Fall Tree

 

A gorgeous fall tree just waiting to become a painting!  

Just draw the foreground piece of land, the basic tree and the larger branches.  Leave a few "sky holes" that you will paint around.

First paint everything except the sky holes with Cadmium Yellow.  (I forgot to take a photo before I added the next step).  When the yellow is dry, add some big leafy shapes with Yellow Ochre, but cover all the yellow, and don't forget to leave the sky holes.

When the yellow ochre is dry, do the same thing with somewhat smaller shapes with Cadmium Orange, or a mixture of Cadmium Yellow and Cadmium Red.

Add a little bit of darker red orange, don't cover up all of the previous layers.  Also, sneak a little bit of green in there - if you look closely you can see a bit in the photo.  Make sure to put some leaves over the trunk.

Start painting in the branches and trunk.  Use Burnt Sienna and Ultramarine Blue - keep it very dark but still brown and not black.  Hide some of the branches (and trunk) behind the leaves. 

Add a few branches of small saplings, and paint the first layer of the forground with burnt sienna.

I added several more even thinner branches (you can do those with a fine tip black pen if you don't want to try it with a brush).  And I darkened and textured the foreground.  I did NOT add any blue to the sky holes.  I don't think it's necessary, and it will look more natural.  I hope you enjoy this one.  A lot of steps, but the only really hard part is not getting the branches too thick.