[Music] Hi, welcome back.

I'm certainly glad you could join us today.

And, as you can see, today I have one of my little friends with me.

This is a little baby cedar waxwing.

And it's easy to tell because he's got bright yellow little tail feathers.

But he's just a very small little baby.

Isn't he the cutest little thing that you've ever seen?

Hi.

Hi.

Hi.

You get an idea of how small he is.

Oh, he's going to eat my ring.

There.

Okay, tell you what.

Let's start and have them run all the colors across the screen that you need to paint along with us today.

While they're doing that, I'll set my little friend down and we'll get started.

Okay, guy, you go sit right over here, and I'll be back with you in just a second.

There you are.

Good.

Okay, today we have our standard old 18 by 24-inch canvas up here, or whatever size you want to use.

We just use this because it's good for the television format.

It's covered with a thin even coat of liquid white.

And it's all ready to go, so let's just have a fun, fun time today.

And I get so many cards and letters from people saying, "Do a winter scene that's cold.

Your warm scenes are nice, but where I live, it's cold, and we want a cold scene."

I'm going to show you a very easy way using a very limited palette how to do one of the neatest little winter scenes, and you can change it to fit whatever area that you live in, okay?

So, we have nothing but black, blue, and white today, so that's what we'll use.

Let's start out with a little midnight black.

Prussian blue.

We'll just mix them on the brush here.

Just mix them on the brush.

Black and blue.

Or blue and black, whichever we prefer.

Alright.

Let's go right up to the top here.

Now, we'll just start up here making our little x's, our little criss-cross strokes, whatever you want to call them.

There we are.

Now, if you want it to look colder, you can add more of the black color and make it look more overcast and like it's really, really a bad, bad stormy day.

Or if you want it to look a little brighter, go to the blue side.

Totally and completely up to you.

There.

Years ago, I had a man tell me he couldn't paint because he was color blind and could see nothing but gray.

Well, even if you're color blind, when you're using only black, blue, and white, you can do a very, very nice painting because all you're working with is values, or different hues of color, different intensities of color, and anybody can do it, even if they're color blind.

It's no big deal.

Alright.

Now, by starting at the top and working down, your paint is continually mixing with the liquid white that's on the canvas and automatically, automatically, it gets lighter and lighter toward the horizon.

And in a landscape, that's what we're looking for.

Okay.

Now, we'll just go all they way across, take out the little brush strokes, and, and we're in business.

Alright.

Maybe we'll have a little water in this.

You know me, I'm crazy about water, so we'll take-- [chuckles] since it's all we have-- we'll take the same colors, just black and blue, and let's lay in a little water.

This is going to be a winter scene, and probably we'll have some snow down here, and this also would work very well as a shadow color for the snow.

So we don't care, we'll cover the whole bottom, and whatever we don't want to be water, it'll be snow.

Alright.

Other side.

But notice we start on the outside edge and pull inward.

That way, you don't end up with big-- watch here, I'll just do it.

You start here and go over.

See the big line?

That's very hard to blend out.

Very hard to blend out.

And it's still showing a little bit.

You have to really work to blend that out.

So start on the outside and pull in, and try to leave a little area open, like in there.

That little open area, if all works right, will look like a little sheen of light coming across your water.

Alright.

Good.

Very lightly, just blend the entire bottom, and that little light area remains in there.

Okay, let's wash the old brush.

Today, let's play a little bit with clouds maybe.

Shake off the excess.

[laughs] And beat the devil out of it.

I tell you what, let me grab the old fan brush here.

Even using just blue and white and black, we can make some very effective little clouds.

Watch here.

We'll take, we'll start with just plain titanium white.

Load both sides of a good fan brush.

There.

Now these are bristle fan brushes, they're, they're pretty stiff in comparison to ones that are made of oh, badger hair or some of the better ones.

These are pretty stiff brushes.

You wouldn't want to use a sable brush to do this because we're really going to push this paint into the canvas.

Now, decide where your little cloud is going to live in our world, maybe, yep, right there.

Right there.

And just work in tight, tight little circles.

Little tiny circles, there you go.

See?

Tiny little circles.

Maybe, maybe the old cloud comes right over in here.

And try not to stay in one spot and just work it over and over and over because it'll look like, [chuckles] look like a big old cotton ball up in the sky.

And we don't want that.

Don't want that.

We want clouds that have character.

Okay.

But all kinds of little things happening there.

Now, let me get a-- be sure it's good and dry, two inch brush.

