Inventive Color

By the sea, by the sea, By the beautiful sea.....

I love to paint the water.  That's why my two homes away from home are Apalachicola, Florida and Boothbay Harbor, Maine.  And if you're near the water, what more natural subject than boats? 

But even a seasoned watercolorist can get a little tired of a favorite subject.  What to do to spice things up a little?

I like to play with color combos.  In this painting of a couple of shrimp boats at Scipio Creek, I began with cadmium yellow and cobalt violet, both in the sky and the water.  The really bold move came when I threw some cad yellow on the stern of the near boat.  Then I repeated it in the area that would become the nets.  Later, when these areas were dry, I added some cerulean blue.  Blue + Yellow = Green (and the nets were really green!).  I continued to add those four colors in ever darker values in the reflections.

I love painting docks, boats, and trees.  Next time.....trees!