[Music] I'm certainly glad you could join me today because today is fun day.

Today we're going to have a super time.

Let me tell you what I've done up here already.

I've got my old 18 x 24 canvas, but today I've cut Con-Tact paper and made a beautiful design on it, and then we're going to paint a happy little painting on that, take the paper off, and I think you're just going to be overjoyed at what happens.

So let's start out and have them graphically run all the colors across the screen that you need to paint this project with me.

And while they're doing that, shoot, let's go on up here and get started.

Ready?

All right, we'll take an old 2 inch brush and let's, let's put some beautiful colors in the sky today.

I'm going to start with a little touch of Indian Yellow, just a little touch of Indian Yellow.

And we're going to go right into about this area, use little criss crossy strokes, little x's, and just sort of let it wander right on off the canvas, like that.

What the heck.

What the heck.

Now I'm going to come right down here, and do the same thing.

Just like that.

Okay.

Now then, without washing the brush, same old dirty brush, I'm going to go into a touch of Yellow Ochre, just a touch, don't get too crazy.

Just tap it a little bit, and then, with the Yellow Ochre sort of just go around like so, just here and there.

Same thing down here.

Whatever we do in the sky today, we're going to do down here.

This is going to be reflected into the water.

Same old dirty brush.

Alizarin Crimson, same old dirty brush, just tap a little of that right into the bristles, just a little, just a little.

Okay, now then, let's just take the crimson and just let it dance up, wherever you want it to, maybe up through there, add a little more color.

Maybe it plays over into this.

You just make the decision, but whatever you do up there, bring it down here.

Just like so.

Now then, still without cleaning the brush, Alizarin Crimson and the least little touch of the Phthalo Blue.

So we have blue, where'd it go?

And crimson.

There you go, and you can just mix these right on the brush.

Son of a gun gets away from me sometime, have to hunt it down.

There we go.

Now, see, that's a nice lavender color, but it's just brush mixed.

All right, let's go right up here.

Now then, we'll just take and put in some lavenders here.

See, fill up all these little holes with lavender.

Pretty.

And lavender, you can get away with putting lavender against the yellow.

Here's a little place we'll add some.

Maybe even wherever.

And we'll come down here in the water, and we'll do the same thing.

A little lavender and let it work up here.

And a little touch in here, shoot, wherever you want it, just, just let it play around and have fun.

Okay, now after all that, we've got the whole canvas covered, and we haven't had to wash the brush [laughs] one time.

And I'm lazy.

I like, I like paintings where I don't have to wash the brush and don't have to work hard.

I try to design paintings that way.

So now I'll wash the old brush, give it a shake, [laughs] beat the devil out of it.

Now then, let's go right up here and just do like so.

Here I'm just going to blend all these colors together, but start in the lightest area and work outward.

You don't want to blend the dark color inward.

Blend the light color outward.

Hope all that makes sense.

Sometimes I have a hard time explaining what I'm thinking.

Sometimes I have a hard time figuring out what I'm thinking.

There we go.

Just bring it all together until it's nice and smooth.

Every once in a while, [laughs] rap the devil out of your brush.

You know this is so much fun.

I get letters from people all over the country, they say they don't want to paint, they have no desire to paint, they just buy a brush and beat it.

[laughs] So, if that, if that makes you feel good, just take your brush and beat the devil out of it.

It beats arguing with the wife or kicking around a dog.

Have fun.

Have fun.

There we go.

See?

Look how soft and gentle that's becoming.

There.

Now you can blend this as much as you want.

There we go.

Just like so.

I'll beat it again.

Now down here, I'm just going to go across, because this is going to end up being water and water is flat, so we just go across and bring all this together.

The color will still remain there, but it'll just look different than the sky.

That easy.

Now we could stop right here and we have a painting for the Museum of Modern Art.

Boy, that's, that would fit right in there.

Okay, let's put a happy little cloud up in here.

Just use the 1 inch brush today.

And I'm going to pull it right through Titanium White, just pull it through and load it full of paint.

Full of paint.

Okay, let's go up here.

Maybe there's a happy little cloud that lives right up here in the corner, and he just floats around and comes right on out there, wherever you want him.

This is your cloud, so you put him where you want him in your world.

And, he has a friend, and the friend lives right over here.

This is just straight Titanium White.

Now it's going to pick up all these beautiful colors that you already have on the canvas.

There we go.

See there?

Tiny little circles, tiny little circles.

There.

Clean dry [laughs] brush, and very gently, very gently just blend that and pull it.

