My first oil painting

So...I've been wanting to try oils for a while since sometimes acrylic dries too quickly to be able to blend and build like I want (especially that one day painting a wedding scene in full sun).

Unwilling to deal with solvents though, I was given a set of these new water-soluble oils, which use no solvents and will thin and clean up with water.

I've had these paints since Christmas, folks, and only picked them up 2 days ago.

What prompted this? Painter's block. Usually ideas pour forth, but not lately, and when I've forced myself to paint (just get back on the horse, right?) the resulting half-finished works have been...miserable.

But...I thought...since I can't paint I might as well just play around with this new-fangled toy...see how they work.

So there I go, working on another one of my car-taken snapshots, this time coming off the Bay Bridge and gazing at my beloved San Francisco with Sutro tower silhouetted against the fading sky.

I won't say the painting process wasn't hard...it was and I had to push through some rough bits and hating my progress. Not because the paint was difficult to work with but just simply because of the blocked creativity I was going through. I have to say though that being able to continue to blend, correct, adjust, try new things and not have my paint dry on me was probably the only reason I made it through to the other side - with, finally, a newly completed painting.