Do you use a reference or do you just come up with these landscapes out of your own imagination?

ohh i love this question! short answer: both. i frankenstein a few references together usually. like using one reference for the gravestones, another for the building. trees i usually freehand, but i like to look at and take fotos of trees all the time, so i have a good visual libary for them haha.

in this specific case! i painted the landscape originally in acrylics back in febuary, after a long walk in the local woods. so it was inspired by the view i had, but i didnt take pictures. there are many different levels to that area, like a hilly lanscape you could say. its quite cool to walk thru. (in fact i used a foto i took of this place as a very close reference to this piece: https://www.furaffinity.net/view/44106753/ ) then a few days ago i decided to transform the scan i had into my landscape project. the vod is still up on my twitch here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1241213519 it begins at 1 hour 50 in, as its the second painting i finished that day. i show and talk about the references i am using for the piece!) i think its telling how similar all my landscapes are, that what really moves me, gets into multiple art pieces.

so, the long answer is, i try to come up with good compositions myself, and then use multiple references to get the details right. i try not to copy or reference fotos 1 to 1 if i dont own any copyright to it, so the only cases where i will take a landscape literally from a foto is when i took the foto myself :3 its because in the digital age we dont credit fotografist enough and i have lots of respect to their profession. espacially artists can be a bit careless when a good reference is just a google search away, sadly.

ahh this got long, my apologies! thank you for your question, it made my day! :D