There.

There's a happy little cloud, and let's put one right down here.

These are the kind of colors that, that my mother would like, so I'll tell you what, I'm going to dedicate this painting to my mother, and she lives in Florida, and I hope she enjoys this.

She's a super lady.

She's my favorite lady in the whole world.

There we go.

Lift this up, like so, and another happy little cloud, that easy.

See?

Little clouds can be fun.

They're easy to make and you just throw them in and, and go about your business.

Now, let's put a mountain in here.

Take some blue, a little bit of blue, Alizarin Crimson, I'm looking for sort of a, sort of a purplish color.

So crimson, add a little black in there too.

So Alizarin Crimson, Phthalo Blue, a little black.

It's hard to tell what color that is.

If you'll put a little over here, grab a little white and rub in there, see, so then you can check it out.

That's not as purple as I want it.

I added some more crimson.

You can change your mind.

Now.

That looks a little better.

Okay.

Let's do that.

Now you have to make a big decision.

Where does your mountain live in your painting?

I think he lives right there.

Boy, he certainly does now.

But the only thing you're worried about when you put this mountain in is the nice outside edge up here.

You could care less what's happening inside the mountain.

Can really care less.

Use a lot of pressure.

Push that paint right into the fabric.

See there?

And mountains are one of my favorite things to paint.

I lived in Alaska for a dozen years, and you can't live in Alaska, and not fall in love with the mountains.

They're spectacular.

Now then, we'll take a 2 inch brush and we want to grab this and pull it.

Because this is wet, you can move the paint.

If this was a dry canvas, at this point, you would be in agony city.

You'd be yelling at me.

This is a wet on wet painting technique.

The paints are extremely firm, extremely thick, so you can do this.

You can move the paint.

And you want to blend it so the bottom of it just disappears, just absolutely floats in the mist.

Okay, I'm going to take white, I'm going to add the least little touch, least little touch of Bright Red to it.

Be very, very limited with this Bright Red, it's so strong.

Get a small roll of paint on the knife.

Okay, go right up here.

Now, if the light's coming from the right, then we want to highlight the right side of the mountain.

Touch, no pressure, just follow right down the mountain.

No pressure though, no pressure, no pressure.

Can't say that enough times.

That's probably still the most common question I get asked when people write, is "How can I make that paint break on the mountains?"

By break I mean leave all these holes.

It's one of two things if you're having this problem.

Number one, the paint you're using is not firm enough.

You're using a thin paint, oily paint, won't work.

You have to have a very dry firm paint.

Secondly, you're too strong.

You're adding too much pressure to the knife.

Take a weak pill.

[chuckles] Maybe, maybe there's a little light zinging through here, and it hits right over there, wherever.

This is your mountain, so you have to make these big decisions.

Let's put some shadows.

For that, we'll take white, a little bit of Phthalo Blue, mix it together, [Bob makes"swoomp" sound] like so.

It's a nice blue, pretty blue.

Cut off that little roll of paint again, always that little roll of paint.

There we go.

And then go in the opposite direction.

Another question that I get repeatedly is that people say "I went out and bought a knife and it don't look like yours.

The blade's shiny."

The blade on my knife looked like chrome.

Because of all the lights here in the studio, we paint the knife black.

But it is no different than the one you have.

No different.

It's very shiny.

But if I left it shiny like that, director'd be out here yelling and screaming at me because it would cause great big flares, big light shiny things, so we paint it black.

The brushes, even the brush handles sometime, with the ferrules, the metal part, looks different because we put tape over them.

Just once again, so the studio lights don't make them shine.

I keep talking, keep building mountains, we're going to be all the way to the bottom of the canvas.

So I'll hush and I'll stop here.

We'll do something else.

Okay, now, we want to create the illusion of mist at the base of this mountain.

Take a clean dry brush and tap, tap, very gently, following the angles in the mountain, always following the angles.

You don't want to come straight across or you'll just chop that mountain off.

Always follow those angles, and softly, softly.

The higher you go, the softer.

Up here, you just barely touch it.

Barely touch it.

Down here you can get a little stronger.

On this side of the mountain, follow these angles.

Okay.

Knock off the excess paint, and very lightly, lift upward.

See how it makes that beautiful, beautiful soft misty area down at the base of the mountain?

And if you can see the entire mountain, it's always more distinct at the top than it is at the bottom.

Because of mist and pollution and all these things, they diffuse and break up the light.

All right.

And that quick, we've got a happy little mountain.

