After reading an interesting thread the other day about the importance of not having a fully "tutorial-based diet", I very pleased to say that I have completed my first ever non-tutorial painting!

Reference photo is attached and I think that completing this has certainly taught me more than any tutorial I have completed, such as:

• Painting figures are hard and getting the perspective on them is also hard

• Painting wet sand is hard as is dry sand...

• Paint spattering is good but looks awful when overused or on wet paper

• Soft rolling waves are hard... (you get the point)

To my credit (and in my limited experience), I do think that this is a very ambitious photo to attempt my own painting from, and there is a lot that I am not happy about in the final result (my quick painting sketch is almost better in my subjective opinion) but I have learnt a huge amount , hey, at least I have got over the first hurdle of painting my first painting, right?!

Another point of note, I don't know if anyone else feels the same, but I really struggled to pick anything to paint when it wasn't something I have taken a photo of or have experienced/been to. This is my own photo from a recent walk with my family and I thought it was nice so there's my reasoning. Also the exercise of attempting to do a 'tonal' sketch, quick painting sketch before my final attempt was enormously helpful.