Watercolor painting of Dakota Crescent

posted on 11:48 PM on Saturday 04 March 2017

We went to Dakota Crescent for our first outdoor painting. It was raining initially but the sun came up a while later. Painting outdoor is rather different as the scene is in front of you in life size and you can see clearly the details. So it does make it easier in that sense but you have to endure the elements like rain, the sun and the mosquitoes. This is the final result after a couple of hours of touch up at home. The sketching and some basic washes are done at the site but the rest was done at home.

The original is shown in the photo below:

One of the wonderful things about painting is that you can change the elements around which you cannot do with photography (well, you can edit the photo but the effect is not quite the same). I really like the colors and shapes at the playground. The buildings at the back were also rather interesting especially the staircase. The sketch took a long time since there were a lot of different shapes and I had to make many measurements to ensure that everything is proportional. The painting was also rather tedious since there were so many colors and details. Furthermore since we painted something that the teacher did not demonstrate, I had to mix the colors and determine the tones on my own. All in all, I think it was a good effort but it really look too cartoonish. It is missing the watercolor feel which Pauline captured much better than I did. I got to work more on the feel. Perhaps more random details.