Dad's Present-A walk in the woods

"M" was excited to come back and paint a gift for dad for Christmas too.  This time he wanted to paint from a favorite picture that he took of his dad on a hike.  This was a fun memory for him and something they enjoy doing together.  The picture would transfer into a lovely painting.   So....here we go!

We started with our background.  "M" was so nice to work with again.  He is so kind.  We had such chill painting sessions!

Beginning the pathway....you can see the basics sketched in here as well.

Adding foliage on the ground...

2 brushes at a time!  NICE!

Filling in the greens!

You can see my outlines for him to use....he alternated various shades of greens.

You can see the picture we used for our idea in this shot.  Now "M" carefully put in the tree trunks.

And then added lightness to the path...

Time to wrap up!

Nicely done "M"!  Beautiful work!

SESSION 2: 

 Today was our finish day... We started out with putting in more branches...

He painted over some pencil lines I added....

Now adding in a tree in the fore ground.

I had him blend some colors to add more dimension...

Looking great!

Softening up the branches....

And finally, that little silhouette of dad!  He started a shoe and shorts....

Now his shirt...

Then I had him use a toothpick to outline some spots- here he is painting in dad's sunglasses.

Gloves....

Toothpick outlining.

AWESOME!

Going over our leaves some more....

Another layer on the trees....

And we finished!   What a special gift "M"!   I love it and I'm sure dad will too!

Artist with his masterpiece!