Let's go in here and begin blending this.

But we're not touching the top at all, and all I'm using is the very top of the brush.

See there?

Just the top bristles.

Okay?

There, good.

And we'll just that right on back.

Right on back.

Now.

Very lightly, very lightly, we'll just sort of fluff that a little.

Just fluff it up.

Just two hairs and some air.

Go over it a little bit.

Look at that little cloud.

And we can put layers of clouds in our world.

But do one layer at a time and then come forward.

Always coming forward.

Maybe, maybe there's another little layer right there, I don't know.

Just wherever you want them.

Clouds are very free.

They just sort of float around the sky and have a good time all day.

There.

But see, layer after layer.

And you could put as many layers as you want, as many as you want.

Okay.

All kinds of little things.

And we just sort of let it float off in here into nothing.

Back to our large brush.

And be sure it's dry.

Be sure it's dry.

If it's wet and you do this, then you're going to lose the ability to blend it because the only reason you can blend this is it's a very thick, dry paint.

If you have a thin, soupy paint, oily paint, then you're in trouble.

And I'm just beating it to knock off the excess paint.

There.

Now all paint has a little oil separation.

Sometimes when you open the tube, there will be a little oil separation and oil will come out.

Don't worry about that.

But if the paint is real oily and real thin, it will not work for this technique.

Now, let me grab another fan brush.

I have several of them going here.

Let's take-- let's take and put some white over there, some black and blue, mostly black, though.

I want it to be into the gray.

There.

Maybe even a little darker.

Ooh, that's nice.

That's nice.

Now, let's go up in here and right in here-- I tell you, let's do it up here.

We'll start way up in here.

Let's have another little cloud that just floats right in here.

But see there, let that little cloud just float right around.

Maybe it comes down and-- I don't know.

Let your imagination take you wherever you want to go.

Just follow it, follow it.

There.

See, now we can make layers, though, of clouds just using basically gray and white.

That's really the only thing that we're using here.

Back to our brush.

Big brush.

And we begin blending that.

Just blend it back.

You want to blend the, the bottom of the cloud back here to where it almost disappears, but we're not touching the top up here of the cloud at all yet.

Not yet.

And then we'll just fluff the entire cloud.

And very lightly blend it.

See how that pushes that whole range of clouds back?

And sometimes, sometimes, sometimes, you can take-- watch here, watch here, watch here.

Maybe here's a little cloud that slipped down.

There's a little opening right there, maybe, maybe it slipped right out of there.

There it goes, there it goes, see.

And we'll just let it float right on back.

And maybe there's another one lives right there.

A little floater in the front.

Front floater.

And you can just have this spill over wherever you think it should.

Back to our big brush that's clean and dry, and we blend the base of it out again.

Just blend it out.

There.

And over here, same, same.

Fluff them.

Lift them.

And then we blend the entire sky together.

But you can just keep on and on and on and make layer after layer after layer of just gorgeous clouds.

It's very simple to do.

Even if you've, if you've never painted a cloud before, this will work for you.

Easiest, most effective way I've ever seen of making clouds.

Alright.

Let's have some fun.

[chuckles] We'll use that old brush we had the, the gray color on.

Maybe in our world, there lives, lives, lives a little mountain.

We're just taking the black and the blue since that's all we have.

Mostly black, though, I want it onto the dark side.

Something like so, and let's come right up in here.

Maybe in our world, yep, see?

We'll have maybe, maybe there's a little mountain there, comes right down.

[Bob makes "tchh" sound] Put all kinds of little bumps and stuff, and maybe it just fades right on over into nothing, basically back here.

See, the only thing we're worried about is a nice top edge.

We could care less what's happening elsewhere.

That's all we're looking for.

There.

See how you can just put in a basic mountain shape with a little fan brush?

Grab our two-inch brush, and all we're going to do here is grab it and pull.

Because the liquid white's on the canvas, we can literally move the color.

This would be difficult to do on a dry canvas, but on a canvas that's wet, it's very simple, very simple.

It'll just move all over.

[Bob makes "tchoo" sound] There.

See?

Just pull it.

This is also an extremely easy and effective way of making the indication of some nice little mountains that live back in your painting.

And I decided I wanted these to look like they're sort of going away from us, so I made this side smaller than that side.

That's the only reason.

If you want it to look like it's a straight one, then make it basically the same all the way across.

Up to you.

We can use-- I'll use the small knife.

