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WIP. Heat haze/Mirage.
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Message
Posted
I'm doing hyenas and I wanted to try and create a heat haze on the horizon. It's much tougher than I ever possibly imagined. Anyway, I've left the background for now and started on one of the hyenas. I've spent 5 hours on this hyena so far, just putting the base colours in and some detail around the face. I'm trying to capture that look of a wild animal, maybe defending it's territory. I've got a lot more detail to do on it plus, put all the colourful fur on it. I am going to do a full bodied hyena in the distance and two on the horizon. I'm going to try and do wobbly legs of the two on the horizon so it looks like the heat rays rising. Will it all work, I don't know but critique welcome. If it doesn't, I can always paint the hyena a burnt sienna put a salmon in it's mouth and paint the Rockies in the background and call it bear creek. You can tell me it looks terrible and to start again, I don't mind. Thanks.
Posted
Definitely carry on! You’ve got the right idea and once the distant animals are dropped in, we’ll get a better idea as to if it’s worked - I think it will…
That horizon doesn’t need any hard edges! Blending into the sky possibly, but this is new to me also… trial and error I think!
Edited
by Alan Bickley
Posted
Denise I don’t use oil so could not give and real advice related to the medium. To my eye you have a good start on the background already as you have no hard lines and by adding the other animal with as you put it with wobble legs this should crest the illusion. I would b tempted to bluer part of the distant animals body as well , my own experience is having been in desert and scrub areas in intense heat is that everything is very distorted and out of focus. I like the hyena you have already started and it look quit wild to me. Your doing a great job and I’m sure others will learn from you , and that’s always rewarding.
Posted
The best heat mirages I have seen were in the salt flats near Salt Lake City in the USA. They gave reflections of the bottom half of distant hills/mountains. There are hills and mountains inAfrica too. Did you have a particular country in mind? I’ve only seen hyenas in South Africa, though I am sure they inhabit other African countries. If it Namibia, then you could have sand dunes. Fierce looking hyena though!
Posted
I think it does need more blending into the sky Alan, I'm also not sure about the bit of scrub I've put in. I'm going to try and get the other hyena in today. The one I started isn't dry enough to start work on it again today. Thanks.
Paul the information you have given me is really useful and I will bare it all in mind as I continue on, thanks.
Linda, I'm glad you think he looks fierce, I've never painted a ferocious looking wild animal and I'm trying to capture some of that natural spirit. I hope I will be able to achieve it. You are so lucky to have been to Africa. I would love to be sitting there now painting the hyena for real. I looked at some amazing photos of heat mirage but trying to paint one is very difficult. If I was painting just the one hyena, I probably would have put mountains in, thanks.
Edited
by Denise Cat
Posted
If you are brave you could try blending the horizon with a palette knife. Scraping straight across should also give you a distorted look. Haven’t tried to create a mirage/haze effect, myself, but used the technique for other blurred effects. Try some experiments on some oil paper with the same or similar colours.
Posted
To get the effect of the furthest animals having these wobbly legs etc, I would paint them in correctly, and then distort these areas by shifting the paint, rather than trying to paint them in a distorted manner.
You can do this with a knife, smudge with fingers, the edge of a piece of cardboard etc.
Posted
Atmospheric effects can be a problem indeed - I'm not very good with pastel, but tried to create a cloud-bank in a small sketch: couldn't get it right, it just looked as if I hadn't finished the picture (and in the event, I didn't! In the words of W Fields, 'if at first you don't succeed, give it another try and then give up. No sense being a dam' fool about it...).
I'm chary about giving advice on achieving these effects in oil - but I think the advice to practise on a bit of old board or canvas, or canvas paper, is good. If it were me, I'd think of adding a little more oil to the paint, mixing a little white into it, or perhaps Naples Yellow* - others will suggest Zinc White, but it's a problematic pigment. I'd also consider using dry-brush, with a mix of white and some appropriate tint, applying that over the dried horizon (you can always whip it off again if it doesn't work). I'd also look for paintings by other artists (eg, David Shepherd) who dealt with the problem in their own tropical paintings.
The reason I'm being unusually hesitant is that I can well see how you might end up with ever thicker layers of paint at the horizon, where you least want them. Take a rest from that area, I suggest - IT'S not in any hurry - and experiment with your colours on a surface which won't matter: and then - remember what you did, if you get a result you like.
*Naples Yellow: nearly all Naples Yellows are hues, not the genuine article. And just about every one of them contains Zinc - you can get a good alternative by mixing Titanium white with a LITTLE Cadmium Yellow Pale. It's a good basis for atmospheric effects, because you can tint it with whatever is appropriate - orange, rose, a mixed grey. And - although Titanium White is opaque, it can be thinned down to a more or less transparent state, and adjusted with the finger: that much overlooked painting tool whose uses are infinite.
Posted
Robert, Naples Yellow, I truly love that colour. In fact I am going to use Naples Yellow mixed with a bit of white for some of the fur. I welcome your comments. After a bit of practice this morning, I pushed on a bit with the horizon, roughly put in another hyena, it doesn't look like a hyena at the moment but it will. I can't put the two hyena on the horizon until I have finished with the background and it is dry. Then I can concentrate on the hyena and develop the detailing on them. Here it is so far, I'm in no rush and will continue to look and think about the horizon but I think it has improved a bit today. Thanks Robert.
Edited
by Denise Cat