[Music] Hi, I'm glad to see you today.

Today I thought we'd do the little animated opening, the little painting that you see at the beginning of each show.

So, tell you what, let's have them put all the colors on the screen that you need to do this painting and let's go up here.

Now, I've already covered the canvas with a thin, even coat of the liquid white, it's wet and slick and it's all ready to go, so let's go too.

I'm going to start out today with a small amount of the Indian yellow.

Tiniest little bit.

Just tapped onto the brush.

Just use the two inch brush.

Let's go right in here.

Put a little tiny, tiny bit of yellow right along, right along where you thing the horizon will be.

And just drop that in.

Just using little crisscross strokes.

Maybe I'll put some down in here.

This was a little snow scene, so we'll put some colors down in the snow that will be reflected from the sky.

Okay, without cleaning the brush I'm going to go into a small amount of alizarin crimson, just a small amount.

Okay, and back up here, right above that yellowish color, the Indian yellow.

Still using little crisscross strokes, we'll just drop in a little, little bit of alizarin crimson.

And sort of let them blend together right here where they come together.

Alright.

Okay.

And same color, we'll just put a little bit down in here in what will eventually be snow.

Looks pretty already.

Okay, and without cleaning the brush I'm going right into some of the midnight black, just a very small amount, and a little bit of phthalo blue.

Tiniest little bit.

It's a very strong color, both of these colors are very strong, so don't get carried away and overdo.

It's real easy to add more color to your sky, but it's a son of a gun to try to take it away.

Still using a little crisscross patterns, little Xs, we'll just, just lay in some little sky shapes, just sort of let them happen.

A little bit more right in there.

And you can just bring them, have some little arms coming out here, wherever, wherever.

And you can put a little bit of that color down in here.

Just here and there, doesn't matter at this point.

This is really just a good way of cleaning the brush.

And speaking of cleaning the brush let's do that.

Shake off the excess.

[laughs] That really is a fun part.

Alright, let's go up here now.

Clean, dry brush and be very sure that your brush is dry as you can possibly get it.

And then, still using the little crisscross strokes, blend this entire sky together.

Very gently.

And that's how the little sky is made.

It's a very effective little sky, very quick, very easy, and it's a nice little sky.

Okay, now then, we want some little footie hills back here in the background, so to make those I'm going right back into the midnight black, a little bit of the blue, I'm going to reach over here and pick up a small amount of white, titanium white.

So we have black, blue, and white.

Okay, and I'm just tapping that brush right into it.

Okay, let's go back up here.

Make a big decision here, where's your foothill live?

I think he lives right there.

Use just the corner of the brush, touch and pull it straight down and lay in your basic foothill shapes.

Just sort of let them wander around.

You don't want them to be real straight.

Foothills normally, normally have little high points and low points, all kinds of happy little things that happen in there.

Straight down.

We're not using much pressure on the brush here, just enough to get the paint to come off.

Okay, now I'm going to have two layers of foothills, so we want to create a misty area in between each layer, that's the only thing that separates these layers.

So with a clean, dry two inch brush I'm going to tap the base of this, and I'm going to strike it quite firmly.

There we go.

See that?

That creates the illusion of mist down there just by tapping.

And then very gently lift upward, just lift it upward.

Okay, now we have a beautiful misty area right along in there.

That's what I'm looking for.

Now I'm going to put another layer of foothills.

I'm going to use the same colors.

A little bit of black, a little bit of blue, but this time I want it darker.

As things get closer to you in a landscape, as we've said before, they need to get a little darker.

Just tap that brush in the color.

Okay, let's go up here.

Now then, here we go.

See?

Now we don't want to kill all that little misty area that was in there, that's the only thing that will separate these two entities, it's the only separator.

It's very important to you, that's your good friend, don't kill it, don't kill it.

There we are.

See?

That easy.

We have another layer of foothills.

And then we'll take that clean brush and once again, I want to tap the base of it.

Just to create that illusion of mist.

And then lift upward.

[chuckles] Isn't that a super way to make some little foothills that are far away and very soft and quiet?

And it works.

Now then, now then, let's have some fun.

I'm going to take some of the liquid white and put it on my palette, and we'll get a fan brush.

And to the, we'll add a little bit of the phthalo blue on the brush and go right into the liquid white.

So it's a very thin paint, very thin, maybe reach over here and pick up a little bit more of the liquid white.

There we are.

Okay, now let's go up here.

I'm going to put some little indication of some happy little, little bushes right here.