Could use the big one or the small one.

I'll take a little titanium white, and I think there's a little snow laying up here on these mountains, but I don't want a lot.

Don't want a lot.

So I'm just rubbing this a little.

And as you go down, let the knife turn so it gets wider.

Figure out where you think there might be a little snow on these, and just play some games here.

Don't kill all your dark areas.

Those dark areas are going to end up being our shadows.

There.

Okay.

Let it go.

Wasn't that little bird one of the cutest little devils?

I like little birds.

All my life, I've raised little birds.

When I was a kid, my mother would always get onto me if I went out and, and swiped a bird out of the nest to raise.

So when I was coming home from school some time, I would, I would literally risk life and limb to climb some great big tree and swipe a little bird, then I'd take it home and I'd tell my mother, I said, "This little bird, Ma, he fell out of a tree and was out in the middle of the highway, and, and the cars were coming by and about to run over him, and I have to take care of him."

And she'd say, "Well, okay, if that's the case."

But I always, always thought she really knew the truth.

And every year, there'd be this little bird out on the highway, and I'd bring him home, and I'd raise him.

Go out every day after school and dig fishing worms for him, and feed the little devils because they, they take constant care.

And then when he got big, I'd turn him loose and let him go.

And then all year, every time I'd see a bird that was the same breed as the one I had released, I would, I'd wonder if that was my little bird that I'd raised and had the opportunity to make friends with.

So I borrowed that little bird from Diana Shaffer, the Bird Lady here in Muncie.

He's a loaner bird, I guess.

But Diana raises hundreds of little birds that are orphaned or, for various reasons, have no parents.

Every year, she raises hundreds of them and turns them loose.

And there's people all over the country that do this, that work with injured animals and birds and orphaned animals and birds, and they need your help.

If you have time, go see them.

Go see them.

And it's a super way for my young friends to get to meet some creatures.

I know I work with Ann Young in Orlando, Florida, where I live, and I go over and just help her feed the birds sometime because she, now she has about 2,000 birds a year.

Whew!

And she always needs help, and so do, so do all the other bird ladies.

So if you have time, give them a hand.

They'll appreciate it.

They'll appreciate it.

And most of them support this out of their own pocket.

They, they can always use a little contribution.

We'll use a one-inch brush here, and I'm just going to tap in some of that gray color, just a little.

Maybe in our world back here, maybe there's just a few little trees that grow right up the side of this.

Just touch, sort of lift upward a little.

We'll come back with another one and do this again.

But this just begins giving the feeling of a little, little trees that are growing right up the side over there.

Just a few.

There.

Okay.

Now, we'll take a clean, dry one-inch brush.

This is a different brush.

I have several of them.

And lift upward.

Just lift upward.

But, see, it'll make it look like there's little trees growing right up the side of these mountains back here.

There we are.

Far, far away.

Little tiny ones.

Little tiny ones.

On the last show, we showed the little kestrel.

He's, he's almost like a little falcon, a beautiful little bird.

Maybe we'll show him again in this series.

So many people have wrote and asked about him and how he's doing.

Gorgeous little bird.

There we are.

And just put layer after layer.

You make up your mind where, where you want these and how many you want because you can get sort of carried away with them.

Take a little more of the titanium white.

And right down here at the base, we can put in the indication of a little snow down at the bottom of them.

See, and that sort of brings it all together.

There we go.

But there's really not much paint.

There's not much paint there.

And not a great deal of pressure.

You still want it to break a little.

I think I'll have some trees there, so I'm not too worried about that side.

Looks like a natural place to have a nice little, a little tree thing growing out there.

Okay.

Let me see.

Let's take a fan brush.

Here's one that had some white on it, that's alright.

We'll go into that same color.

Same color, blue, black, and white.

But we don't want it, we don't want it real dark right now.

We don't want it real dark because we're going to make several layers.

Maybe back here lives some little evergreen trees that are far away.

Or whatever kind of trees you want.

Just touch and sort of pull downward.

Get a little more color here.

There.

And just keep tapping with that.

See?

Just keep it going like so.

There we are.

Okay.

[chuckles] All kinds of little things.

Okay, we'll just take this right on up, maybe to about there.

Wherever we want them.

Alright.

Now then, we want to create the illusion of mist at the base of these, so what we'll do is just tap on the two-inch brush.

Mist in a winter scene also helps make it look very cold.

Very, very cold.

Then lift upward.

There.

And at the base of that, we'll put a little bit more of the snow.

