I start with a preliminary brush drawing. I take Ultramarine (511), draft a drawing and make a tonal underpainting, carefully transferring the proportions of the rock, the ratio of light and shadows from the sketch to the canvas. The rock consists of several main protrusions and faults, it is important to convey the diagonal movement of their lines correctly and lay the main shadows in tone. Ultramarine is my favourite pre-drawing colour, with a rich blue with a red tint. The lines drawn by it at the beginning become part of the finished work: I do not paint them to the end, they shine through in some places, emphasizing colour accents.

Tempera can work both liquid and pasty, increasing the amount of water in the paint, obtaining a more liquid consistency, while the colour remains equally bright and saturated. Earlier, I often worked with oil, but, unfortunately, I began to have allergies, and I was looking for an alternative to oil paints and settled on tempera, because it does not cause allergies in me, is as close as possible in consistency, opacity and finish coating characteristics to oil, only dries much faster and almost does not smell at all. Tempera’a drying speed is the same as any other water-based paint: it dries as the water evaporates, it doesn't bother me. At the first stage, I try to work in liquid so that the paint is docile, like watercolours. It is easier to paint the canvas with liquid paint. In the future, I will work more pasteously, creating the texture of the rock with thick strokes.

After finishing the preliminary drawing and designating the main shadows, I move on to the second stage of the underpainting: I cover the entire plane of the canvas with colour, constantly refining the drawing and working on the details.

First of all, I add warm shades to the shadows. To do this, I add Ochre light, Cadmium red deep or Quinacridone rose to Ultramarine, getting complex muted shades of varying degrees of heat and cold. I apply them on top of the first layer, making the shadows denser and deeper. As I move on to the illuminated rock fragments, I paint over the white canvas with a liquid mixture of Ochre light (206) + Cadmium red deep (303) paints, producing a transparent, colourful layer that retains the glow of the white canvas. Next, gradually, where necessary, I apply thick layers of paint, without adding water, adjusting the pattern and refining the silhouettes with paste strokes, forming the texture of the rock, adding Titanium white (101), Cadmium lemon (203) or Cobalt turquoise (531) in the mixture.

At the final stage, I once again go through the brush throughout the work, strengthening the details or vice versa, taking something to the background. It is important for me to get a whole harmonious work, consonant with my inner sensations from what I saw in a living landscape, I will be convinced that as a result this is exactly what I wanted to convey on canvas.