Final Painting

I know, two posts in one day!  WOW!  Actually, I am just behind on my blog.  I finished my class at the Academy for the summer on August 8th, but then we went on vacation on August 10th and when we came back I went back to work teaching at my college, so now it's already September and I haven't posted my final painting.....

This final painting is of my children, but this time I have all three of them in the composition.  It's a scene that I took myself at our annual Watermelon Picnic.  On the first day of summer vacation every year, we take pack a watermelon, and some other snacks in a basket and head down to Hunter's creek.  We hike the creek till we find a nice sunny spot and then we slice up the watermelon and have a picnic.  We have been doing it for about 4 years now and the kids really look forward to it every year.  They love walking in their shoes in the creek and eating the watermelon.

You can see from the original photo and value sketch how the figures were arrange on the day I took the photo.  I decided to move them closer together and facing inwards towards the center of the creek.  I  added the watermelon and picnic basket, which were not in the frame, to tell the story a little better, and I changed the clothing on Hunter in the foreground to help him stand out from the dark forest background.  I am pleased with how it turned out seeing as this was the first time I successfully rearranged my own photo to make a more engaging composition.