Figure out where the bottom of these trees are, lay a little snow just like that.

See?

You can put layer after layer after layer in your painting, and these various layers, that's what makes your painting look like it has depth.

It's not just an old, flat painting.

Now, now we'll use the same colors since that's all we have, and we just make it a little darker.

But we still want to, want to have room to get even darker if we need to.

And maybe right in here, we'll just push upward with the, with the brush.

Maybe there's some little grassy things growing right there.

And there's a few little trees.

We're beginning to, to be able to make out a little, little bit of the shapes here and there because it's getting closer to us now.

A little baby tree lives right there, but he'll grow up and be a big old tree.

See, there's one that already has that's grown up pretty good.

There.

Just push upward.

Something like so.

Maybe, maybe in our world, we'll have another bigger one right there.

Okay.

Something that goes like that.

Just work back and forth.

We start with a corner of the brush, and as we work down the tree, we just push harder and harder.

Harder and harder.

And automatically, that will happen.

Let me grab another brush here.

We'll take an old two-inch brush with a little titanium white on it.

Grab the bottom of that blue and black color, and give it a little pull.

See how it creates the illusion of shadows under there?

A little dark area underneath, but don't be excited if you pick up a little of that color.

It's nice.

And now, here comes our snow.

It just sort of-- it'll sort of happen.

Just sort of look at your painting and decide where you think these things should be.

Just will sort of happen.

Just fill it in.

Like that.

But angles are very important when you're doing the snow.

Very important.

Shoot.

We'll take some of our darker color-- guess what color it is?

Since we only have one color.

Pull straight down, straight down.

See there, there it comes.

There it comes.

You can see it happening right there.

And that quick, that quick, we can turn that little thing into a happy little pond.

Sometimes you can touch a little white and pull that down, and it'll make it look like there's a little sheen reflecting across that.

There.

See?

Instantly.

Take a little liquid white, mix it with a little of the titanium white just to thin it down because a thin paint will stick better.

Right over here, we'll put a little water line in there.

Just like so.

There we are.

Okay.

Act like you're trying to cut a hole right through the canvas.

Just really get in there.

There.

Now, with our brush that has the titanium white on it, I'm going to pull that distinctly through there.

[Bob makes "swoo" sound] Go right through.

There we go.

And that sort of pushes that whole lake area back.

Okay.

Let me grab one of my-- there's the one.

I grabbed the wrong fan brush.

A little blue and black, maybe, yep, right there.

Let's put one.

Sort of look at your composition and decide where you think there should be a little tree.

I think there should be one right there.

There we go.

Just let it work right off your brush there.

Maybe it, it lives in the foreground a little more, like here.

But isn't it a super easy way to make nice evergreens?

Grab the bottom, give it a little pull so there's a shadow under it.

Shoot, you've got it there.

Let's go on the other side.

We need something over there, too.

We don't want him left out.

Maybe we've got a big tree that lives right there.

Corner of the brush.

This is a good painting to teach you how to make evergreen trees.

As you've seen in this series, there's numerous ways to make evergreen trees.

You can use the oval brush, the one-inch brush, the fan brush, just about any way you can think of.

There we go.

There they are.

And we don't care in here too much because you can't distinguish much in there.

Here's one that maybe is a little bent.

There we are.

He just sort of hangs on like that.

Maybe there's a little reflection in the water.

Okay.

Just grab a two-inch brush, pull it straight down.

Straight down.

And then go across.

Instant reflections.

Now, I'm going to take a darker color and put another little tree right there.

I used a darker color so it will stand out, and it will look like it's in the front.

But you have to work with values when you're doing this.

Don't use up all your darkest colors in the background because then when you get in the foreground, you have nothing darker, so it won't stand out.

Sort of, sort of plan how many layers you're going to have in there or start with quite a light value, and as you work forword, you have some darker values to use.

Alright.

Gotta give it a little something to stand on since it's just sort of hanging around out here.

Let's do something like that.

This old tree here needs a little place.

[Bob meks "tchoom" sound] There we are.

Take a little of the liquid white, cut us out a little water line.

And it lives right about there.

Something right along in there.

See there?

And you can put a, put the indication here and there of a little ripple or a sheen, whatever.

There.

Take the clean knife, scrape in a few little sticks and twigs.

And you have a finished painting.

Hope you like this one.

It'll teach you how to use a very limited palette and do some fantastic things.

From all of us here, happy painting, God bless, my friend.