Merging Clarifications

Some additional information on the merging expansion recent blog:

when I refer to "bouncing around" in order to avoid horizontal banding affect, remember that I want variety in the color merge and am essentially painting across the paper and down (I usually paint in an angled direction across and down the shape to use gravity for my wet washes); I do not always bounce around the shapes with my merges, particularly if i know i am going to be changing colors rapidly in a given shape and know what "local" colors i am going to use; however, if i want to create a lot of variety in a larger shape and again avoid a banding look, i may go to the right an inch or two, lay down a new color then go back to the first and still wet wash and fill the space between that i left blank, jumping back and forth to get more variety. I mention this as a lot of my students do get a banding affect when they begin the merged washes exercises. Part of this is because they are using limited colors. again, I recommend sketching out some landscape cluster shapes and practicing until you can see more variety in your washes. I hope this helps.

I also suggest painting fast, wet and loose as you try this..it is fun and helps you to do less analyzing about what you are doing and more reflex, letting the paint, brush and water do their thing.

Next blog will talk about the advantages of painting fast and doing a lot of painting sketches for practice.

Have fun. Ron K