Final Project for Richard Thorn's Watercolor Landscape Class

Richard, I was very happy to find your course! I took David Poxon's class to learn how to create textures and it opened vast horizons for me! I am a painter who thinks I should be looser and freer, but who turns back to realism every step of the way, regardless of the medium. David gave me the tools I needed to get realism in a new way in watercolor and I've been delighted.

But I wanted to do landscapes also. Your course has offered me the tools to approach complex scenes in a way I simply couldn't do before. When I would look out at the woods, I'd have to close my eyes and look away because it was so overwhelming - too many textures, too many twigs, too many leaves! Your demonstration gave me some ideas about how to approach such a scene.

Still, I didn't quite have the courage to take one water, reflections, and gazillions of branches quite yet! So instead I did the first two images I've attached here. I really like how Surrounded by Gold (the first image) turned out. The trunks are perhaps a bit crude, but I enjoy the texture of the leaves and feel like this is a successful piece. The second one is a different story. I worked hard to find the layers and to give a sense of the heaviness of the weather and the distance of each layer of landscape. I'm not satisfied with how the trees turned out. I'd love to increase my skill - any ideas how to do that? I'm relatively pleased with the rocks. The grey is made from mixing colors, not a black/white grey. I'm wondering if I should have applied layers of color to make the grey so it would be more interesting. I'd welcome your input.

The next four pieces are ones I did before I took your course when I was trying to come to terms with landscapes and watercolor. I think the bottom one, Akureyri Fjord, was the most straightforward to do because it isn't possible to do any details - everything was too far away, and the piece is only 6" square!

I'd be grateful for any input you may have.

Next I plan to paint a scene with water and bare trees in it to see if I can learn those techniques as well.

Thank you so much for this course. You have some wonderful techniques which made your stunning pictures possible. I appreciate your sharing them so generously.