chance for the distant trees to blend into the sky.

Whereas right now it makes a very sharp edge.

Then I can wipe, just take that away like that.

A little bit underneath gives nice distance.

What we're going to show there is that there is some distant water, which is very nice.

You feel you know where it's coming from, and you know where it is down below.

And as my beautiful director says, the movement in that water is really good.

So we'll make that happen when the time comes.

for now we'll just put in some general blue that will set there, then we'll put character into it.

Okay, so I came down a little low, that's all right.

When I put the bluish tone into it, I'll push it back up, because the sky doesn't come down quite that far.

Okay, let's go ahead with some of the blue.

Boy, just the name of this makes it good.

Phthalo Cyanine Blue Red Shade.

Gee, that's powerful.

Take a little bit of that, it is a powerful color.

Here's pure White, I think I'll use about that much.

That lets me know how much White I need, then we'll judge the formula by the Blue.

The Blue is so powerful, I'll take just a little bit.

Then I kind of have in mind, I'll say, that's about 10 White 1 Blue.

That's the way you do it-- you can get your formula as you go.

Let's hold this up-- oo, that can be a little darker.

Okay, so that ends up being what?

That ends up being 5 White, 1 Blue, because I doubled it.

I double dog dare you.

Where have I heard that?

Okay, fan brush.

And this works out the same way as the foliage coming against the sky.

Down here, you're putting this on, then the rocks will soften into it.

It's so much fun to paint.

And I've been doing it for many years.

I started in 1962.

Gee!

And this would be 2020-- that's a long time.

38 plus 20-- 58 years?

Phew!

Something like that.

I wasn't too good at math, so if I messed up, you can correct it.

Okay, I'm wiping a little bit.

In wiping, I have some of the previous, it's actually palette knife lights there showing, and it gives me an indication where I want to place them.

Down below.

Oo, this is going to be so great.

Okay, I want to do one thing on the edge there just to show you.

Now when I look at that, here's what I look at.

I see the same blue; let me just hold this up.

It has a little bit of a green look to it.

So I'm using 5 White, 1 Blue as we previously did.

That's just to give me a little extra quantity.

Okay now, what do I want to add into to that?

Let's try some of that Nickel Azo Yellow.

I'll take a small chunk of that.

Oo, that's powerful, but let's use you, let's use you.

Whoops, I almost go over to the original.

We'll kind of feel the way here.

The reason I say that is, I want to go a little darker in here, but for now, let's use this to touch the edges.

It even comes down a little bit along which will be a branch.

Okay, so a little darker, I'll take a little more of the Blue.

Where are you Blue?

You didn't go anywhere, did you?

This is a little bit of the straight blue, just kind of clean it off on the brush, push in there, then mix it slightly into the foliage you just placed on.

What is kind of helpful, and you can see a little bit here, you get a little bit of feeling almost like seeing through.

If that's a blessing, let's take some more.

We'll take some of this color and just have a little bit of see-through.

Nothing wrong with that.

Gosh, this is so much fun.

I'm glad we chose to do it this way.

I have a dry brush just to blend a little bit.

That's not your job; it's my job.

The big bunny brush.

Oo, you do a nice job.

You do nice work, bunny.

This will give us such a great start towards finishing this next week.

I'm so pleased that we chose to do it this way.

All right, what else should we do?

We could take a little bit of our Burnt Umber.

And this is Maroon Perylene?

Gee, I need to learn the names.

Maroon Perylene, it's beautiful with the Umber.

And we'll start putting this down here.

Then before, we could do it next time, I'm going to take the finger.

Where is that blue?

There is the blue, push just a little bit for the distant water.

So we'll go on with this next time.

We have a head start on "Mission Creek."

See you soon.

[piano plays in bright rhythm & tone] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ (woman) Funding for "Painting With Paulson" is made possible by... To order the complete 13-episode series 20 of "Painting with Paulson" on DVD including Bonus Features and Line Drawings, please visit or call...