Let's have some fun back here.

Let me grab a fan brush.

Let's mix up, shoot, we can just use the mountain color.

We'll add some brown to it, and least little touch of Sap Green, least little touch.

So we've got some Dark Sienna, some Van Dyke Brown, blue, crimson.

Shoot, we'll throw some black in there too.

Anything you've got, just throw it in there.

Okay, let me clean off my knife.

Take our fan brush, load it full of paint, a lot of paint.

Just really fill it up, really fill it up.

Okay, both sides.

Let's go up here.

Now then, back in here, I want a happy little tree, and I think he lives right there.

Take the corner of the brush, and just begin building your little tree.

[laughs] Isn't that super?

These little trees live right in these fan brushes.

Like that.

Maybe, yep, right there, there's one that's a little bigger.

You have to make a decision though, how many trees live in your world?

Maybe, we'll have a little, little land that comes right out through there.

Wherever, wherever, wherever.

And we'll reflect some that right down into the water, just, just generally, we're not looking for exact shapes.

Just generally.

Another little tree.

You saw him there didn't you?

Yeah, I knew it.

There.

There we go.

Just all kinds of happy little trees.

Now then, let's have some fun.

Reach up here with your big brush, grab just the bottom of this, just the bottom, see?

Pull straight down, it's important that you go straight down.

Beat your brush, come across, and instant reflections.

Now we can take some Liquid White, into that I'm going to add the smallest, smallest amount of the Bright Red, cut across it, and go right up here, and I'm literally pushing very firmly, going to cut in a happy little waterline.

Just cut it in.

And while I have that old knife here, we'll scratch in the indication of a few little tree trunks here and there, wherever you want them.

Isn't that something?

That easy, you can make a fantastic little tree.

Same color, now, as we move forward in the painting, I'll tell you what let's do, let's have a big tree, and he goes way up here.

Boy, this is going to be a big tree.

Now you can do this with a 2 inch brush and be faster but since I've already got this brush dirty, we'll just use it.

Whatever.

[Bob makes "duddle, lut, dut, doodle" sounds] Just come down, using more and more pressure on the brush as you work down, down, down.

Son of a gun, I didn't realize that tree was going to be that big.

We may have to nail another canvas on the bottom to get all of him.

That's all right.

Let's give him a friend.

You know me, I think everybody ought to have a friend.

Everybody ought to have a friend.

You know I travel all over the country doing demonstrations for PBS stations and, and other charity groups, and I meet so many fantastic people.

I have made hundreds and hundreds of friends all over the country.

And if I get to your town, I hope I get the opportunity to see you and to meet you and talk with you, look at the paintings that you're doing.

It's almost unreal some of the paintings that people are bringing me that they're doing.

And I'd like to see yours.

Taking a little Dark Sienna, a little Van Dyke Brown, and let's go in here and pop in a happy little bush or two, like so.

Maybe right about there.

Like so.

And one of the things, we, we maintain a little mailing list, if you would like to know when we're going to be in your area, just drop me a line, you can just send it to the address at the end of the show, drop me a line, give me your address, and we'll send you a card when we're going to be in your area and you can come out and see us.

Or contact your PBS station, ask them when they're going to have us.

There.

Okay.

Just all kinds of happy little bushes.

Now I want to reflect some of these into the water, so you just reverse the brush, and drop them right into the water, that easy.

That easy.

You can do it.

Right there.

Now then, clean dry 2 inch brush, touch, pull straight down, straight down, straight down.

See there?

Beautiful reflections.

Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful.

I've seen this happen a thousand times, a million times maybe, and it still excites me.

Still excites me.

Look at that.

Shoot, I can't stop.

I see something else here.

Let's just bring these right on around.

Right on around.

I know, I'm probably messing up this painting, and you're going to call me bad names.

Sometimes this, this starts working so nice though, you can't quit.

It's just fun.

And painting should make you happy.

Should bring you freedom.

There we go.

Let's take, let's take a little Dark Sienna.

Let's put a tree trunk, right up there.

[Bob makes "tchoo, tchoo, tchoo" sounds] Take a little white, a little touch of brown in it, just enough to highlight a little bit, a little bit of blue in that too, it looks like.

Dark Sienna, white, let's put a tree trunk, here and there in our big old evergreens.

Look at that.

That easy.

Now then, let me wash one of these brushes here.

Wash an old 1 inch brush, give him a shake, a little rap, go right into the Liquid White.

I'm going to pull this through some yellow, Yellow Ochre.

