Bad Choice!!. How to paint a Tree

[rafaelega]

Hi all.

I am in progress of finishing a confederate soldiers scene (as you can see in my forum) but now I have problems with the tree. I cannot locate the correct colors I must use for painting the tree. I just paint the tree in two occasions but each one is worst than the other.

The first one appears in my sbs. The second one (here it is) shows a strange gray-green result. I am not happy with the results. I wish to know how you would paint this tree (color, technics, ...).

thanks

Rafa

 

[Guy]

When I paint trees Rafa, I give it a base coat of Rust flat enamel and then do a wash of chocolate acrylic. After the wash dries I go back and dry-brush accross the grain of the tree with rust bringing out the wood detail. Check some of the pics in my gallery for the end result on stumps and trees.

 

[rafaelega]

Thanks for your help Guy. I'll have a look to your pics.

Rafa

 

[Guy]

Here is a pic of a tree I just did using the above technique

 

[rafaelega]

Nice job. A good sample.
Thanks again,

Rafa

 

[thegoodsgt]

I would go with shades of gray, tinting the colors toward warm tones.

 

[captnenglish]

Honestly I like the effect. Trees in the Eastern and Southern U.S. are often covered with moss etc so this look natural to me, butt hat is just from the picture you have posted.

 

[John Long]

I can't argue with Guy's results, but I do the opposite. I paint in a very dark brown like sepia, and drybrush lighter until I get the result. I usually use varying grades of brown to naples yellow oil paints.

 

[amherbert]

Hi

I don't know if it's the color balance in the picture, but that tree looks pretty good to me. Mossy trees are pretty normal, and if you take a walk in the woods there are lots of trees that have some green to them. Others are more brown, others more grey, not including silver birch etc.

If you don't like the greens, try brown with grey and yellow for highlights. That worked well for me when I painted a log.

Andy

 

[milminwh]

Hi Rafa,
Pete Herrara gave me an excellent oil paint recipe a couple of years ago and results were outstanding. I dont have the info any more. Perhaps he can post again?
(Peter: TREE bark recipe...NOT other natural substance recipe you posted on PF recently!!! I was waiting for someone to question your posting and very curious to see your reply, but it was never questioned!)
Regards,
John

 

[Ernest]

Hola Rafa para mi tu arbol luce bien, quizas algunas tonalidades con colores complementarios o algunos lavados de algun marron rojizo quizas, todo depende del tipo de arbol al cual te estas fijando, algo que yo hago es buscar fotos en la web para tener una clara referencia del arbol que quiero pintar, la web me ayudo mucho con imagenes para representar un arbol tipico europeo otoñal, te sugiero que usas las refernecias fotograficas mas claras que consigas......
Un saludo
ER

 

[Roc]

Rafael, first of all your trees look allright, but since you asked,I will give you my version for painting trees.
Acrylic paints.
1 - Base = Burnt Umber+ a bit of black.

2- Dry brush with charcoal gray.

3- medium highlight = Tan.

4- extreme highlights = tan with a bit of white , too be applied only to the upper part of tree.

5- towards the bottom of the tree closest to the ground, dry brush some moss green.

6- when completely dry, give it a wash of Sepia to pull everything together.
The Sepia wash is oils.


I hope this helps

Ciao

Roc.

 

[Larry R]

Funny, I wouldn't change anything. I hunt a lot in woods previously used during the civil war and they pretty much look like what you painted!

 

[Patrick Kirk]

Rafa,
I agree with Larry...looks realistic to me...I wouldn't change a thing...

All the best

Patrick

 

[Brent Fordham]

Your tree looked great to me too. The first time I looked, my first reaction was, "What's he talking about - nothing wrong here". :lol:

 

[PJ Deluhery]

Seems to me that you did just fine, Rafa. I suppose it depends on where the tree is located. It sure looks to me like it could fit in with a Confederate figure in terms of a US locale. I have used a lot of the color combinations mentioned above, so I'd say if you are unhappy try one of those. Personlly I'd leave it alone.

Happy Painting.

 

[rafaelega]

Hi all.

I must thank you all your help. I do not have enougth space probably in order to thanks all the people. In fact now I am not sure about what to do with the tree. My wife told me that it was too green (¿?). Probably the problem is related with the light I am using the make the pics. I prefer to do that with sun ligth but usually I cannot do that because at when I arrive home there is not sunlight.

Well. Probably I will paint the ivy and the leaves before doing any change in the tree. I'll try to put some pics with sunlight ASAP.

Thanks to everybody. You are the best!

Rafa

 

[Marijn Van Gils]

Hello rafa,

to me the tree looks also very good. Certainly nothing wrong with the colours, as there is plenty of variation in it, and trees can have all kinds of colours!

Maybe two possible improvements (for future trees, as I would leave this one alone also):

-although you did a great job on the texture, nothing beats the texture of natural materials. Starting the tree with natural roots and only adding the joints in putty is the best IMO.

-the tree looks to have a slight satin gloss, but maybe it is only the picture. If it does shine a little, this can make it look wrong in real life, while it still looks OK on photo. A perfectly matt piece of natural wood always looks the best. This is easily achieved with some matt varnish, and can imrove the look of the tree dramatically.

Congratulationson a well-done tree, and I hope you make many more!

Marijn

 

[rafaelega]

Hi Marijn,

Thanks a lot for your kindly comments. Really I did some improvements yesterday and now the tree seems to be more related with the rest of groundwork. I will post some pics asap.

I know your excellent groundwork in several of your dioramas and I appreciate very much your comments. By the way I will try a perfect matt for the tree.

Thanks again,

Rafa

 

[rafaelega]

Ok. I attach some new pics of the tree. You can see the ivy and also the changes made in the tree (mainly the color). The following step will be a wash with burn siena color.

Regards,

Rafa