waterfall

I have had a photo cropped from a larger one which is of one of the creeks that abound in our area. This crop just shows the water falling over a rock, making a "waterfall" perhaps a foot high. This makes a good abstract shape and I've been working on painting it over the last week. Here's the photo:



First, I painted the picture in watercolor, quickly so as to stay loose. I knew watercolor wasn't the best medium for this project, and I tried anyway. I was right. I don't much like this painting, although when I just looked at it small (it's 10" x 14," a quarter sheet) it didn't seem so bad.



Today I did what I've wanted to do all along, and painted it in pastels. A much better medium for painting the value shifts and blends that are in this photo, and I didn't have to save any whites. I've changed it from the photo, something easier to do with pastels because when I don't like something I can go back and change it easily.


So here's my final waterfall painting, the same size as the watercolor version.