Original subtitles

- Hi, welcome back.

Certainly glad you could join us today.

I thought today we'd just do a little painting

that's a lot of fun, and I think you'll enjoy it.

So let's start out and have them run all the colors

across the screen

that you need to paint along with us.

While they're doing that, let me show you

what I got up here today.

Today I have my standard old, I'm using an 18 by 24 inch

double-primed, pre-stretched canvas,

but you use whatever size you'd like.

And I've taken some contact paper

and just cut a little oval out.

And then we've covered the whole inside

with a little liquid white, and that's all there is to it.

So without further ado, let's just have some fun.

I'm gonna start with a little two-inch brush.

We'll go into small amount,

just a very small amount of the Indian yellow.

Don't need much, just a little.

Let's go right up in here.

Then we'll come right up in here.

Let's do a scene today that has a lot of earth tones in it,

something that's very earthy.

There we are.

Start with a little Indian yellow.

We'll just throw a little in like that.

Without cleaning the brush,

I'll just add a little touch of yellow ochre.

Just a little bit of yellow ochre,

and we'll let those blend together.

Ochre is sort of a nice, gold color.

It's beautiful. I like it.

Now, then.

We're going to use nice earth tones today.

Tell you what, tell you what.

Gonna grab my little knife here.

Let's mix, today,

some alizarin crimson and sap green,

in about equal parts.

These two colors mixed together make a beautiful,

beautiful brown.

Very warm, chocolate brown.

I like it.

And you could use your dark sienna and Van Dyke brown,

but I thought today we'd use this warm brown.

Very nice. Okay?

Let me wipe off the old knife here.

And we mix these colors pretty good.

Sometimes we leave colors marbled,

but these, I mixed them pretty good.

And we'll load up some color with the old two-inch brush.

I didn't even clean it.

Just right on top.

Let's go back up in here.

We'll start right at the tippy-top,

and using little X's, little criss-cross strokes,

we're gonna begin blending downward.

The color is continually mixing with the liquid white

that's on the canvas,

and it'll get lighter and lighter as you work down.

There.

Somewhere about like that.

We'll come back and blend all that out in just a second.

Right now we're just applying some color.

All right, now while I have that color going,

maybe in our world shoot your hornet.

We'll just do something like that.

We can do anything we want in our world,

and I think maybe we'll just put a little color down here.

We'll see what happens.

There.

Something about, like that.

All right.

The most fun part of this whole procedure.

(laughs) If you've painted with me before

you know that's washing the brush.

We wash our brush with odorless paint thinner.

There's a screen in the bottom of the bucket

that I'm scrubbing the brush against.

There we go.

Now then, we just shake off the excess.

(brush banging)

(laughs) And beat the devil out of it.

That really is the fun part.

And then I'm gonna start in the light area

with a clean brush,

and just blend upward,

about like that.

You wanna blend this

until you can't tell where one color stops

and the next color starts.

And then it's just right.

Just right.

There.

That's about all I'm gonna do

for a little sky in this painting.

Okay.

Now then.

Let's use that same brown color we made

out of the crimson and sap green.

Once again, in about equal parts.

I'll make a light brown here.

So I put some white and some of that brown together.

Now then.

Cut across, and get a little roll of paint

lives right on the end of the knife.

Let's go up in here.

And maybe we'll put the indication.

I don't want a lot of detail.

Just an indication of a little mountain

that lives way back in the distance here,

far away.

Little quiet guy.

There he comes.

And all we're looking for is the top shape up here.

We could care less what's happening below.

We just want the top.

The rest of it will just happen.

There.

Hmm. Now then.

Take the ol' two-inch brush,

go right up in there, and bend it firmly.

Pull it, and you can move this paint.

The canvas has liquid white on it.

It's wet, slick, and you can literally move the color...

and allow the base of it to just blend right out to nothing.

See?

Already it looks like a little mountain that's living,

gosh, we don't even know how far away it's living.

Way back in the distance somewhere.

Quiet little guy.

All right.

Now, as you know, in a landscape,

as things get closer to you,

they should get darker in value.

So we use that same color,

and I'm just adding a little more of the brown to it.

Maybe we'll have another range here

of little distant mountains.

About like so.

Once again, cut off.

Get our little roll of paint.

That little roll of paint is very important.

It makes applying it up here much, much easier.

Another big decision.

Where does our little mountain live?

Or this is quite a big mountain.

Maybe he lives right there.

Something like that.

These are decisions that you have to make.

In your world, you have unlimited power.

Absolutely unlimited power.

You can change the course of mighty rivers.

You can build mountains.

Anything that you wanna do in this world,

you can absolutely do.

There.

Now then, wipe the knife off.

And I'll just, I'll wipe the knife on just a paper towel.

