#172 'Southsea Promanade' 9x12"

I have been out painting over the past 3 days. The first day at Queen Elizabeth Country Park nr Petersfield. Being early morning there was no sunlight and the tones were very close together and a bit dull on the wooded subject I chose. After an hour and half of painting I wiped it off. I don't often do that at such a late stage in the painting. Someone recently asked me what is your 'success' rate for paintings? About one in five I scrap. I'm not sure if this is acurate - typical I scrapped the next one I did! But all was not lost I moved 20 feet to the early sun shining on a pond it was Monetesque and I will finish it in the studio soon....

This painting of Southsea Promanade is a familiar scene to me, as I walked my dog and ran along here for 11 years. Yesterday was a bright, sunny day, packed with people, it had a lovely English seaside feel to it, with people eating fish and chips and seagulls hovering above.

I spent quite a while getting the compostion right I changed board sizes from an 8x10" after drawing it too small. I didn't want too much promanade but enough to get a feel of it. Contra Jour again with the sun directly opposite me. I really checked the tones, comparing each area with the next. Saying to myself is this part lighter or darker? Like the promanade would have been easy to paint too dark.
The people I sketched in with the brush as they were walking by, adding some light and darks (and the dog!) in the studio today.

I enjoyed painting this one, so many people stopped to say hello and take a look, good to be out there painting again....