How to Create a Great Painting From an Imperfect Photo Reference

By Shelby Keefe

This is a photo I took when in Cuba with Eric Rhoads and 99 other people for the Paint Cuba trip back in 2016. I thought I was photographing this guy without his knowledge, so the shot was taken very quickly and not an ideal composition, but he caught me and smiled in the process of “busting me”!

In his quick look toward the camera, I felt I caught the joy and lighthearted quality that so many Cuban people exemplified. So, even with this challenging composition, I really wanted to try to capture his nature and his spirit in a painting.

First, I needed to downplay and move that architectural finial on the stone wall. It was too similar in strength and it divided the canvas in too equal a way. So I made the “ball” smaller and shorter, and the wall longer, to create a better division of space. I could’ve taken out that ball altogether, but felt it had such a Cuban flavor and spoke to the crumbling ornate structures we saw all over the place.

Second, I eliminated a lot of detail and softened the background into general shapes of color with only suggestions of texture. I also exaggerated any shapes and color that helped create impact, such as the light that hits the top of the wall and the color of the ground.

Third, I pushed back the distance in the far left upper corner by lightening the value of the subjects, creating atmosphere and space.

The finished painting still breaks some compositional rules, having all the meaningful information way over on the left, and cutting off at the bottom the curved step that leads your eye around. But hopefully this man grabs your attention by his knowing smile and you can forgive the awkward nature of this non-standard composition.

Shelby Keefe, “Solista del Sol,” oil

Know that your life will be easier if you start with a good photograph to begin with!

Come to Plein Air Live – from the comfort of your studio (or your living room). It’s the world’s largest plein air convention and it happens online in March. Learn more and register here.

When Mood and Atmosphere Steer the Ship

Sometimes in painting, composition and color conspire with atmosphere to brew a perfect storm of mood and emotion. Atmosphere relates to the amount of diffusion or deliberate indefiniteness (essentially, either under-drawing or over-blending in the work). Monet used the term “envelope” to emphasize that he wasn’t painting objects but rather the air between and around them.

Softened (i.e., blended, often called “lost”) edges leave areas of a painting less defined and therefore require the viewer to become actively involved in completing the image. Conversely, strongly atmospheric paintings minimize or eliminate hard edges and attention-getting contrasts. Bestowing a dreamy haze reminiscent of memory, an artist can use the lost-edge technique to convey emotional content.

Ideally one’s art conveys something of the depths of human feeling. To that end, mood in painting is a complex interplay of color, composition, technique, and style. When they all come together, a viewer experiences a painting as an emotional journey.

C.W. Mundy has a way of teaching that encourages you to shut down your internal self-talk and just paint without stress and the anxious voice of criticism coming from inside your own head. He shares numerous insights from a 60-year career as an artist and illustrator in his video, Painting with Freedom. Download CW Mundy’s video. now.