There now.

Once again, I'm gonna grab this and pull.

Think about angles here.

Because of today, I'm only gonna use brush strokes

to create all the highlights and shadows

in these little mountains.

There we are.

Before this series is over,

we'll do some mountains where we go in and paint.

Make a lot of detail.

But these I want to be far away.

And things that are far away, you don't see a lot of detail.

In fact, if you put too much detail,

you lose that illusion of distance.

But just the brushstrokes

will create enough illusion

that it's sufficient for what we're doing.

See there?

It looks like mountains back here.

And it's all we need.

Hmm. Easy.

Can do, easy.

All right.

I like that brown.

I'm gonna keep using it here.

But we'll take and make it darker.

A little bit darker.

There.

Something about like that.

Each layer, once again,

as it gets closer to you, should get darker in value.

Darker and darker.

We just grab a,

I'm using a number six fan brush,

but you can use number three.

Doesn't matter,

doesn't matter.

You make the decision.

Load both sides of the bristles with a lot of paint,

a lot of paint.

Let's go up here.

Now, let's have some little, some little distant trees.

Show you how easy they are to make.

If you've painted with me before,

you've probably done this.

You know it works wonderfully.

Wonderfully.

We get letters everyday

from fantastic people, all over the country,

who'd never believe that they could create

such beautiful masterpieces.

Get hundreds and hundreds of photographs from people.

I can't even believe what they're doing.

It's wonderful.

And my young friends, all over the country,

are doing this.

And they're painting paintings.

I have young friends that are 12, 13, 14 years old,

that are actually selling paintings

and making a happy buck.

Isn't that fantastic?

What better thing to give young people confidence

than do something like this,

and people come along

and are willing to pay 'em for their efforts.

It's not the money.

The money means nothing.

But what it does to a young person,

or even an old person like me.

It's ego.

Is unreal that somebody would spend their hard-earned cash

on something that you saw in your mind

and you put on a piece of canvas with your hand.

I'm gonna create some mist down here at the bottom.

Two-inch brush,

I'm using only the top corner.

When I tap it, strongly, severely.

Just really get in there

and take out all your frustrations and hostilities.

Now gently, gently.

Enough hostility.

Now gently lift upward, see?

Takes out the tap marks and creates the illusion of mist,

floating right down at the base.

I'm gonna wash my little fan brush off.

I just wanna,

I wanna play a little more.

Little more.

And I'm gonna go into straight brown.

That brown we made with the crimson and the sap green.

Just straight.

I want this to be the darkest layer of background trees.

There we go.

Now, right under here.

Let's have another layer.

And in your world, you make as many layers as you want.

But each one of these little layers

will help increase the illusion of distance

in your painting,

and to me, that's very desirable.

I like paintings that have great depth in them.

That's what some of the old masters were so good at.

You could look into their paintings

and absolutely see into infinity.

There we go.

Now then.

I wanna create the illusion of a reflection.

Now, when I was a traditional painter, this was hard to do.

But watch here.

All you do is grab it.

(laughs) Look it there.

Grab it, pull down.

Straight down though.

And then gently go across.

Just enough to sorta give it a little watery feel.

And I'll lift up just a wee bit.

Little bit, little bit.

There.

Like that.

Now, I'm gonna go into Van Dyke brown.

I'll even put a little dark sienna in.

I want a very dark brown now.

Once again, cut off that little roll of paint.

And let's just put that little indication back here.

Maybe it is a little land mass that lives under there.

Holds the trees up so they don't fall in the water.

Something about like that.

I'm gonna lift upward here and there on it just there,

to break up that top edge.

Now, let's take a little touch of the liquid white.

I'm gonna put a little brown in it too.

Just a little bit.

Pull it out very flat, and cut across.

Let me do it again so you can see it for sure.

Cut across.

And we go up here.

Take that.

And we can literally,

we'll just cut us in a happy little water line,

lives right in here.

Right in here, like that.

There.

All right.

And you could put a little ripple or two

in the water if you want.

It's up to you.

Up to you.

There.

But all these lines need to go basically straight across.

If they don't, it'll look like the water's gonna run

right out of your painting.

And you don't want that.

All right.

Ready to get brave with me?

(laughs) You know me.

If you've painted with me before,

you know I have a love of big trees.

I'm gonna take some Van Dyke brown, dark sienna,

and I'm just pushing the brush like so.

Let's go up in here.

Big tree time.

All right.

Why not right over in here?

Just use the corner of the two-inch brush.

Just the corner.

And let's begin putting in some basic shape and form.

of old giant tree that lives right here

and overlooks this beautiful little scene.

About like that.

I don't wanna lose the top of my little mountain.

I wanna be able to see it,

sort of through the branches.

