Painting experiments

I am working on developing some exercises or experiments that will help me loosen up. I tend to get focused on details and this tightens up my technique. This tightening results in surface that is too smooth and an absence of brush strokes.

Here is one that I have come up with. Readers please feel free to comment with exercises that have worked for you.

Paint directly from life within a specific time limit, such as 45 minutes. When the time is up the painting is complete.

I am planning on trying this with seated models. I think most of my friends could sit for 45 minutes. Especially if cocktails were involved. Working from a still life would work too.

I plan to set up the palette in advance by mixing some of the colors that I will need. For an exercise like this the panel (painting surface) will need to be relatively small 18 x 24.