Mighty Mountain Lake

[Music] Hi, welcome back.

I'm certainly glad you could join me today.

You ready to do a fantastic little painting with me?

Super.

I'll tell you what.

Let's have them run all the colors across the screen that you need to paint along with me.

And while they're doing that, let me tell you what I've done.

I've got my old standard 18 x 24 inch canvas up here.

I've covered it with a thin, even coat of the Liquid White.

And it's all ready to go.

So, drag out your paints or pull up your easy chair.

Either one, and let's have some fun together.

Let's start out today with some Prussian Blue.

Good, strong, dark blue.

Just a little bit of it.

Let me say that again.

A little bit of it because it is very strong.

On the two-inch brush, and let's go right up here, and let's just drop in a happy little sky.

Let's just do a fun painting today.

Start at the very top of the canvas working all the way across, and making little X's, little crisscross strokes.

Little crisscross strokes.

There we go.

And by working across like that, and then begin working downward, your paint is mixing with Liquid White that's already on the canvas.

And automatically your color will get lighter and lighter toward the horizon.

And that's exactly what we're looking for today.

Let the paint work.

The canvas work.

Shoot, take life easy.

Just let it go.

There we are.

Now very lightly go across the whole sky.

Just take out the brush strokes and bring everything together.

And that quick [laughs], we've got a quick little sky.

Very simple and easy.

Now then, add a little more of that color into the brush.

Maybe we'll have a little water down here.

Shoot, I love water.

So, maybe the water lives in our world... Oh, I'm not sure where it's going to be.

So let's just throw some blue in.

Wherever we want water, we'll have it there.

If we don't want water, we'll paint right over it.

We're not committed at this point.

We can do anything that we want to do here.

Any old thing.

Okay.

Now very lightly we'll go across the entire canvas.

Three hairs and some air.

There.

Now then, let's wash our old brush.

We'll just scrub him off in some odorless thinner.

Give him a shake.

[laughs] And just beat the devil out of him.

Sometimes those brushes get away, and they go zoom.

Clean to the other side of the room.

That's when you find out who your friends are.

Take a little of the Titanium White.

Just pull it in one direction through the brush there.

Get a lot of color on the brush.

Shoot, let's make some big old fluffy clouds that live up here in the sky.

Tiny little circles.

Tiniest little circles.

There we go.

And we're looking for a basic shape here.

Don't just throw this on at random and hope that a cloud will appear.

Sort of plan out what it is you want to do.

There we go.

Just basic cloud shapes.

And don't stay in one area and keep working.

Look here, if you just stay here and keep working and working and working, all you end up with is a big cotton ball.

Now I got to get rid of that.

See?

But if you do one of those, you do a cloudectomy, and you're in business again.

That's all it takes.

Okay.

Keep that brush moving.

Let them dance in there and just let them play.

Clouds are one of the freest things in nature.

We'll give him a friend right here.

Big old friend.

There we are.

Other side.

And just some very basic little shapes.

Shoot, whatever you want in there.

There.

When we were kids, we used to look at clouds and see all kind of things in them.

The same thing happens in your paintings.

Do clouds and you stand back, a lot of times you'll see all kinds of things in there.

Okay, now we're just going to use the top corner of the two-inch brush.

Gently, gently, blend those clouds.

Gently blend them.

Just here, don't overwork them.

Don't overwork them.

Now we'll lift them.

Give them a little fluff.

There we are.

And very lightly, two hairs and some air, just give them a little blend.

Same thing over here.

This'll give you some nice practice with clouds.

They're a lot of fun to do, and they're very, very easy.

Very easy.

I beat the brush just to knock off excess paint so I don't have to clean it.

Now we can lift these up.

Make some big old floaters out of them.

There we go.

Now, maybe in our world, shoot, while we're doing clouds, maybe there's another little cloud that lives in the front here.

And you can do these clouds and make just layer after layer of them, but do the one that's farthest away first and work forward.

Always working forward.

There we go, maybe it comes right on over here.

We don't know.

We don't know.

Today I'd like to do a... Let's do a big mountain.

I get a lot of requests from people wanting to do mountains that don't, that don't have snow all over them.

Big dark mountains.

So maybe we'll try one of those today.

And if the painting develops out of it, that's even better, but I'm really interested in showing you how to do a mountain today.

So let's do that.

All right.

Let's start with Midnight Black.

And we'll put a little Van Dyke Brown into it.

But a lot of color.

Pull the paint out flat.

Really put some pressure on it.

Go straight down.

Cut across.

Get our little roll of paint.

Let's go up here.

Now you have to make a big decision real quick today.

