Hello, I’m Hall Groat II, I’d like to welcome you to my studio here located in upstate New York. I’m about 250 miles North of New York city. Today we’re gonna focus on one painting of a classic grouping of red delicious apples I had here situated right behind. Now this time we’ll gonna talk a little bit about composition and how I’m actually gonna frame these pyramid of apples using what’s called a viewfinder. Yes, all I’ve done is taken a piece of paper, this is actually a piece of like a notebook paper that I’ve folded in half then just cut out, like a rectangular shape here, open it up and then you have a really nice viewfinder that you can look through. And actually decide how you wanna frame your composition. Looking at the pyramid of apples little bit closer, you’ll notice that around the apples I have all sorts of like old branches and leaves that I found outside that I sort of used to add to the composition. So we got the angle here in the bottom. Okay then, midpoint’s right about here. I have my large bristle brush, the number 8 brush, and taking a little bit of the linseed oil, putting it down here and I’m gonna work with a little bit of a ultramarine blue that I have here over on the corner. And my goal will be to from dark, perhaps, to a little bit lighter with this gray blue. So it’s a little bit of titanium white mixed in with ultramarine blue with a tinge of a burnt amber in there. Sort of neutralize it, warm it up a little bit. You know it’s about having fun, and you shouldn’t have to struggle when you’re painting. These apples, you’ll notice that there’s a tops, there’s bottoms, there’s fronts, there’s backs, there’s the sides, left and right. You really gotta realize that they are, for the most part base on cubical forms. For the secondary planes, I’m gonna take my darker valued brush and actually use a little bit of alizarin crimson, little bit of linseed oil, mixed up a darker value at first. Some of the secondary planes got this area back here, I’m gonna move in here. So I’ve got that same tonality on my brush and I’m gonna bring this around like that. Yeah, moving down to a synthetic brush that approximate a sable, it’s a number 2 brush, and I’m gonna mixed up a little bit of cadmium red and alizarin. We’re looking right down at the spot of light I was describing, there is the stem sticking out, and there’s a leaf behind it, then that spot of light moves off to the right. As I move back you can see that spot of light within the larger context. And I’m noticing there’s a little bit of light over here, and we’ve got the top. You know, I’m gonna model this brush stroke a little bit further. Like that… go back in get a little bit more red… come across… actually I’m gonna use a little bit of alizarin crimson. Take my scraper and clean up some of these. I wanna mix up some variations on cad yellow, cad yellow and a little bit of yellow oaker, I’m gonna bring out. Alright, let’s see if I can suggest some of these leafs that we’re studying now. It’s amazing how much texture they have to them. You can sort of see I have this, little bit closer, and you can see leaf and the texture, see the texture. See what’s coming from underneath right there? I can scrape right into it. It’s nice to allow that to come through and this will allow the paint to drag across. They come across when I brush like this, sort of discover the form, within the texture. Then I’m gonna come across and restate that contour by painting the form of the leaf. I wanna keep that very atmospheric factor, sort of bring the paint over a little bit, sort of thin it or take or just pat down, it’s over stated. Using that same small brush, you come right down in here, sort of build the area where the stem emerges out from, come back across the top with a little bit red. Okay, at this point, I’m gonna get into some of the background and you know, mush some warms into the cool areas that are in the back. Allow the color to move around. Pretty satisfied with the way this painting’s turning out. I’m gonna spend some time with the refinement, but for now I wanna get into that background. So let’s see, perhaps a little bit of yellow oaker, and some other tonalities back there. Use the same brush to soften some of the leaves. Push that back there, bring that right in here. Okay, now I’m gonna mix up a little bit of a lighter, looking for some of the lights again, slowly working up to higher light. And the final touches with just a little bit of titanium white, quick dashing highlights.