The birch is a stunning tree, one of my favourites and really good to paint or draw. The older trees are cracked and gnarled with bright green moss cascading from the bumps.The bracket mushroom that I made the paper from lives upon the birch tree too and while I was out hunting them I found a beautiful tree as a subject to paint. It made for some great photos looking up towards the sky
 |
The first painting drawn with pen |
I worked very quickly on the above painting using pen and watercolour. But I didn't like the shape of the trunk, it didn't have the sinuous-ness that I liked in the tree. So I decided to do it again, just in watercolours this time. I used masking fluid to mask out the edge of the trunk so I could work on a quick wet into wet background. I use the Masquepen type pictured below and quite like it. Also I used some of the Daniel Smith Primatek paints which I love for unstrict botanical work like this or landscapes.
 |
You can see my horse chestnut buds emerging (still working on them too!) |
 |
Here are the 2 together |
This second painting below took 5 days, much longer then the first one. I used a touch of gouache to get back the highlights on the moss which was especially difficult and I think this subject would be great for oils, maybe.
I think I'll be keeping a look out for more interesting trees and maybe invest in some oil paints as I've never used them. That would be a new challenge.
Here's a little woodland sculpture we made in the woods today!
Happy holidays.