My recent trip to Nevada gave me an opportunity to visit Red Rocks Canyon and play with my camera. (Please visit my blog with galleries of my desert photos.) Those photos gave me an excuse to play with digital painting again. 

The colors of the Southwest are very different from Florida colors, so using the digital program allowed me to sample the colors from the photographs as I made the freehand images.  Sampling the colors helped me to see the difference between what I thought I saw and the actual colors present.  The reds and oranges contained far more pinks, browns and purples than I expected.  The greens were even more gray than I expected.  My color theory training tells me “of course” these are the colors, but my eyes need practice seeing the reality of the colors that build the image. 

If I had gone first to my paints or pastels, I would have made many wrong choices.  Now I will be braver in pushing the unexpected colors to create the effect I experienced in my brief visit.