Fab day, so over the wall and onto the riverbed at the bottom of my garden. There was a Spring Tide or something quite close, so the water was low and the riverbed wide. As I was about to slap my first tone down, the stonework on the face of the bridge, a white van passed across my field of view. It caught the sun (from behind me) and I immediately realised that the bridge was not white, as it appeared, but a dull cream... at least compared to the van and its reflection. This taught me something most regular plein air painters know so well, they don't even think about, to make the highlights count, leave a tone out of the value scale between the highlight and the next darkest tone. It really makes the highlight sing! Spent 1 and a half hours on this pic.
I had 30 mins left before the tide came in, so I captured some colour notes on my favourite river structure, the footbridge and tube line (District Line) bridge. I like the composition and colours so will work this up to a larger picture back in the studio, another day.
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