I'm going to reach right up here and get a little Dark Sienna.

I want to darken that down a little bit, oh, yeah, that's nice.

A little Bright Red too, what the heck.

Okay, let's go right up here.

Now maybe, right here, lookie there, there's a happy little bush that lives right there.

And, while we have this on here, let's reflect it right into the water.

Just like so.

Put a little more of the Liquid White on my brush.

Make the paint a little thinner.

Thin paint will stick to a thick paint.

Ooh, there's a nice bright one.

Just let him shine out here in the sunshine.

We'll put one, there he is, just sort of look and see where you think a happy little bush would would live, and drop it in, drop it in.

Anywhere you want him, that's where he ought to be.

Reflect that right into the water.

Lookie there.

Okay.

Wash that old brush out, give him a shake, go right into, grab a little of that, Dark Sienna.

Let's go over here.

There's another happy one.

All my bushes are happy.

Yours should be too.

Okay.

I'm going to add a little thinner to my brush, go right into a touch of Bright Red, a little Yellow Ochre.

Okay, let's go right up here.

This big old tree here, oh, we're going to make him really shine.

Really shine, and work in layers.

Think about all the little clumps of limbs and bushes in here.

Don't just throw these on at random.

Don't throw them on at random.

There.

Ooh, boy, that is a beautiful little tree, beautiful little tree.

And, maybe right here, there's another little tree.

And I want to reflect some of this right into the water.

Like so.

Another one, tell you what let's do before we get too wild here, let's pull these down.

Look, right there, most gentle touch imaginable, and go across, and that's the way you create those beautiful little mirror reflections.

Okay.

Here we go.

There's another little bush, another one right there.

Come right out here and drop in another one.

See?

Just bush after bush, however many you want.

You can use the brush sideways and just pop them right in.

Let them go.

Tell you what.

Maybe there's a happy little path.

There he is, right there.

Take a little color, come right around like that.

You need a little place to walk around there.

Okay, then put some bushes on this side of the path, see, that'll push it down into the painting.

Just let them hang over the path.

There's a few here and there, like so.

Like so.

There's one.

Wherever you think they should be, it's exactly where they should be.

Going to take a little Van Dyke Brown, and we'll just drop some land in here.

A little touch of land here and there.

A little Bright Red, a little brown, a little white, put a little touch of highlight, like so.

There.

Ooh, all kinds of nice things happening.

Put a little of the Liquid White, put us in a little waterline.

See how that stands out?

It's really what makes that just work so well.

Maybe just a little ripple here and there, wherever you want them, wherever you want them.

You can take and pop in a few little grassy areas just to break up that straight line.

Now then, you know me and my big trees.

Let's do it again.

Take brown on the fan brush, Van Dyke Brown, maybe there's a big tree, here we go, he lives, right there, and he's got a crook in him and he comes down and he's got another crook and [Bob makes "swoo" sound].

There he is.

There he is.

He needs a friend.

He needs a friend.

[Bob makes "swoo" sound] Just like so.

We can take the knife, a little white, pink.

Just pop in a few little highlights here and there, wherever.

Wherever, wherever, wherever.

Okay, our liner brush, and a few little limbs, and we about have a finished painting.

Which I better have because I'm running out of time.

This goes right on up.

Put them in, and as many or as few limbs as you want in your world.

Just put them in.

I think you will find this one of the most fun things that you've ever done with, with the ovals and the Con-Tact paper.

And here, in just a second, I'm going to pull this off and let you see.

And drop me a line, let me know what you're doing with some of these ideas, things that you would like to see.

I'd love to hear from you.

Just like so.

See?

As many or as few as you want.

Maybe there's an old stick lives right here.

[Bob makes "rrr" sound] There he is.

He's an old crooked stick.

Somebody stepped on him when he was little.

Then you can take the knife, go back in here and scrape out just a few little sticks and twigs.

All of that helps create the illusion of distance in your painting.

I'm going to take a little bit of the Yellow Ochre, and just highlight this tree, just a little.

Don't want much, don't want to lose that nice darkness.

Now then, for the big event, let's come right up here, let me pull the Con-Tact paper off as I'm telling you good-bye for today, and I really hope you've enjoyed this painting.

It's one of the most fantastic paintings I've ever seen.

From all of us here, happy painting, God bless, and we'll see you next time.

[announcer] To order a 256 page book of 60 Joy of Painting projects or Bob's detailed 3 hour workshop DVD Call 1-800-Bob-Ross or visit BobRoss.com [music] [music]