I go to as many local exhibitions as I can get to, and also look at artworks posted on various Facebook pages. And when a painting hasn't worked, there are usually the same reasons. Perhaps especially with watercolour, where some seem to think you should just lay down one wash and leave it, the issue is usual tonal contrast - i.e., there isn't any. I've seen a number of paintings recently - the product of the same tutor's classes - where a path, for example, has dappled shadow - all of the same tone, right the way along its length. Now - going out and actually taking a look would show you that this isn't how light behaves; the painting lacks any kind of recession, and what is intended to read as a pathway looks a lot more like a block of undifferentiated colour standing up in front of you. Is this due to a fear of strong colour? Just not looking properly? Or a belief that to retain luminosity, you have to put the wash down and leave it, neither dropping in stronger colour, nor glazing over it? It isn't just in watercolour that this fault arises - you can see it in oils and acrylics: there, it's usually just inexperience, with (perhaps) less of the fear factor. But however beautiful the colours you use are in watercolour, they're not going to work for you if you're timid with them. Juice it up a bit! The other thing that goes wrong so often is anatomy - much more excuse for this! Anatomy is perishing difficult, second only to three-point perspective. But I saw a painting the other day (not on here, be it said) where one leg would have had to have been about 3 feet longer than the other if you stretched the figure out and asked it to try to stand up. If you INTEND that (though why would you?) then I suppose it's fair enough, but I'm pretty sure the artist didn't. We can't all go to life classes - or persuade friends to pose for us (especially in their birthday suits). But there are so many books and dvd's and YouTube films on anatomy and perspective - and drawing figures loosely, not even those (very good, in my opinion) classic studies) that we all ought to be able to find guidance. I'm reminded of Daveyboyz's study of the Charles Bargue course (spelling in both cases from memory, and you can guess how good THAT is...): but again and again you see poses that couldn't be achieved by anything other than an alien: hands that are far too small, or far too big; legs that couldn't support a body; eyes shaped like perfect ovals - I mean: good, you can draw an oval! But eyes do vary just a bit, and few of them look as if they've been printed on the face with a template. None of this is aimed at people starting out - you've got to develop your feel for drawing, and sensitivity to tone; preferably, keep drawing all the time, from your schooldays onwards - look at Lewis Cooper's drawings on the forum and gallery here: these are generally caricatured figures, not necessarily intended to be taken as closely realistic, but they could all WORK: the legs could support the bodies, the arms could swing freely: can't swear to the efficacy of some of his noses ... you do get the impression that they might cause their owners to overbalance... but you believe in his drawings, which are of course a mile or three away from the classical approach. One of our POL successes is Paulette Farrell - when she started out here, her drawing was enthusiastic and spirited, but stiff - she hadn't mastered the volume of figures, or of shading. But she looked, and learned. The people who bother me slightly are those whose work never seems to develop: maybe they're happy just to doodle, draw, and play with paint, and if so - great. But most of us, I think, want to get better at what we do (mind you, I could be wrong about that!); Paulette certainly did, and asked me - one blushes, modestly - for advice. Her progress since then certainly is NOT down to me - but that's not the point; she looked, she practised, she sought advice, she didn't stick to just one model or method. If in doubt, ask, read, watch, study, get out there and do it. There was a very good book, which I have, entitled Anatomy and Perspective for the Artist - but it's one of many, there's bound to be something in print still. Don't do what I do, and read more than you ever paint - but do both: work will improve over time, but not if you keep on making the same mistakes over and over again. And this ends my lecture, posing as a blog....