Painting shallow water

By the Sea

12 x 9 soft pastels on Art Spectrum Colourfix

Miki Willa

Painting shallow water means having a mastery of the light touch with pastels. This is something I am working on learning. The area I painted was a very shallow tide pool area as the tide was coming in. The sandy bottom was clearly visible in places where the reflected blue of the sky was weakest. There were also some rocks completely submerged that I wanted to show. In the shadows of the rocks, the sandy bottom was very evident. I am pretty happy about what I accomplished. Someone else was happy enough to buy it right off the easel. That made me doubly happy!