Where's your mountain going to live?

Maybe in our world, there it is.

It comes right down here.

Wherever you want it.

Shoot, just drop it in.

Really push that paint in there.

Maybe it goes over here.

Comes down.

There.

And all we're looking for right now is just a basic, very basic, shape.

That's all we're concerned with.

We're really pushing that paint in there.

This is just Midnight Black with a little Van Dyke Brown in it.

Okay, maybe this comes over, and [Bob makes "bloop" sound], maybe there's a little bump there.

Now when you do your painting, you do it any way that you want to do it.

Maybe your mountain has a totally different shape.

And that's fine.

Painting should make you happy.

If it does nothing else, it should make you happy.

And if it doesn't make you happy, [laughs] you're doing the wrong thing.

Because it's fun.

And if you can do things all of your life that make you happy, needless to say you're going to be a happy person.

There we are.

Now then I'll just take this old big brush and very gently I'll grab some of this and just pull it.

This is just pulling the paint down.

Remove the excess paint.

It makes it even so you can add more colors on top of it.

That's all.

There we go.

Just let it blend right on down here toward the base.

Okay.

Boy, we have one huge mountain today.

But we said we was going to do a big mountain, so what the heck, that's all right.

That's all right.

Wash the old brush off.

[laughs] There we are.

There we are.

Let's have some fun now.

We'll take some white.

Dark Sienna.

I'm using the little knife.

I've got that little knife.

I'm going to put a little Van Dyke Brown over here.

But notice I'm taking one pile of paint.

Dark Sienna on one side and white.

Van Dyke Brown and white here.

Now maybe over in here we'll take some Van Dyke Brown and a little black.

Add a little of the Prussian Blue to it.

I'm making several different colors.

A little more blue.

We'll use that maybe for a shadow color.

Oh, that's nice.

That's nice.

That's what we're looking for.

Leave all these colors marbled.

Now let me wipe the old knife off.

I just wipe it on a paper towel.

Now then, let's go up here.

Get our little roll of paint on the small knife, and let's begin picking out some of these little highlights.

Touch.

No pressure.

No pressure at all.

Touch and just pull.

A little bit of the shadow color maybe.

Right back in there.

No pressure though.

No pressure.

Here and there we can go back with a little dark.

Add some little ridges and all kinds of beautiful little things that are happening.

Sort of let your imagination go.

Do whatever you want.

Just all types of little things happen in here, though.

But absolutely no pressure with the knife.

If you put pressure, it's going to look like you iced a cake.

Here you go.

Just barely, barely touching.

Pulling them down.

To our shadow color here and there.

Touch, pull down.

And there's always some dark shadow areas in there.

You can just drop them in.

Blend some colors in.

Boy, you just make some of the most ferocious mountains.

This is where the old mountain goat lives.

He hangs out up here and has a good time.

Okay, maybe over in here even some little things happening.

All right.

Now then, I'll go right into some straight Midnight Black.

Let's come right up here.

Maybe there's a peak that lives right there.

It goes maybe way up here.

Comes down through there.

Wherever you want it.

Just sort of think about all the things that live in this mountain.

Shoot, tell you what.

Tell you what.

Maybe, maybe there's a glacier in there.

Maybe there's some snow laying up there.

I'm taking a little of the Prussian Blue and white.

Mixing it together.

Very little blue.

A little roll of paint.

If you want to have a glacier, maybe tell you what, maybe he lives, [Bob makes "sssoo" sound], right along there.

Make a decision.

Drop him in.

Just let him, just let him lay in there and sleep.

There.

Maybe he comes out here.

I don't know.

And you know when you buy your first tube of paint, you get an artist's license.

And that license says you can do anything that makes you happy.

So use that license.

It's yours forever and ever.

Okay.

Back to our black.

Maybe now we'll just have all kinds of little things that live right along in here like so.

Wherever we want them.

Maybe that comes...

There, we don't know.

We don't know.

Wherever.

Shoot, maybe some of that snow's laying down in here.

But it's just playing games here with contrast.

A lot of nice contrast going on.

Maybe, maybe there's a little snow.

There it is.

Just think in these areas where there will be little areas that maybe the snow would fall in there and it didn't melt.

And beautiful things happen.

Okay.

Add a little touch of Bright Red here in that color.

Shoot, we'll get crazy.

A little more of the Dark Sienna.

But leave it marble so you have all these streaks happening.

Because when you pick up that roll of paint, those streaks are still in the paint.

They're still in there.

And we can come along in here.

Just change its flavor a little bit.

Put a little highlight here and there.

Let a little light play across there, wherever you want it.