So we'll sort of work diagonally to that.

There we are.

All right.

But now, when you're doing your tree...

you sort of, you decide, you decide,

what shape you want it to be.

Big tree, maybe smaller than this one.

Or it could be bigger.

In your world, maybe the tree's stronger than this one.

There.

It's up to you.

Absolutely and completely up to you.

Painting offers you freedom.

Okay, now I'm gonna reload the brush.

But this time, I'm gonna load it a little different.

I'm gonna pull it.

Just go straight down, and pull it in one direction,

right through the same colors.

Van Dyke.

I'm gonna reach over here and get a little black too.

Darken it.

I want this to be dark, dark.

So you have black, dark sienna, Van Dyke brown.

I'm just mixing them on the brush.

But notice, the brush is straight down,

and I'm pulling it in one direction.

That'll create a curve.

And I'm gonna turn the brush over.

See that curve, right at the top?

You want it up.

Okay, let's go up in here.

With that rounded part of the brush to the top.

Watch here.

You can touch and push,

and we'll start making all kinds of little bushes

that live back here in our world.

Just push.

Try not to let the brush slide.

It's just a push and a bend,

and then you come straight out.

Maybe, yep.

Right along in here.

I don't know.

You decide in your world

where you want all these things to be.

Wherever.

Once again, on this piece of canvas,

you have unlimited power.

So you make these big decisions.

You decide.

To me, that's probably one of the most fun parts

of painting.

There.

All right.

Now.

Let's take, hmm, there's a fan brush.

It's already dirty.

I'll put some brown on it.

Grab my knife.

We'll have a little bit of fun here.

I mixed a little bit of the liquid white

with some titanium white.

I wanna thin it down a little bit.

Grab a little touch of dark sienna.

I wanna make a light brown.

But this color is a little bit thinner

than what it was originally,

'cause I put a little liquid white with it,

intentionally, to thin it down.

Okay, wipe off the knife.

Now, I'm gonna dip the brush into a small amount,

a small amount of paint thinner,

and go right through Van Dyke brown.

Once again, we've thinned the color a little.

Now, take this.

See the light color that we made?

Pull one side through.

So now I have light on this side,

dark on that.

Light, dark. 'Kay?

Now, you have to make a decision.

Which side is the light coming from?

I think we'll have it come from the left.

Touch, and pull down.

And in one stroke,

you can make the highlight and the shadow

of a nice tree trunk.

That easy.

Isn't that sneaky?

Maybe we'll have another one, to show you how to do it.

Straight down.

(woosh)

There.

And that easy.

We have just a little tree trunk.

'Kay, I'm gonna use the ol' dirty brush here.

Has the brown on it.

I'm gonna go into some of my yellows,

yellow ochre, predominantly.

Maybe, let's get crazy.

Take a little bright red and put it in here.

(gasp) Nice color.

But notice how we're loading this.

Put it on both sides, and then give it a little push.

That little push.

See that little ridge right there?

There's one just like it on the brush,

and that's what we're gonna paint with.

'Kay. Let's go up in here.

Now, we go slightly above the dark,

'cause we want the shadows underneath.

And using just the corner of the brush.

That didn't show well enough.

I'm gonna add a little touch of liquid white.

I want that brighter, so you can see it.

Gonna reload the brush, same way.

That's a little better.

A little better.

Just want you to be able to see it.

Normally, when we're painting for television,

we paint a little brighter than we would at home,

so it shows up better.

There.

But now we get thinking about shape and form...

and put in all kinds of little leaves and stuff

that live here on your tree.

These are the highlights.

This is the fun part.

Icing on the cake, whatever you wanna call it.

There we go.

There.

But you need a dark background to make these show up.

Light against light creates nothing.

Dark against dark creates nothing.

They just blend together.

So you need contrast.

Light against dark, dark against light.

Play with it.

You'll enjoy it.

It's what makes a painting interesting.

There we are.

Ooo, a little red there.

Looks like Jack Frost hit here a little.

I like that.

Darker, darker, darker down here toward the base,

because at the base of the tree,

there will be a nice shadow area.

That's where all my little friends,

little Peapod, the pocket squirrel,

and my little bunny rabbits, and all those live in there.

There.

Okay.

Let me find a little one-inch brush.

There.

And let's take,

we'll go through a little cad yellow,

we'll just use all the yellows.

Be right back.

I'm gonna get a little alizarin crimson.

If we're gonna have colors that sort of remind us of fall.

Once again, pulling that brush in one direction.

It's a beautiful close-up here.

You can see it.

Now, turn it over.

See that curve?

That's what we want toward the top.

Let's go up here.

Now, right above.

We can go right in here.

And we can begin putting some gorgeous little highlights

on these individual bushes.

Work on one bush at a time.

