The last painting that I was working on and "got stuck" with how to finish it, is shown below. This painting, oil on masonite board,  had started off with multiple glaze layers that seemed to glow nicely, but then when I tried to add the Antelope image, the entire painting seemed to collapse. It is obviously too large for even a foreground presence and must be modified or eliminated from the painting.

The subject of the painting is "Temple Mountain" in the San Rafael Swell area of Central Utah, near Goblin Valley National Monument (Northwest of the monument).

Since the subject is Utah desert sandstone and limestone formations, we can use poetic license and exaggerate the coloring a little more on the red side. Also, it is difficult to posterize the edges to explain the rock crevices and cracks, but this is a central requirement for the finished painting.

Here's the painting on the windshield of my car.  Notice the disproportionate size of the Antelope and difficulty in presenting the rock crevices.

Now I'll use Photoshop to define what it needs for a finished painting:

 Now we're getting somewhere. If I can finish the painting like this, then it would be adequate to the vision of the location that I was trying to portray. The question is how to posterize the edges correctly to create the desired effect?  Maybe a very dry brush and ink? Or, maybe it has to be an extremely large mural sized painting to allow for the brush to define the edges correctly. Or, maybe it will now live in the digital realm and get printed as a large-format painting as if finished as a painting.

Does it really matter how we arrive at the image we are trying to create? As long as the journey is taken and the desired image is available for replication and enjoyment, what difference is there in dabs of paint or finishing extrapolation of edges via photo editor tools?  There are very fuzzy lines here for an artist like me that just wants to see the envisioned end-product created, regardless of convention or mandatory procedures from antiquated academics.