Fog City (2020)

In 2019 I became an ambassador for BenQ, a company that puts out some of the most spectacular computer monitors. I was given a 32-inch monitor to add to my workstation. A few months later I was sent a newer model. I set both of them up above my touch sensitive 32-inch Wacom Cintiq which is my main working monitor (my canvas).

Staring up at these three beautiful monitors I was suddenly inspired to create my third panoramic painting. This is the second time that technology was the driving force for my vision. Times Square was the first. I always wanted to do a painting of it, but I could never get the feeling that I was looking for. It was the introduction of 64-inch printers from Epson that made it possible. Times Square is a huge place that bombards you with visual stimulation. The only way to capture it was to go BIG. Five feet by twenty-five feet big!

For this new panorama the subject was clear from the start, the view I have lived with for the past 25 years — the San Francisco skyline! Not just a collection of buildings but rather the beauty that has fascinated me for so long, a city blanketed with thick fog amidst a stunning sunset. With that vision clear in my mind I set out to create it.

I borrowed a photographer friend's camera, equipped with a 500mm lens and proceeded to photograph the scene from my window. I didn’t have to wait for the right moment because the scene was clear in my mind. All I needed was the position of the buildings. I plotted out the level of fog to determine which buildings would be visible. I then started doing the research necessary to properly re-create each structure. Using Google, I did a search for each building and Sutro Tower and collected a myriad of reference images. Using Google Earth, I did a series of flyovers to get an idea of what the rooftops looked like. In the “Google Street” mode I walked around the buildings to get close-up details of how the facades were constructed.

I spent two days traveling to San Francisco to do further reference studies. I stopped by Yerba Buena Island to get better views of the skyline. What a stunning view! I then went to the top of Corona Heights Park to do a photo study of the houses that lie beneath Sutro Tower — another stunning view and next to the Randall Museum. I actually built a small model of Sutro Tower with some wooden strips and cardboard to study the effects of light on the various surfaces. In total I spent about two months doing all the research.

Now that I knew what everything looked like, I proceeded to start painting. Each element was carefully created keeping in mind how the setting sun would light them. An aerial view, taken from Google Maps, was used to determine the position of each building within the three-dimensional space. The sky went through various iterations until I achieved the drama that I had envisioned. The fog also took a tremendous amount of experimentation to get it to look just right. It helped that a majority of the time all I needed to do was look out the window and study it. As each element was completed, I made a print on my Epson printers, especially the P9000, to ensure sharpness of detail. Getting that first final print made it all worthwhile.

https://www.benq.com/en-us/monitor.html
https://www.wacom.com/en-us
https://epson.com/usa