Recently took a trip up to northern New Mexico, near Ghost Ranch. Even though its only February the weather was sunny, maybe with a little cold wind and the red and white cliffs just looked so perfect. The photographs don’t do the landscape justice at all, it is always a treat to head up there.
During our small hike I started thinking how cool it would be to do some sketching of this area when I got home. I really like to plein air paint with oils, however I didn’t have any of that stuff with me, just working with the ipad and the photographs, I can see how this type of landscape could come in handy in future projects.
I wanted to really get a sense of the color in my sketch so I thought the easiest thing I could do was go digital. I use clip studio paint for my ipad pro and that works pretty well. Started with a pencil sketch to get the outline of the cliffs and then I just added varying layers of color until it gave me a sense of how it looks in reality. This kind of study is very valuable and relatively cheap in terms of time. It give me a good starting point for a future oil painting of this environment.
This illustration will be going out to Patreons so if you want a print for the price of a fancy coffee, and a write up on the process, sign up today! (link in top right corner of home page).
WKW Illustrations 
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