Go Fly a Whale

Whale Kites! (4′ x 2′)

Concept sketch where I experimented with shifting the composition to use the rule of 3rds.  The whales were shifted to be closer to the intersection points of the grid lines and then horizon was shifted 1/3rd of the way up the canvas.

This painting is 4 feet x 2 feet.  Above, folks on the beach (mother and daughter) are only about a 3/8″ tall and are holding thread

I tried to build up some texture on the whales using acrylic latex caulking on both the whales and the horizon line.

above, starting to think about where to place the shadow.  This ended up being the most difficult part of the painting – for me.

Here is a closeup – before some final touch-ups and adding the kite-line.

I like this piece overall because it was completely free-hand. l like how the clouds and texture on the whales came out.  Something difficult in this piece for me, was trying to decide on variations of blue/green in order to get sky, water & whales to look right together.

Hope you enjoyed! thanks for reading.