Videos

This is a collection of time-lapse video posts from the Amdall Gallery Instagram and YouTube channel. They are typically Instagram Reels, YouTube Shorts, or longer 4K time lapses set to music, and are typically included with a a blog post. More videos can be found on the channel.

Window Backlight, oil on paper. This latest oil painting is another that followed a graphite pencil sketch. The original sketch was done while waiting for a flight, and I decided it was solid enough to try a different medium and expand on it a bit. I wanted to try something a bit new with some nice sunlight coming through windows in the background. Unfortunately, due to cropping necessary for a Reels video, those windows don’t show up in the time lapse. But at least you can get a sense of how the portrait itself came together. It’s a solid one I think! Some nice texture and visible brush stroke remnants that I really like. I have to admit though, I’m not totally sure about head tilt and eye alignment. Swanson Inspired, sketch vs painting. Lately I've really been enjoying sketching with a graphite pencil - just scratching out casual portraits in a small notebook. I've especially liked the concept of sketching and painting, then comparing the two. I'm going to keep rolling with this concept for new portraits, but I also thought it might be fun to go back to portraits from earlier this year and do the same. Field of Wheat painting vs sketch. Like the cat portrait, this was a continued shift in order. The first three were pencil sketch first, followed by oil painting. This one was flipped, with painting happening first, and the pencil sketch coming later when I decided I wanted to do another comparison. My sketchbook is pretty small, so I didn’t have a lot of room for as much of the figure as I did with the painting. But the sketch to painting side-by-side does have pretty solid fidelity between the two. It’s not exact of course, but I think it might be the closest of all the ones I shared this weekend. Field of Wheat, oil on paper. This painting was actually directly inspired by a previous one I shared this weekend. In the high contrast portrait from Saturday, while I was working on it, I shared an instagram story with a poll asking if I should finish the background. Most people said yes I should include a real, detailed background with actual stuff (instead of a generic one or none at all). But, by that point, I had already figured there were some things I couldn’t fix about that portrait, so I decided to abide by the poll, but in a fresh painting. Chip the Cat, painting vs sketch. This is the 4th pencil and oil paint comparison, but this one has a significant difference - the first three started with the pencil sketch, then I followed up with a painted portrait. But with this one, I actually did the painting first, then decided to sketch something for another side-by-side. I had some issues with shapes and angles in the painting, which I think ended with it not really looking like our new kitten. And those issues somewhat continued with the pencil sketch. So, at least I was consistent! More broadly though, they aren’t bad generic cat portraits….just not exactly of OUR cat. I think I’ll have to do another fresh one at some point to redeem myself.  Chip the Cat No. 2, oil on paper. For my second to last painting this weekend, I've got another of our new family cat. For now, we're calling him Chip, although that will still probably change. This sweet Ragamuffin kitten has been with us for about a week, and he already acts like he's lived here for years. High Contrast painting vs sketch. Now, to compare this oil painting and graphite pencil sketch. Looking at the two side by side, I really think this is the worst fidelity so far between the two portraits. They were supposed to be the same portraits in different mediums, and to me that isn't apparent. That being said, in a vacuum I do like both of them. As I mentioned in the reels video description, I really like the contrast on the painting. And the sketch has an interesting look I think. So, I'll call this one a nice result, but indicative of some areas for improvement. High Contrast Low Fidelity, oil on paper. This was a really interesting project. Once again, it's an attempt to paint one of my earlier sketches, but this time I think I was far off the mark. There is really poor fidelity between the sketch and painting, but I’ll focus on the painting itself here and comparison later. One thing I really like about the painting is its really great contrast. I have often tried to push myself towards working darker and being less cautious about color values, and here I really feel great about those areas. I like the color use quite a bit here. Graybeard painting vs sketch. Here’s the oil painting and graphite pencil sketch side by side. It’s actually the second one I’ve done the dual portrait comparison of, and I think the result was pretty similar to the first one. There is a