Sunrise over Yalaha

I seem to be following celestial movements with my last few sketches. I have been following the phases of the moon on each evenings fire pit burn and this morning I woke up before a bit early to sit on the front porch and watch the sunrise over Yalaha.

I seem to be trying to ground myself to the earthly movements as we hurdle on this little rock through space.

It was interesting trying to sketch the sun rise. I was just finishing drawing the homes when the sun first peak up above the roof line of the house across the street. I immediately switched to painting and added the brilliant sun. Then when the sun was fully exposed, my sight whited out because I was starting right at the bright light. I lowered the brim of my baseball cap to keep from being blinded and switched to painting the foreground. The lighting switched from dark to light and I had to decide what looked right for each passage of the painting.

When the sun sets, I am still online with virtual students. I often have to use a black curtain too help block the light from allowing me to see the computer screen. Because if this I have become quite familiar with the movement of the sun. There are many tall pine trees that block an unobstructed view of the sunset each evening. On past vacations as hoards of tourists lined up to take cell phone photos of sunsets, I would sit and sketch the tourists, completely missing the sunset myself. Painting a sunrise or painting a sunset are the most challenging painting assignments when on location.