After my trip to the Newport Coast this winter, I was inspired to paint Inspiration Point, a coastal viewpoint in Corona Del Mar California that is poplular for watching sunsets. I did a couple of versions of this painting, the first of which I wasn’t happy with so I put it on the drying shelf and let it stare at me for a couple of months until I felt motivated to try to figure out how to improve it. I don’t know if you’ll think my recent changes for the second version were an improvement, but feel free to let me know which version you like better in the comments.
Here’s the first version.
I eventually came to think my colors were too saturated and the dark brown rocks were too consistent in color to give the viewer a sense of depth between the foreground rocks and the distant background rocks. I also thought the sand was too strong in orange tones in the foreground. I also reworked the large pointed rock that is in the foreground.
Below is the latest version. No guarantee it will be the last version. 😁
The differences are pretty subtle. Which version do you like better?
I’ve just passed my one year anniversary picking up a paintbrush. As a relatively new painter, there is still lots of second guessing my choices, repainting and often repainting again and again until I am happy with it. Some I’ve learned I will never get happy with, but hopefully with more experience, this will become less and less often. As my painting instructor says, “just keep painting”! Not everything is going to be a masterpiece, but hopefully everything will be a learning experience.
Below is my reference photo that inspired this painting.