Wherever you want it.

A little shadow here, and a little shadow there.

There we go.

Okay.

And it's just all kinds of nice things happening.

It's more of the dark over here.

There.

And, again applying some little shadow things.

[Bob makes "shoo" sound] Gotta make those little noises.

Gotta make those little noises.

A little of the color in here.

Plays right down through there.

Just let your imagination go.

You know it's fantastic.

I get so many letters from young people all across the country that are painting, and painting has opened whole new worlds to them.

And it's so wonderful to hear from people.

My gosh, some of them three, four, five-years-old.

Their parents write and tell me that, that the children have taken an interest in it, and they watch the show and they paint.

In some areas, I have friends that have started painting clubs.

Especially in high school and then college, and et cetera.

And they get together.

They paint together.

And they had some [chuckles] Bob Ross painting clubs, and I was absolutely flattered to hear that.

Absolutely flattered.

And they've sent me some photographs.

A little roll of paint.

Of some of the things that they're painting.

It's unreal.

It's unreal.

And young people have a better imagination than I do.

Boy, they can paint some of the most beautiful things.

Here, we're just putting in little, little doers wherever you want them.

Maybe there's another stone here in the front.

So maybe up here.

Just sort of look around and see where you think a stone should live in your world.

These are some rough mountains.

And if you take your time, you can do some unbelievable effects like this.

Just take your time and work at it.

Play.

Enjoy.

That's the name of the game, is enjoying.

Really only enjoy what you do in life.

If you do, then you'll do a good job.

And I certainly enjoy what I'm doing.

I spent half my life doing somebody else's thing.

And if you can ever, ever get a job doing the thing that you like to do best, then it's wonderful.

I'm just taking a clean, dry, two-inch brush and just tapping.

Just tapping.

I want to create a little mist down here at the base of this little mountain.

Big mountain.

There.

Just a little mist.

Then lift gently upward.

That takes out the tap marks.

Brings it all together.

Over here, we'll follow these angles.

Sometimes it's nice just to take the brush the same way and tap in little grassy things that just grow right up in there.

And that works very well.

Very well.

Shoot, maybe we can even do a little touch of it here.

You can take a little green or Yellow Ochre or something.

It doesn't matter.

Tap a little color in there.

I just want to show you how.

I'm not really going to do much of it, but you can see.

Just follow the angles and go right on up.

And you can have grass growing all down here at the foots of your mountain.

And that's very pretty and very effective.

Okay.

That's enough of that.

Let me wash the old brush.

Just to show you how to do that.

[laughs] There we are.

Maybe back here let's have some fun, shoot.

We'll take some black.

Some Prussian Blue.

Van Dyke Brown.

There's some crimson.

Maybe a little Sap Green.

Whatever you got.

Just mix it up.

As long as it's dark.

Okay, let me wipe my knife off here.

We just wipe this knife on an old paper towel.

Okay, find a fan brush.

Maybe back here in the back there's some, maybe there's some little trees that live back there.

Let's drop some of those in.

And this is one of the easiest ways to make the indication of a lot of little trees far away.

Just take the brush and tap downward.

See?

That's all there is to it.

You can make a whole forest in a second here.

There we go.

And we're just looking for basic, very basic, shapes.

These are too far away to have much detail.

Now, sometimes...

Here's a problem that happens.

You know, make them like this.

And it begins looking like a fence.

[chuckles] If that should happen, all you do is just add a few more trees.

Just fill that in.

If they get too far apart, they look like a fence.

Now you could either add a few more trees, or put wire on it, either way.

Whatever, if you want a fence, then that's what you oughta have.

Sometimes maybe you want one there.

All right.

Hope you got to see the show that, the last show that we did or so.

It had Hank Snow in it.

That son of a gun's a heck of a painter.

I really enjoyed my time with him.

We went to Nashville.

Annette and I did.

Painted with Hank and a couple other people from the Grand Ole Opry a couple of days.

He's a lovely, lovely man.

I hope he sings on the Grand Ole Opry for another 50 years.

Okay.

Now then.

I want to create the illusion down here.

Maybe some little trunks on those trees.

So I'll just take a little white on the fan brush.

Grab it.

Lift upward.

Make it look like little trunks that are far, far away.

If you happen to put one in there that's too light, just rub it a little bit.

It'll go away.

Okay.

Now then.

Maybe back here, just use that same old color.

Just going to tap in what'll end up being a little land area back there.

A little land.

See, remember we wasn't worried about where our lake was going to be or little pond.

Because we decided we'd just chop off whatever we didn't want.

Now is the time to do that.

Decide where your pond's going to be.