passing resemblance, but certainly not strong fidelity between the two. Graybeard, oil on paper. I’ve been drawing a lot over the past week, mostly due to convenience while traveling, but I’m still “all in” on oil painting. Sketching did give me an idea though - why not try both pencil and paint version of the same portraits? That’s what I ended up doing for that first one last week. I thought it might be fun to try that again. This painting of a gray-bearded man is one I tried in pencil first, then painted this one. I may share a separate side-by-side post with some comparison discussion. Here is part two of my frenzy of sketching, mostly done yesterday while traveling. But I did work on some this morning as I was sitting around drinking my coffee. I'm having fun with this informal pencil sketching - I wonder if I'm going to keep at it? It is pretty good practice, especially when I'm not in a position to paint. I spent a lot of time yesterday at airports, so I had some time on my hands. Fortunately, I brought a small sketchbook and some pencils. I've really become fascinated lately by the notion of "sketching like a painter." It's a totally different approach to the way I've done pencil drawings in the past, but it's really fun. Here are the first three of the six I did! Walkthrough Portrait, oil on paper. I wanted to do a "live" portrait painting video, with real time discussion as I painted. I figured I'd go with something in my wheelhouse - a somewhat straightforward head and shoulders portrait. This is a high speed time lapse from that session. A better view of this fun pencil and paint project. It all started with wanting to have some art time with my kids, but not wanting to break out the paints. I thought I’d try a new approach to sketching, treating the pencil like a paint brush and making it as close to my current painting process as I could. It’s very different than my old approach to pencil sketching! I kind of like the feel of it though, a fresh new thing to try that produces a visual effect I really like. After doing the pencil sketch, I decided to try the same subject and pose again in oil paint. Pencils Then Paint, oil on paper. This was such a fun little project. It at started when my kids were drawing, and I wanted to join in the art fun, but didn’t want to go through all the painting set up. I had a random idea - why not draw with them, but approach it exactly like painting? Follow my same oil painting steps, brush grip, and all that. It’s so very different than how I previously approached drawing. I’ll post separate images of the drawing, but the next day after sketching this way, I was inspired to try to paint the same subject. Poor Planning, oil on paper. I really botched this one I think. I've mentioned before, I prefer to do as little planning as possible when I paint. I like to say it's because I'm trying to be judicious with the limited time available to art...but maybe it's a dash of laziness too. Anyhow, predictably I didn't prepare here and it cost me this time to some extent. Chip the Cat, oil on paper. Although we haven't actually met him yet, I thought it would be fun to paint the little kitten we're going to adopt soon. He's still too young to come home to us, but we're picking him up in about two weeks. We're very excited to meet the little guy! The Judge, oil on paper. Do you ever get into a painting and think, “what in the world am I doing?” I don’t always know where these portraits will take me. Especially when I’m feeling really loose and easy-going, I don’t necessarily stick to any real plan. I do use references, like stock photos from royalty free sites like Unsplash, people I know in real life, or even AI generated faces. But I find the most fun in not worrying about straying from those references - I very much need these to help me realize where light should be and what colors I should be trying to match. But to me, that means there’s room to just let things happen sometimes. Professor Bowtie, oil on paper. This was another of my "paint as fast and efficiently as possible" efforts. Essentially trying to cram some painting time into a spare hour or so, which can be somewhat of a challenge. A large part of what I'm trying to do right now as a painter is simply get practice in the big areas I want to improve: 1) freehand proportions, 2) light, and 3) color representation. I feel like my biggest need is repetition, so just getting paint time feels like a win. Quick Painting Study, oil on paper. Even though I always try to paint somewhat quickly, sometimes it's fun to kick that into overdrive. It depends on the subject, how complicated the pose is, and all that...but usually I can expect 2-3 hours for a portrait. On weekdays though, if I feel like painting, I usually can't get that much free time, so I try to crunch all of that into about an hour. Expressive Planning, oil paper. This is somewhat of a continuation of the painting I shared yesterday. It’s very much in line