Help!!!

Jen remember we all had to start somewhere and it looks as if you have made a good start with trees and bluebells. I don't think I would mix oil pastels with watercolours. you might try using watercolour pencils to tidy up any little areas to add a few little darks on the leaves and bark but you have come to the right place to ask for help, there are plenty that will give you all the help you need good luck Tao

Just to throw my two cents in - I agree with Tao and Syd: all this needs, and you could do it with watercolour pencils, or just stronger, less dilute watercolour, is to strengthen the tones - do you have a garden, and is the sun shining? Or do you have access to someone else's, or a nearby park? Put the photograph to one side for a minute, and go for a walk - see how dark, and colourful, the shade and shadows are. Get some of those darker tones in, firm up a little of the drawing of the bluebells, and orf you go. Photographs have their place, but looking at nature is better if you want to capture it.

Well it turned out okay till you ruined it with those dark letters all over the actual subject of the painting. It looks as much to me.like.trees and bluebells as matchstick men and women look like people when drawn by you know who...thats a compliment by the way. I think youve made a jolly good stab at it. David

Well, let's first of all accept that Jen and Nature don't always hit it off - and take it from there. I think the writing on the picture was overkill, and the very starkness of it contrasted with the somewhat pale, pastel-coloured picture. I think most of your critics would agree on that ... but if this is just a sketchbook study, that doesn't matter. You wouldn't want it on a work you intended to exhibit. Then I get to Syd's comments about insipidity, and lack of 'punch' - and I'm sort of with him, and yet sympathetic to what you were trying to do. We can have pale paintings .... many of them work well. But what Syd means by punch would be what I'd mean by light, dark and contrast. You needed in this painting some real, strong darks to satisfy Syd and me (if that's a thing you would want to do!) - some indication of the shadows branches make on tree-trunks, and of those the trunks make on the ground. And particularly with the foliage and flowers, some dark - the light hits them, and throws shadow, even on an overcast day. Don't be afraid of darks in watercolour or any other medium - if you had mixed some Burnt Sienna and Ultramarine, for instance, or Viridian and Burnt Sienna, or even a brighter red, until you had a bit of serious dark, you could have stippled that into the foliage, run it along parts of the tree trunk, letting it merge with lighter colour and tones. If you'd mixed the Ultramarine with a bit of Rose Madder/Permanent Rose, you could have picked out those areas in the bluebells where shadow is thrown. And you still could. My diagnosis, if asked for a critique, would be that this artist is nervous of darks and mixes her watercolours with rather too much water and rather too little paint. But you can draw, clearly. So my advice would be to practise, on odd bits of paper - take more photographs - go out in the countryside or just into your garden, take a seat with you, and try to capture the tones, the lights and the darks, with a big brush, water, and plenty of paint. And do this often - you're hesitant at the moment, and need to build up your confidence.

Much better - you've gone for stronger colour and it has much more impact in consequence. I say again, though - don't be afraid of pale tones, if they suit the subject; the best drawings and paintings tend to consist of both pale and strong. All you really need to do is - more. Just keep practising, in the time allowed you by the four-year-old.

Yes Jen, so much better...keep going.