The Secret to Sparkling Pastel Ornaments Revealed

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I'm sharing my painterly technique for creating ethereal, shimmering Christmas ornaments in pastel! Join me for a special painting session where I'll reveal my secrets for capturing that ephemeral holiday sparkle.✨

You know those moments when light catches a delicate ornament just right? In this lesson, we'll learn how to capture that magic with pigment. I'll guide you through each step of creating luminous holiday ornaments in soft pastel that seem to glow from within.

What I'm revealing today:

  • The painterly technique behind that shimmering glow

  • My layering secrets for achieving dreamy, pastel effects

  • The surprisingly simple method for adding mesmerizing highlights

Whether you're a seasoned artist or just beginning your creative journey, these techniques will add a beautiful new dimension to your holiday paintings.


It's the season of wonder, and I want to celebrate with you! So let's create some holiday magic together!

Wishing you a Merry Christmas, with abundant creativity and joy in the coming year.🌟

Alain Picard

Colors of Fall: Three Strategies for Painterly Landscapes

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Living in New England, one thing never fails to take my breath away—the vibrant colors of fall. The changing leaves here rank among the most stunning sights in nature. I want to share the beauty of autumn with you and explore how we can bring this seasonal magic to life through our art.

Painting Fall Foliage: A Perfect Opportunity

Autumn landscapes present a golden opportunity to hone your painterly techniques. The season’s bold, rich colors demand expressive brushwork, making it a perfect time to stretch your creativity and learn new approaches. Let’s walk through three key strategies that will guide you through painting the essence of fall using pastels.

Thumbnail Sketch, Tombow Brush Pens, White Paint Pen

1. Design with Value

Before diving into the vibrant hues of fall, it’s crucial to first establish a strong foundation with value sketches. Simplifying your scene into light and dark shapes helps create a well-designed composition. By squinting at your reference, you can filter out the details and focus on the large value masses. This method allows you to see the pattern of light, middle, and dark tones that form your scene.

When painting light, you’re painting form. But with shadows, you’re capturing the atmosphere. Keep your shadows flat and simple, avoiding excessive detail. Simplifying the scene in this way lets you see your subject in a more painterly manner, setting the stage for a dynamic composition. 

100-Stroke Color Study on LaCarte Card

2. Suggest with Marks

Now that you’ve laid out your composition, it’s time to take bold steps with your mark-making! One of the best exercises to develop your confidence in this area is the 100-Stroke Challenge. The goal is to make each stroke deliberate, as you’re limited to only 100. This encourages you to squint down your scene and make each mark count.

Some helpful tips:

  • Use side strokes to cover more ground.

  • Step back often to view the big picture.

  • Be decisive with your marks—once you make them, don’t touch them again.

Blaze of Glory, Alain Picard, 10.5x16” Pastel on UART400 Board

3. Create the Impression

With your underpainting in place, carry on to the final painting, bringing your fall colors to life with just enough detail to suggest the scene’s magic. Remember, you’re creating an impression, not a photograph.

Here’s a helpful mantra I like to use: “Be an impressionist, not a journalist.” Journalism is all about describing granular details to tell the story. Impressionism is about capturing the big effect to create a feeling of the moment. This mantra will remind you to focus on the big effect, stepping back often to ensure you maintain the freshness and simplicity that impressionism requires.

In the final steps of a painting, build up the lights with thicker pigment, while keeping the shadows airy and flat. By simplifying your details and focusing on form in the lights, you’ll capture the essence of autumn.

 

Fall’s glorious colors offer endless inspiration for painterly landscapes. By focusing on value, bold marks, and a painterly impression, you’ll capture the beauty of autumn with a fresh, artistic approach.

Keep showing up at the easel for your creative dreams!

Alain Picard

My Portrait Palette Box

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This is my pastel portrait palette, organized by value and color, according to the 6 basic skin types. More on that in another post. Along with the rich soft pastels, there are small batches of hard pastels which have been sharpened to a point and organized in groups of neutral grays (far right), cool flesh tones (right), warm flesh tones (center right), and warm earth tones (upper left) within the box as well. I find these very useful for the small details of the face. As you can see, light values are at the top representing "tints", and dark values are at the bottom representing "shades". Neutral values are known as "tones". Compliments to John Heilman for the Original Box from HeilmanDesigns.com.

In our Painterly Portrait course we not only talk about how to create amazing portraits using pastels but we also talk about efficiency strategies such as this to make your painting time fun and stress-free.