For the third year in a row, I participated in Maria Smirnova’s sky challenge on Instagram (#magrish_challenge_sky run by @magrish). In November, she posts grayscale reference photos and the challenge is to paint them in the colors of your choice. Typically, Maria’s sky photos depict cloud-filled sunsets over Paris. I previously posted about by 2023 and 2022 challenges. So how did I fare this year?
Week 1
Loved:
- These are colors that I enjoy!
- I like the lighting effects in the skyline.
- Masking the sun with masking tape was pretty effective.
Learned:
- I think my value contrast in the clouds could have been stronger. Later, I saw other people’s responses to this prompt where the sky is a mass of very dark clouds with just a band of vibrant color at the bottom, and I think that works very well for this prompt.
- There is something about the clouds that is too “soft”, I think that I used too much wet-on-wet and could have stood to add some contrasting wet-on-dry effects in the cloudscape.
- Once again I have learned that when I try to do a painting twice, I often don’t do any better the second time!
Color Notes: I used a limited palette of MANS, Quin Red (PV19), and Cobalt Blue for the clouds and added in Indanthrone Blue for the silhouettes.
Week 2
Loved:
- Value contrast
- Balance of softness and crispness
Learned:
- Seasonal change can reset expectations about drying times! It’s been very dry lately so I underestimated how quickly the sky would dry, and my attempt to mist it wet again was too late so it just turned into white speckles. How come I can’t get the timing right when I WANT white speckles??
Color Notes: The blue sky color is Schmincke Ultramarine Finest + Schmincke Cobalt Turquoise.
Week 3
Loved:
- I think I did an okay job with a difficult thing, which was creating clouds with gaps/highlights.
- Using a flat brush made it easy to make squarish building shapes.
Learned:
- A ruler might have helped me to not slant the buildings and leave enough room for them.
- Skies often look like nothing until you add some kind of foreground.
Conclusion
I found the sky challenge very difficult this year; perhaps I’m just rusty, or maybe the difficulty level has increased!