"Farm Near Westmore Vermont" - How I use a "Thumbnail Sketch Value Study" to work out the details of a painting.

Each  fall we travel to New England to spend a little time enjoying the colorful autumn colors that are so prevalent there. Of course for me that means painting and sketching. In October of 2005 we enjoyed a stay on the shores of Lake Willoughby in a rustic 1900's era home owned by a friend of mine, Sam Kent. Lake Willoughby is located in Vermont's northeast kingdom just north of St. Johnsbury and Lyndonville. A dirt road, Hinton Hill Road, leads from the tiny town of Westmore over the mountain behind the lake. It's one of my favorite drives and affords a beautiful view of the lake. On one of our drives over Hinton Hill Road this little farm caught my eye and I stopped to shoot a few pictures and planned a painting. This painting was done after returning home to my studio in St. George, Utah. I actually used the painting in a watercolor workshop, as a partial demonstration of using receeding values and aerial perspective to achieve distance. The original painting is owned by R. Johnson of Washington state.