We started painting one of the whole eggs, but first masked out the highlight on it. Wet on dry, I used raw sienna + quinacridone rose and added winsor yellow to the sunlit side of the egg, adding a band of violet as I worked down the egg with ultramarine + quinacridone rose. Using the same initial colors but just adding more rose, I painted the bottom of the egg. After the egg dried I painted the harder line shadow on the the left side with a darker violet of ultramarine blue + winsor red.
I approached the other eggs in the same way and using the darker violet to get the deeper shadows.
Next I started painting the interior of the bowl. I made a base color of the green bowl mixing Thalo Green (Daniel Smith) and Winsor Red. To this base color I made a sunlit side by adding Winsor Yellow to it which I painted to the left of the eggs in the bowl. At the same time I mixed the red clay color along the rim with Winsor Red + Thalo Green, and while the yellowish green color was still wet, I added the red to the rim. I added a little Quinacridone Rose to middle area of the rim and then I continued with the rest of the rim to the right with the base color of the green. When this dried, I painted the shadowed part of the interior of the bowl to the right of the eggs, covering the deep shadow part of the egg. I used the base color green and I added Ultramarine Blue to the mix. After painting it in, I dropped in some Raw Sienna close to the egg. After this dried, I needed to make the egg show through the shadow. To do this I used Gamboge (M.Graham) and painted it in where the egg is in shadow. I saw that it needed some pink so I added some Quinacridone Rose. I painted the dark to the left side of the eggs with the same color as the dark on the right side.
I then started to paint the base of the bowl. I painted the light color on the whole base of the bowl with base color plus some thalo blue. I painted a very light wash with this color. When that dried I painted the shadowed side. I used the same color with more thalo in it, plus adding some Quin. Rose at the bottom. I then painted the reddish base with the same red and the rim and mingling the colors.
Now the big shadow! It's a very large area so you have to work fast even though it is done wet on wet, if it's anything like today with 48% humidity, your paper will dry fast. I used ultramarine blue + thalo blue + a little winsor red. However, when you get closer to the eggs, you have to drop in some quinacridone rose and winsor yellow. Near the single egg I just dropped in quinacridone rose. Near the bowl I dropped in a little sap green but not too much. If you are not happy with the shadow, you can do it over again, but you have to dry the paper completely with a hair dryer. Then rewet it all and do the same thing again. I did it twice to get a stronger color and it also smooths out some blotches.
Here is the finished painting, although it is a demo picture and a little sloppy, but I actually like all the wiggly edges! I'm actually getting used to painting on an easel sideways! The last thing to paint is the inside of the broken shells. I used ultramarine + winsor red but on the bottom one I put some of the color that is in the shadow underneath it. I added a shadow on the broken shell, and I added some shadow underneath on the table. And it's done!
