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.