Ko‘olau Marsh (in progress)

Oil painting on Ampersand gessoed clayboard.

First, I painted a thin wash after first drawing the outlines and blocking in major elements. My initial intent was to let the bottom of the painting stay undeveloped, but as you can see, this didn't happen.

As I added more color and deepened my darks, the painting began to look almost finished, but in reality, it was far from it. Something about the mountain didn't feel right to me, so I took the paint off and redefined the ridges.

When I blocked in the foreground according to my 

reference photo, the shrubbery looked too massive; so I put flowers there instead.

I'm currently working on the marshy foreground area, which was originally just a dirt area. Unfortunately, I don't have a photo reference for any of the foreground stuff; so I'll just have to feel my way around it.