Morning and Afternoon on Currituck Sound

"Memorial Day Weekend on Currituck Sound" 8x10 oil on canvas

      We're back on the Outer Banks! The weather is spectacular, the ocean is warm and I intend to take maximum advantage of both. I spent the day painting and chose to focus on the Sound today because dramatic clouds were floating over it as opposed to the cloudless blue over the ocean. It truly is a blue and white world here on the Banks. Lucky for me that it is my favorite color and if you look around my studio you could say it is my signature color. Today, however I had the pleasure of adding the rich red from our flag to the view. It is our tradition on this weekend to place a flag on the oceanside deck as well as the sound side one. Memorial Day weekend signals the beginning of summer and the colorful beach umbrellas dotting the beach will provide inspiration tomorrow.

The painting in progress

     I am working off my iPad down here and don't have any editing apps to help my images so I apologize for the straight from the camera quality which is a little dark.
     I mentioned my love of blue and thought you might like to know which ones are on my palette. I always put out ultramarine, cerulean and cobalt turquoise. When at the beach I add indigo and Paynes gray. The latter two when mixed with cadmium yellow make a wonderful rich, dark green. I don't like to use tube greens so you will find my palette lined on one side with my blues and one side with my
reds and yellows and the top center is for white. My reds today were alizarin and vermilion and my yellows were cad lemon, and cad yellow light. Since I had forgotten to bring ochre I mixed a little of red oxide with the two yellows to come up with a rich, dark yellow.