See, all you have to do is just touch with the fan brush and pop upward.

Just give it a little upward pop.

Now this paint's much thinner than what's on there, so it'll just come right off your brush, just like so, that easy.

There we go.

Now we can wash the old brush.

Okay, now it's time to start making some decisions back here and we start working forward.

So I'm going right into the titanium white and to that I'm going to add the least little touch of bright red.

Let me say that again, the least little touch, it's very strong.

A lot of paint on the brush, both sides are loaded full.

Okay, let's go back up here.

Now we have to start thinking about the lay of the land, so just grab that and begin, begin pulling it.

Now we want to create the illusion of shadows and highlights and warm and cool spots all through this snow back here.

There we go.

And every once in a while you can pick up a little bit of the phthalo blue, a little bit, and work it in there.

And it'll help create that illusion, there's little hills and bumps and all kind of things happening back in there.

There, there's a little bit of paint right there.

It's a super, super easy and very effective way of making some beautiful, beautiful snow areas.

You can add a little bit of the Indian yellow here and there just to, just to make it shine.

because it'll reflect what's up here in the sky.

And you know the stories we've heard about yellow snow, be careful, don't get too much of it.

There.

There we go.

And you can turn this into an extremely warm painting.

Sometimes winter paintings are so cold that they're, ooh, they're not much fun to look at.

I like to make winter scenes that are nice and warm and make you happy.

Okay, okay.

Let's do something.

I'm going to take and mix up, I'll take some black and some blue, a little bit of alizarin crimson, and just mix it with a knife, and a least little touch of white into it, titanium white.

There we go.

There, a good dark color.

Okay, let me wipe my knife off here.

Now then, we'll take the old fan brush and load it full of paint, just pull it through there, give it a little wiggle.

See, there's a lot of paint on the bristles.

Okay, let's go up here.

Maybe right back here lives, I think we had a, yeah, we had a happy little evergreen that lived right there.

Take just the corner of the brush and begin working back and forth.

I had a lady at one of my classes, she called these Z trees.

She says, "because all you're doing is going back and forth and making little Zs."

And I think that's a good analogy.

Just sort of work it back and forth.

And you're forcing the bristles to bend downward.

See how those bristles are bending?

And that makes all those little hangy down things that are under the limbs.

Makes your tree look really nice.

We don't want him to get lonely.

You know I always, always give my little trees a friend, because friends are so important I think they're even important to trees.

There we go.

And that quick we got a couple of happy little trees back there.

And we can take our fan brush that had the white on it, add a little blue to that, load it full.

Okay, let's go back up here.

And let's put the indication that maybe there's a little snow hanging on, lookie there, just a little, don't want to kill all that dark, because it's nice and contrasty.

Helps make them little trees stand out.

Just put the indication of a little bit of snow there.

There we go.

Okay, maybe, maybe there's a happy little weed that lives right there.

Okay, I'm going to wash off my old fan brush.

Then we can begin going back into our snow colors and then reach right up in here, grab under there, and sort of pull that out.

And begin working with the lay of the land here.

Look at that.

See, now you've set that tree right up on a little hill back there.

And that's where that little tree would be happy.

You know, when you watch this, beginning of the show, it only takes about 30 seconds to see the whole thing, but it takes a lot of fantastic people a long time to animate that.

They do that [chuckles] one frame at a time.

I couldn't believe it the first time I saw them doing that.

But it made me appreciate some of the magic of television and we, we're very fortunate, we work with the best crew in the country here.

There we go.

All kinds of little things happening.

Okay, that gives us a little background and some snow.

Let's have some fun now.

Let's go to the old round brush and go right into some Van Dyke Brown, a little bit of dark sienna, and we're just going to tap it into the bristles.

Okay, let's build some happy little trees.

Maybe, let's go right here.

Maybe there's a little tree that lives right here.

Some little bushes and weeds, they come right on out, I don't know where they go.

Wherever you want them to go, that's where they go.

And I bet, I bet we.

Now remember we had some on this side too, so we'll just drop some right over here.

Now I like to start at the bottom on these trees and work upward, that way, that way the darkest color is at the bottom.

And it creates deeper shadows on the base of the tree.

There we are.

And all you're looking for here is just some very basic little tree shapes, we're not looking for a lot of detail yet.

Detail will come later.

Right now all we're looking for is just some happy little shapes.

Let's put a few more in there, I think they were a little thicker.

There we go.

That's getting pretty already.

