Painting need critique please

You can reduce the pixel size on most apps/programmes: it depends on the machine you're using to learn  how it's done (and I'm the last person to advise you, having the memory span of a goldfish on matters technical - I just blunder about and manage to do it, and then forget how I did it).   What would you like a critique to concentrate on?  What do you think is your biggest problem?  Just diving right in, I would say the problem here is that this looks like three different paintings - the various parts don't cohere yet.  You have a backlit horizon of trees, and a lozenge shape in front of them on which a lone tree sits: the reflection shows it's sitting on an area of water, with a stream feeding into it, its banks being not yet defined.  There's an irregular area of grey-blue to the right, which might be anything at this stage - bank of trees?   I would suggest softening some of your edges: certainly increasing your colour saturation (I've just had another squint, and I see you're planning a large tree on the right, which would help to throw the middle-ground elements back, so that's a good plan), getting your strongest tones and marks in the foreground, and tying that island-lozenge shape on which the tree sits into the painting - modify the colour, strengthen the boughs of the tree, strengthen the reflections (bearing in mind you'll be working over some of it, so I should get going on the right foreground especially as soon as you can.   Make your colours 'talk to' each other - introduce a bit of one into the others, lift some paint out with a damp but not wet brush, bring some shapes in that aren't straight, and above all: more colour.   At the stage you've reached, much is possible with a bold brush, lots of paint, any implement you can find to scratch into it, add texture, but it's at the stage many of us reach and then have a quick panic - don't be afraid of ruining it: treat it as a game you're playing with yourself, experiment, let go and let rip!

I think the initial composition was the issue here Christine, a bit disjointed and the high vantage point isn’t the easiest thing to get right. Nothing particularly wrong with the way you’re applying the paint, apart from lack of tone, which will result in an insipid painting - nothing that can’t be rectified with a bit of help and advice…  It would be really beneficial for you if you took out a subscription to Leisure Painter magazine… it’s packed with help and advice plus demos to follow - it’s aimed at the novice and enthusiastic amateur. Go to store and subscriptions on this website.

I think the initial composition was the issue here Christine, a bit disjointed and the high vantage point isn’t the easiest thing to get right. Nothing particularly wrong with the way you’re applying the paint, apart from lack of tone, which will result in an insipid painting - nothing that can’t be rectified with a bit of help and advice…  It would be really beneficial for you if you took out a subscription to Leisure Painter magazine… it’s packed with help and advice plus demos to follow - it’s aimed at the novice and enthusiastic amateur. Go to store and subscriptions on this website.

You could have saved it, but if you're not enjoying a picture you're working on and fear it was doomed from the start, abandoning it and trying again is probably a course of action which will spare you much frustration and pain in the neck. Of course, I endorse the other advice you've had - and it does us all good, however clever we may think ourselves (most of us don't, mind: most of us play host to that irritating inner critic, always ready with a large dose of wet blanket), to pore over the magazines, buy a good dvd or three, haunt YouTube for tips, and best and most of all - watch others paint in real time, not in these useless fast-forwarded flicks: Lord knows what good anyone thinks they do..... Don't put off applying paint to paper or whatever for too long, though, or you'll convince yourself you'll never be able to do that - and once you've decided that, of course - you won't.   I think you almost got there with this one - your final resolution, or attempted resolution, was a big improvement on where you were at the beginning: but I would say again - there are two elements to watercolour; one is water, the other is colour - weak washes of ultramarine and yellow ochre or raw sienna can be spirit-sapping - if in doubt, give yourself a treat with Pthalo Blue and Cadmium Yellow, Cadmium Red, Burnt Sienna, Ultramarine: apply the paint full strength, drop water in rather than flood the paper. The result may well be ghastly beyond endurance, but you'll have learned about strong colour - anything but insipidity.   And finally - (I do shut up eventually) - you to YouTube, thence to Alan Owen, and Charles Evans; invest in a couple of Charlie's books; watch, read, and digest.  That's where I go when I want to be reminded of how to paint in watercolour (which I also forget, it not being my main medium.  And good luck.