One bush at a time.

Don't get greedy.

I know, I know, it gets good,

(laughs) and you get greedy.

Maybe even though we talking about autumn,

maybe a little sap green.

'Cause all bushes don't turn at the same time.

Maybe this one back here,

maybe there's a little green left in there.

Maybe when Jack Frost was coloring all these,

maybe he missed this one.

Something like that.

There.

There.

Just let your imagination take you to any world

that you want to be in.

Any world.

It's what's so great about imagination.

To me, it's the greatest thing that an artist owns,

is his imagination.

Because without imagination,

it's hard to envision things and to paint 'em.

Let your imagination go.

It's like any other part of your body.

The more you use it, the better it becomes.

Just like exercising a muscle in your arm,

your imagination gets better too.

There.

Now if you have trouble making your paint stick,

add the least little touch of paint thinner or liquid white.

Now, liquid white will make your color a little brighter,

and it'll change it a little.

Sometimes, sometimes that's very desirable.

Sometimes you wanna keep the color pretty close to being...

what you loaded on the brush.

Pure.

And in those cases...

you would use a little paint thinner.

But, let me reemphasize the word "little."

You don't need much.

You need very, very little.

Okay.

Shoot, we're coming along here pretty good.

We need a path in there.

Just seems like a natural place.

Take a little of that Van Dyke brown.

Once again, get our little roll of paint.

That little roll is very important.

Let's go up in here.

Now then, just sort of go back and forth,

gently, gently touching the canvas.

There.

And if you mess up a little bush like I did there,

we'll just go back, and we'll drop it right back in.

In our world, we can change anything, whenever we want.

Whenever we want.

Now I'm gonna take a little brown, a little white,

mix it together.

And we'll make just a little highlight color

to put on there.

Maybe I'll even put a little touch of the crimson in there.

(gasps) Just to warm it up.

There.

Once again, cut it off,

and that little roll of paint.

I'm gonna keep saying that over and over,

'cause it's so important.

I was talking about my little squirrel,

Peapod, that lives up here.

Believe it or not, he's still with me.

I let him go, oh, more than a year ago.

And he still lives in my backyard,

and he comes every single day...

and scratches on the back door,

just like a little puppy.

And he'll scratch on the door,

and if he sees me in the kitchen,

until I pay attention to him.

And I'll open the door.

He'll come in the house.

He knows where I store all the goodies,

and the nuts and everything.

And he'll go pick him out a nut, and out he goes.

But even after a year,

he remembers, and he comes back.

And to me, that's very special,

that one of God's little creatures would take the time

to share their little world with me.

That's special to me.

I don't know,

but I'm 'bout half-crazy, so.

There we are.

Okay, let's take a clean knife.

I just wanna put the indication, here and there,

of some little sticks and bushes,

in the bushes.

There.

Just some little things that live back here.

'Cause they're always here.

You always see 'em in the woods.

Yeah, there.

Okay, maybe over on this side.

The other little squirrel that I still keep,

she has epilepsy.

And I've maintained her now for four or five years,

'cause, you know, the veterinarian told me

she would die in six months.

But I didn't tell her,

and she's been with me all these years.

And that's Squirrely Girly Brown.

You've seen her, I think,

if you watch the show.

I've shown her many times in the past.

She's a neat little squirrel.

She still lives with me.

And I keep her in my basement in a great big cage.

The basement's where I paint.

So she's right next to where I practice painting.

I tell you what, let's bring the camera up here.

I'm gonna take the contact paper off.

It's time for the moment of truth here.

And let's take a look-see at what we have.

Pull that paper off.

There. There's your painting.

That easy.

And this is your last chance.

Now you have to come back

and do any kind of little things that you wanna do.

And your painting is just about finished.

I'm gonna take a little bit of paint thinner,

a little bit of brown.

Maybe we'll put a little stick out here.

Got a little time left.

So maybe in our world there lives,

maybe there's a little ol' tree that pooped out right there.

Maybe he died.

But his little skeleton's still here.

And in nature...

you see little trees like this all over.

There.

See, but mix paint thinner with your paint, to make it thin,

almost to the consistency of ink.

And then it'll flow right over the top of it.

That's all there is to it.

And you decide where they live.

Okay?

I think with that,

we're gonna call this one done.

I'm gonna take a little bit of the bright red,

a little paint thinner, and we'll sign this little rascal.

Hope you've enjoyed it.

We'll sign it right here.

This is a very simple little painting.

Don't think you'll have any trouble with it.

But if you paint it,

if you have time,

take a photograph of it and send it to us.

We would love to see it,

and every once in a while,

we put 'em together,

and we like to show 'em on TV.

Until then, I'd like to wish you happy painting,

and God bless, my friend.

(uplifting music)