Conceptual Design

      Intruder On Antelope Flats

           This painting depicts a view along Chapman Bench, a long flat north of Cody,
           Wyoming and just beyond the Chief Joseph Highway turnoff. The painting's
           name reflects its content rather than the place. The following describes the
           artist's decision process and painting steps used in creating it.

           The original scene contains a number of interesting elements and some design
           challenges. As to colors, there is a nice blue-orange compliment between the
           sky and foreground enhanced by the mirroring of cloud colors in the foreground
           snow. The late afternoon shadows give definition to the foreground brush and
           distant hills, both of which would otherwise tend to be uninteresting monotones.
           The detail view shows that those hills contain a lot of color variation and are the
           most interesting land aspect.

           As to physical layout, the large sky area dominates and the road and fence are
           unwanted distractions. The desired painting elements simplify down to two
           rectangles and triangles. After experimentation, the following design was chosen.

           The sky area no longer dominates and, to emphasize the distance to the hills,
           the foreground area has been heightened. The hills have been pushed to-
           gether a bit, eliminating the less interesting area between them. Though off-
           center, their size difference gives balance to this placement. The resulting
           design has pleasing proportions. However to show off the interesting colors
           in the hills, the canvas will have to be of sufficient size. Also, the relatively
           few and simple design shapes tend to make for a static composition. In order
           to maintain viewing interest some dynamic qualities will need to be introduced.

           So far the antelope have not been addressed. It is typical to see them at such
           a distance where, unless one is looking, they may not be noticed. This quality
           will be retained in the painting. Perhaps one of them may need to be moved
           closer to help define the center of interest. That decision will come later.

           THE PROCESS: Using a ball point pen on a second photo, an outline of the
           right-side hills was drawn in farther to the left and new scene boundaries drawn
           to correspond with the simplified layout design. Four by four grid lines were
           then penned in.

           A quarter inch border was penciled in on the canvas (to allow for frame overlap).
           Then four by four grid lines were drawn inside the border. Using the grids on
           the photo and the canvas as guides, the clouds and hills were sketched on the
           canvas. A few critical hill points were measured on the photo and located on
           the canvas by scaling the measurements. No foreground elements were drawn.

           Painting proceeded in steps as follows: (1) The sky and clouds were painted
           wet on wet. (2) After partial sky drying, the hills were detailed over several
           painting sessions. (3) Some of the clouds were whitened a bit and touches of
           alizarin crimson were added to a few horizon clouds to emphasize the hills
           (some of this occurs in the original scene).

           The entire original cloud pattern was squeezed into the painting, giving the
           feeling of movement somewhat downward and towards the left. This is
           countered by eye movement from the left hill back to the darker, farther hill
           on the right. This begins to build in the dynamic elements necessary to
           make an interesting painting. Of course, the center of interest will have to
           be strong enough not to be overcome by such dynamic elements.

           In step (4) a narrow band of the flat plain was added along with hints of the
           sagebrush establishing the dominant foreground colors. (5) Going back to
           the hills, the area between them was touched up to show grass and brush.
           This completed the sky and hills. (6) a bit more of the foreground was
           painted in and the distant antelope were placed grazing back towards the
           left hill. Their direction adds another dynamic.

           At this point the center of interest had two competing elements, the left and
           right hills. It was time to form an area of interest that would subtley lead the
           viewer to notice the antelope. Several of them were looking back towards
           the photographer, to them an intruder. It was decided to include a different
           kind of intruder to complete the area of interest. With proper placement
           this would appear to be what the antelope were looking at. Step (7), the
           doe was painted in using the reference photo below right along with more
           grass and brush.

           At this time of year the mule deer typically are found down in the pastures near
           Skull Creek grazing with the Two Dot ranch's cattle. So by coming up on the
           bench and crossing the road into the "antelope flats" in a sense this doe was
           intruding. As can be seen in the photo, her "Oh-Oh!" posture was really due
           to a buck in rut, not any antelope.

           On site, hints of a line were barely visible in the sagebrush parallel to the bottom
           of the hills (it doesn't stand out in the photograph). This was changed to a
           diagonal in the painting. As the enlarged insets show, this feature was barely
           suggested. However, it becomes one of the most important design elements in
           the painting, providing a path for the viewer's eye overriding other interesting,
           but conflicting dynamic elements .

           Step 7, foreground painting, continued over a number of sessions. In the original
           scene snow shows up in a band parallel to the road. This was changed to a more
           interesting form which also provides a visual entry point into the painting.

           Sky colors were used for the shadows on the snow and more of the hill colors
           were introduced into the brush at the very bottom of the picture, further tieing
           together all portions of the painting.

         This painting is composed of simple major design features. It has been given life          by introducing subtle dynamic elements that imply competing directions. Starting          from the bottom of the picture there is a visual path leading to the major area of
         interest. This strong area frames the distant antelope and draws the viewer into
         the painting. The color scheme provides overall harmony.