My usual practice when seeking something to paint is to search through photographs, mine and other people's, and my old sketch-books; and to go out and about. Trouble is, I have three friends who, knowing the island at least as well as I do and probably better, take against those scenes which I construct from a number of different sources. They may mean it as a joke (of the heavy-handed variety) but I get a little tired of comments that some of my work is "fake", because it's not of one scene but of several, distilled (I like to think!) into one. Now, I wouldn't actually describe a view as, say, Wootton Bridge if it were nothing like W B; but I do like to move the scenery around a bit; to shift the odd tree; push the occasional hill or quarry gently to one side - and I fully intend to carry on doing it, because rarely does a particular viewpoint offer the ideal subject for a painting. I wonder if anyone else is similarly troubled by those who object to "making it up" ... and if I should grow a thicker skin... I've tried a few experiments lately, largely inspired by what I've read elsewhere or seen on websites. It struck me for example that a certain Irish artist achieved quite a glowing effect in her paintings, and I wondered how she did it. Transpires that she is in the habit of painting the complementary colour as an imprimatura to the colour scheme she intends, so for example a scene that is predominantly green would be based on a red ... I'd never really tried this in any very systematic way; normally, I would lay down a first coat of burnt or raw sienna, or a mix of the two. But I thought I'd try it ... I think total failure sums up the experience. I applied cadmium red acrylic as a base coat for two predominantly green landscapes; the only way I managed to achieve any glow at all was by painting ever more opaquely until I'd covered the red entirely, which rather defeated the object ... the paintings were both darker than I'd normally have managed to achieve, and had more wretched, tight detail (I may post them later) as I tried to rescue them. I'm not quite sure what this teaches me; perhaps to start with, do it your own way, not someone else's; forget theory, just do it; and don't think that any amount of technical devices, dodges, tricks or tips can substitute for just banging down what you see and doing your best with it...... Perhaps I just went about this the wrong way, but I don't think I shall be trying it again. The mystery is, why did I try it in the first place? Why, when all my other paintings have been based on blocks of colour and built up from dark to light, with oil and acrylic, and t'other way about with watercolour, on the basis of a quite light wash of colour, did I really think that I was going to leap forward in some magical way if I put down a base of bright red? I've said it myself in the past: don't look for tricks and short-cuts, or to technique to carry your work..... is it just me that is quite so capable of ignoring all I know and would recommend to anyone else, or are many of us like this? Back to the drawing board....