I like these, these little warm winter scenes, they, they do nice things in here, they make you happy.

Okay, a little, little thinner on my liner brush, and we'll just pull it through some brown, and turn that brush, turn it and pull it out, it brings it to a very sharp point.

There, you can see it.

Okay, let's go up here.

And in here I'm just going to put the indication of a few little trunks.

Just a few here and there.

Most of them you won't ever see, but should they show through it gives the painting some detail, and that always is nice.

Just here and there.

Wherever you think a little trunk should live to hold up all this, trees and shrubs back here.

Just drop it in, drop it in.

Shoot, I'll tell you what let's do, let's put some pretty colors on there.

I'm going to go right into some of the yellows here.

Some yellow ochre, some cad yellow, a little Indian yellow.

Just tap this brush into it.

And the least little touch of the red.

Whew.

Least little touch.

Okay, let's go back up here.

Now maybe, maybe there's a tiny bit of highlight just playing right on the top of these.

Just to create a little color.

And if you're, if you're out selling your paintings a lot of times people will buy your paintings because of the color more than the content.

Because they, they have a special place in their house that that color combination will just fit.

And warm colors are very popular right now.

I think maybe they're always popular.

People [chuckles] don't like to be cold.

Maybe, maybe right there.

There we go.

A little bit more of the bright red.

Let's put a happy little bush that lives right there.

And all I'm doing is just tapping with the top corner of that brush.

That's really all I'm doing.

Just barely touching.

Now your paint has to be a little bit thinner than what's on the canvas if you want it to stick.

The yellows I use are a little thinner than the other colors, that way they stick easier.

And yellow is normally always used as a highlight color.

There, you see?

Just layer after layer after layer.

Just layer after layer.

Okay.

Now then, we can go back to our fan brush and we can begin just running right up in here and grabbing this and pulling it out.

You don't care if a little bit of that brown color comes out into your snow.

[chuckles] That's the only thing worse than yellow snow.

There we go.

Pull it right out.

But it makes it look like shadows.

There we are.

Okay.

Now then, over here on the other side maybe, maybe we'll take some of those same little yellows, just tapping.

And let's put a few highlights right over here.

You know, we all do things we don't think about, and sometimes they're just automatic.

And the other day I was doing a demonstration for a fantastic group and a young man about, oh, he was probably about 10 or 12 years old, just walked behind me and I heard him saying out of the [chuckles] corner of his mouth as he walked around me, he says, "Maybe, maybe, maybe."

[laughs] So I could tell he'd been watching the show.

And I don't realize I'm doing that sometime, but he made me aware of it.

So he was cute.

And he, he brought in some fantastic paintings to show me.

Then we recently did a show in Missouri and I had a young lady that was four years old bring me some paintings.

Son of a gun, she was, she was just fantastic.

Four years old and already she's a fantastic painter.

By the time she gets my age, you know, 22, she's really, she's really going to be something.

And if you believe I'm 22 I want to sell you some land in Florida.

There.

Okay.

Tell you what let's do, that painting had a little cabin in it, a happy little cabin, so let's do one of those.

Let's start here with some Van Dyke Brown, cut us off a little bit.

There, see it's right out on the edge of that knife.

There you can see it real good.

Okay, let's go up here.

Let's start with the back eave of that cabin, we'll give him a little back eave, like so.

Now this may not be an exact duplicate of the painting that you see animated, because you can never go back and do a painting that's exact, but it'll show you how that painting was done.

And you can do your own at home.

There, so make the side.

Now then, let me grab some white.

This is just straight titanium white, touch and give him a happy little roof.

Don't want him to freeze to death.

Got to give him a roof.

There.

And sometimes you'll find it's easier to scrape out the basic shape, and it helps remove some of that loose paint that's underneath.

Put a little snow on the other side.

A little bit right down there.

Take a little bit of the dark sienna and some white and let's put, let's put some highlights on these boards.

Just some highlights.

Mm.

Makes it look like old, old wood.

A little bit of brown, give him a door.

There.

And we can take just the point of the knife and create the illusion of some old slabs here.

This, this cabin's made with old boards.

A little bit of blue and white and we'll just put the indication of a little window right there.

That's really hard to see, but it's there.

Okay, now then, let's go right up in here, put a little snow coming right down through there.

Right down.

Then you can cut this off and put it wherever you want it.

And we'll take, this is a little bit of, oh, a little alizarin crimson and a tiny bit of phthalo blue.

Make a lavender color.

Dark lavender color.