Grab.

Pull straight down.

Just pull it straight down.

And this will be the reflection.

Instant reflections, that easy.

Then go gently and lightly across.

There you are.

Okay, now then, let's put some pretty things out there.

Maybe this is fall, and all the beautiful colors are beginning to happen.

Shoot, let's get over here in some red and Indian Yellow.

We'll make this one with a lot of red in it.

But when you do it, you make it with any color that you want.

And I'm just in a mood today to do some beautiful colors.

Some nice, bright colors.

It's a fantastic day.

It's a good day to be alive.

Come to think of it, every day is a good day to be alive.

There we are.

Just tapping.

Okay.

Maybe we'll come over on this side.

Just drop in a few more little things.

Now think about the lay of the land.

It begins getting very important.

Ooh, a beautiful red color there.

In Alaska, we have a lot of mountains like this, and in the fall the colors will change, and you have all the oranges and yellows and red.

It looks like a painter went crazy, and his palette spilled all over the landscape.

And I've never seen such things as Alaska has in the autumn.

The colors are absolutely spectacular.

A little bit here and there.

Okay.

Now then, let's take a little bit of Van Dyke Brown.

Let's just scrub a little dirt down here at the bottom.

Just really scrubbing that in.

There we go.

A little bit of the Liquid White on the knife.

And with that, let's just put a little water line in.

Just to break it up.

There we go.

All right.

I'll tell you what let's do.

Maybe back here, maybe there's some bigger evergreens.

We'll just take the fan brush, go right into that color.

A lot of paint in the bristles.

Let's go ahead up here.

Maybe there lives in our world, maybe there's an evergreen that lives there.

Just sort of look around in your painting.

Because each painting is different.

Each painting is different.

Just put them in and go with them.

Wherever you want them.

Wherever.

Let's put one on the other side.

What the heck, right there.

There he is.

There he is.

Now then.

Maybe down in here there's some...

I'll tell you what let's do.

Let's put some, yep, right along here.

Let's just close this little pond in.

If we had another 10 minutes on this show, there wouldn't be a pond at all.

We just keep taking a little more and a little more away from it.

There.

And now you have just a skinny little pond out there.

Just enough to be very pretty.

Okay, we can come back with our nice highlight colors.

Our fall colors.

The ochres and yellows and Bright Red.

And let's just begin putting in all kinds of little, little grassy things here.

Ooh, there's some more of that red.

I like that.

It's pretty.

There we go.

Just decide where you want them.

Drop them in.

That's all.

Maybe, I'll tell you what.

Let's have a little bit of fun.

Maybe down here in the foreground, I'll take some Liquid White.

Go into, we'll use some Cad Yellow.

Go right over here and grab a little of the Bright Red.

Whew, make a firecracker here.

Let's go right up here.

Maybe there lives a happy little bush right along here.

A little more of the red.

Just put all kinds of little... Look at that.

A little bush right here in the front.

Maybe... Ooh, there's a nice red one.

Jack Frost has hit him hard.

Really thumped him.

There we go.

Just some little things right down here in the foreground.

And, in our world, maybe there lives a nice evergreen tree right there.

Use just the corner of the fan brush.

Work back and forth, back and forth.

There we are.

Right down there.

Shoot, that's fun.

Let's have one over here.

There he goes.

There, back and forth.

I had a lady in class one time.

She called these "Z" trees.

Like Zorro.

That might be an excellent analogy.

Just back and forth.

Back and forth.

I get a lot of letters asking if I still teach classes.

And I really don't teach many classes anymore.

We have a lot of young people that are good and tough.

[chuckles] They can go out here and do it.

I got lazy.

I want to stay at home.

A little trunk here.

A little brown and white.

But we have a lot of teachers that travel around and teach.

Including my son, Steve.

That little rascal.

Why, he's a heck of a painter.

A little yellow, a little green.

Put a little highlight on these trees, and I think we'll be about done.

Sit right on there.

A little more Sap Green.

That's a little too bright yet.

Oh, that's nicer.

I call Steve "The Little Devil."

He's six foot five.

He's not so little.

He calls me "Shorty."

A little highlight on these little trees.

Shoot, we've got a finished painting.

I really hope you've enjoyed this one.

It's a lot of fun.

That mountain will give you a little challenge.

But it'll teach you how to use all of the equipment and to make some fantastic effects.

So, until next time, from all of us here, happy painting and God bless.

[announcer] To order a 256 page book of 60 Joy of Painting projects or Bob's detailed 3 hour workshop DVD Call 1-800-Bob-Ross or visit BobRoss.com [music] [music]