with the approach I want to practice, which is focusing on broad shapes, then working gradually smaller, all while using the largest brush I possibly can. With this one though, I wanted to play around with different color values. Basically, explore contrast across the same or similar hues. It’s always a fun exercise to test my color mixing, which admittedly still needs a lot of work. Ideal Practice, oil on paper. Because I'm untrained as a painter, just kind of learning as I go, I don't really know what the "right" way is. I try to learn as much as I can from watching more experienced artists on Instagram and YouTube, but a lot of my approach comes from figuring out what feels the best to me. After 115 paintings, I'm starting to realize that one of the most satisfying approaches seems to be using a large brush for as long as possible, blocking in big shapes and progressively getting smaller. I don't know exactly why, but there's something so satisfying to trying to mold and features in the alla prima way using a big ol' brush. Elaborate background, oil on paper. Well…it’s elaborate for me anyway. My life as an artist basically consists of whatever time I can carve out between work and general life stuff, so I try to approach portraits as efficiently as I can. Basically that means leaning heavily into alla prima/wet-on-wet techniques, doing very little planning, and not spending much time on details and backgrounds. Probably not the best approach for high quality, but I really need practice more than anything, so this approach works for now I think. Perhaps once I’ve gotten more experience, I can shift gears and work on more comprehensive and detailed pieces. Approximately Steve Winwood, oil on paper. Sometimes when I'm painting, I have internal narratives or conversations with myself. They don't always make sense, and are sometimes just nonsense or jokes. With this painting, one of those weird thoughts I had was almost like an announcer saying, "Are you bold enough…to paint Steve Winwood badly?!" I kept thinking that as I was painting, as he transformed from looking like horror villain Leatherface, to James Vanderbeek, to finally a caricature almost in the neighborhood of Steve Windwood. It did make me chuckle out loud a couple of times. Colleague Portrait No. 4, oil on paper. Technically, it’s probably more like number 20ish. But it’s the 4th oil painting I’ve done a colleague and that I’ve shared a time lapse video of. No names as usual, but this particular subject is leaving our team soon so I thought this might be fun. She’s a true “Renaissance Woman” - probably one of the most multifaceted, multitalented people I’ve met. It's rare to meet someone with true expertise in as many areas as she has. Swanson Inspired, oil on paper. This was pretty fun - I came across some AI generated people somewhere (probably on Reddit) that I think were basically famous people but if they were medieval/fantasy world types. I don't remember all of them, but there were some pretty funny ones. Although I don't think it was captioned, one looked like Nick Offerman (Ron Swanson from Parks and Recreation). Profile Troubles, oil on paper. I don't think I'd realized this before, or at least considered it in any depth, but profiles using paint are really tricky. It's odd, because sketching a profile using pencil actually seems somewhat easy. Yet trying to do it using oils somehow feels quite tricky. I'll bet it's largely a matter of practice - most of my paintings are straight on or 3/4 profile view. Blue Jacket, oil on paper. Sometimes when I paint without much of a plan, I lose control of a piece. Unfortunately, there are times that means it turns into something I don't like...but other times, it actually somehow works out. With this painting, despite some twists and turns, I think it turned into something I can look back on positively. Flower Cliffs, oil on paper. After knocking out a head-and-shoulders portrait I felt good about, I thought I’d take advantage of the artistic headwind and jump right into a figure study. I saw an AI-generated image somewhere (made from midjourney or stable diffusion I think) that was kind of cool; a woman sitting in some rocks or on a cliff with flowers around. I thought I’d try that scene using the ol’ oil paints. Natural Flow, oil on paper. I really enjoyed this one - for whatever reason, the entire process felt like it unfolded in just the right way. In paintings, it seems like there are hundreds of little forks in the road where a color mix or brush stroke decision shape what it’s going to be. Somehow, each of those forks felt like the right one was chosen. Honestly, that almost never happens to me. This felt so natural from start to finish.
“Painting to Music” Playlist. Time-lapses set to classical music.
YouTube Shorts Playlist. 20-30 second time-lapses.
Art Discussion and Walkthrough Playlist. Conversations about art.
Product Reviews Playlist. Mostly art products, but some other things too.