It was about 5 years ago on a visit to Scotland that I took the photographs that were the source for this picture. My sister and I had gone on a day trip to Mull and Iona. We took the boat from Oban to Mull in the morning, passing this lighthouse on the way. Looking back at my pictures, I had taken a couple of photographs and promptly forgot about them, they were not particularly memorable pictures. The way home was a different matter entirely. The calm sea and the low September afternoon sun cast a beautiful light over the scene and made some stunning reflections in the water. It's amazing what a difference the right lighting makes.
At that time I was working mostly in watercolours and I knew that I wouldn't do this scene justice so I filed the pictures away, knowing that one day I would come back to them. A few weeks ago I went on a colour theory course run by Colour Tutor. We spent a very interesting day learning about saturation, tone and mixing along with many other topics. I would highly recommend this course to anyone with an interest in colour. Combined with a relatively recent move towards working in acrylic, it helped give me the techniques I needed to tackle this picture.