And we'll just put the indication of a little, happy little path right here.

See, he needs a little way to get out of this cabin.

Then we can come back with our round brush and go back into some of our yellows, a touch of the red, tap them in.

Let's go right here.

And we'll come right along here, and we'll let's, we'll just let a few little bushes grow right up around the edge of this cabin.

That sort of sets it back into the painting.

And if I lived in this little cabin I'd, I'd want to set back into the bushes and trees where the salesmen couldn't find me.

I'd be hiding back here.

Okay, and we can take a little bit of the titanium white and just sort of smooth that out on the bottom.

Okay, that easy.

Now then, we had a little fence.

So I'm going to just dip my liner brush right into the liquid black.

That's the easiest way to make a little fence.

See, just pull it down.

And we just let it go right on back.

Maybe it goes right over the hill back there.

And there's still some, still some old fence things laying across there, like that, let them go.

With the liquid white we can come right back and lay a little bit of snow on there.

See, isn't that super?

Really gives your painting a lot of detail.

And when you're doing this at home you can, you can just get crazy.

Put all kinds of beautiful little things.

Maybe we'll have this post come right behind the house.

We don't know where it goes that way.

There.

Okay.

Now then, let's go over here, play a little bit on the other side.

I want, I think we'll put some big bushes.

I'm tapping that same old round brush, I haven't cleaned it yet, right into the browns again.

Let's go up here and, and, and we're going to have a great big tree, oh, right over my pretty bushes back there.

This big tree, oh, he is a big tree, he lives right here.

So you just start thinking about some basic shapes, how you want your tree to look.

Lookie there.

See, big old tree, there he comes.

We put this dark in so the light will show when you put it on there.

There is a happy little bush.

This comes right on down.

Mm.

That looks good already.

Now then.

A little paint thinner, right into the brown, just really load that brush full.

Okay, let's go up here, see, and turn that brush when you're pulling it down.

Turn it, it helps, helps make all kinds of old gnarly effects.

Keeps your tree just from being a future telephone pole.

See, you can just drop all those things in.

And we can take our round brush and right back into the yellows, a little bit of the bright red, just tap it.

Okay.

And we'll go right up here.

See, just, just put the indication of a few little highlights, just some warm colors in here.

There.

And as many or as few as you want.

Just drop them in.

Isn't that super that you can make all those little things that quick?

Sometimes it's fun to go right into, let's take a little bit of the blue and white mixed together.

And lookie there, we'll put one in that it gives it a little bit of cold feeling.

Maybe he's got a friend right there.

So mix a little cold in there with all that warm.

Mm.

Just makes all kinds of beautiful little things happen.

There we go.

There's one right there.

And as many them or as few as you want.

It's up to you.

Painting, painting gives you freedom.

Gives you freedom.

And I think we all are looking for that.

At least I am.

There we go.

All kinds of little happy things.

Alrighty.

And we lay that brush down, and we'll go back, go back to our old fan brush.

And, and a little color in it.

We're just mixing between blue and a little pink, and then we're going to change this plane.

In other words, I want this to go there in a different angle.

So it looks like it's overlapping what's back there.

Just by changing the angles here you can create all kinds of fantastic illusions.

See, just... And it doesn't matter, once again, if you pick up a little bit of that color, it really, really adds to your painting.

Let's take a little bit of the, this is just a little bit of blue and white on the brush.

Just tap in a few little, a few little happy bushes and weeds coming right down like that, there's one.

Okay.

I'll tell you what, as you know I like big old trees, so let's do a big old tree.

I'm going to go right into Van Dyke Brown and pick up some of the midnight black and just mix them together.

Okay, let's go right up here.

Maybe there lives a big tree, oh, he does now, does now, right there, right there.

See?

Big old tree.

And let's give him an arm.

[Bob makes "sshhoom" sound] Boy, he is a big tree.

And all we're doing right now is just looking for a very basic shape.

Very basic shape.

And we can take a little bit of the browns and white, this is dark sienna and a white, and let's just put the indication of some nice little highlights here.

Just here and there.

Just here and there.

Like so.

Okay, while I got the old knife going here, a few little fences posts we had, I think, in that one.

A little white, like so.

I'm going to take the old liner brush and we'll put the indication of a, of a happy little limb here and there.

And the old clock tells me it's time to leave for this week, so I hope you've enjoyed this one, I hope you've enjoyed seeing it at the beginning of each show.

And until next time, I'd like to wish you happy painting, God bless.