Start all over again

 Alright, so much for feeling sorry for myself. Yesterday I got off my butt, stopped feeling sorry for myself about the Craft Fair on Saturday and sold some of the Neath prints that I'd made for the Craft Fair, to cut my losses a bit. I also sold an original sketch to a chap I met at the school craft fair a couple of weeks ago. Some you lose. . . but some you win.

So I made another watercolour this morning, and it's another London Borough of Ealing Watercolour as well. This one is a complete change of pace - not a bus or tram or trolleybus. I went to school in Elhorne High School in Hanwell. At the back of the school there was a very large field, and that led down to the Grand Union Canal. It's still a very picturesque place.

I didn't make may process photos at all today. This is partly because I was working so quickly. It's not as detailed or complex a view as either of the watercolours I made last week, and I really didn't need to do much more than outline the treelines, ad where the land meets the water, and the basic shaped of the canal boat, the lock and the lockkeeper's house. 

Once I started painting It went incredibly quickly. I felt most trepidation about painting in the water and the reflections so I did the sky first, and the started on the grass, then the trees. then the house, the lock and the wall on the right. I liked what I'd done by this stage, but I also knew that the bottom half of the picture was going to make or break it. 

Here's the finished picture. I won't lie, considering some of the rubbish I've produced in watercolour in the past I am really rather pleased with this one.The surface of the water is better done than I've managed before, and having the reflected foliage that little but darker than the trees works well. 

Pastel - Amelia in the pool

This is based on a photograph of my granddaughter, taken in the hotel swimming pool on her recent holiday in Bulgaria. It's more vibrant than the previous two pastel pictures because I bought a better set of pastels, which stand out more than the rather cheap and cheerful set I was using last week.

Amelia in the pool

Watercolour- water effects - river reflection

Elvet Bridge - Durham

There are a number of bridges still standing in Britain that have buildings and structures on them, and this one, the Elvet Bridge in Durham is one of them. Obviously I wanted to paint the bridge, which I love, as well as I could, but what I was most interested in was getting the reflections in the water, and on this score at least I'm quite happy with what I achieved. This was a one session painting. I dampened the whole piece of paper, then quickly applied the sky - mostly cerulean blue - then the river - a mixture of cerulean and cobalt, just to make it slightly deeper in colour than the sky. While the river blue was still wet I started applying grey, brown and green reflections, and I'm pleased with the way they diffused into the water, although I did apply some more reflections when it had dried.