These Azaleas were everywhere growing wild along the rivers and in every garden in Japan when I visited in 2003. I love painting white flowers, the challenge of leaving the whites and creating wonderful shadows to help explain the shape of the flower.

This is a full sheet 300gsm Arches CP. I used 300 as I knew I would not be using large wet washes. Masking fluid was used only on the stamens, these are so important with Azaleas as they are the distinctive feature of the flower.

When I paint white flowers I take more care with the drawing as I rely on the drawing to pull the flowers together. With these I worked on the shadow shapes first, then progressed to the centers. The background was painted in sections, cutting into the flowers shapes and flooding the colours to create the illusion of masses of flowers in the background. Stunning white flowers are created by luscious darks. So I worked on pulling the darks into strategic places to create an interesting composition. This was a lot of work, requiring a lot of concentration but the result was stunning!

This ended up being a ¼ sheet, although it began as a full sheet 300gsm Arches. The painting originally was of huge eucalyptus from my trip to Apollo Bay in Victoria. The Otway Ranges is covered in enormous ancient trees. I was fascinated by the rubbish at the bottom of the tree but decided to tell the story of the whole tree and half the forest!

This area of the painting was done with lots of layering. I masked out a few sticks and twigs using a very fine brush. I then painted areas of the ground in a variety of interesting earthy colours. I allowed it to dry then masked out some more interesting twig, bark and stick shapes. I repeated this process maybe 5 or 6 times, each time trying to define more of the shapes I wanted without over painting. Once the process was complete the masking fluid was rubbed off to reveal a whole range of coloured sticks and twigs. I worked up areas where it needed definition and scraped out some whites with a blade.

The painting as a whole did not work so I cut it down until all I was left with was the rubbish under the tree, which was the very reason I wanted to paint this setting. The moral is to paint what you love and love what you paint! This little painting won First prize at a big show and was sold instantly!

I have travelled extensively throughout Australia and the colours of the outback are spectacular, they are very intense as are the contrasts in shadow. The red gorges and scrubby trees with their grey foliage and white trunks is typical of the vast majority of our inland landscape.

This is a ¼ sheet 640gsm Arches. I use 640 when I plan to use LOTS of water. This painting was completed in about 15 minutes. I was totally inspired and set out lots of fresh paint, wet the paper, used a big brush and just let the painting evolve on the paper. My technique? Large wet red wash, drop in darks, lift out areas for the trees, drop in grey/green paint, keep it all wet, let it run, keep dropping in more colour. Then create the dark section to give the illusion of one rock wall in front of another. One last huge brushstroke for the foreground. How exciting was that! Once the painting was dry I painted the trunks of the trees with a greyed off Chinese white.

This small work was matted in 200cms of black matt with a matt-finish black frame. It shone like a jewel. It was the first one sold at a major exhibition and there were several people wanting to buy it.

These wonderful poppies grow in my garden every Oct/Nov, they are hard to propagate and wonderful to paint. The vibrant red petals and dark centers with a touch of white is a striking combination.

I started with a simple drawing, paying attention to the center of interest, the large open poppy, placing this on the junction of the Golden Mean, I placed all the other flowers to support the main poppy to provide a flow through the painting. Using Arches 640gsm CP full sheet, the stalks and buds were masked out (I am not a great believer of masking fluid but used creatively and sparingly it can be very useful)

The soft light reds went in as a single wash, the lime green under wash also goes in now at the base of the painting and allowed to dry. Now the scary bit: I wet the entire background, I mean sopping wet! Mix large pools of Cobalt Blue and a variety of greens and have a large dob of Alizarin straight out of the tube ready. Then in goes this big wash, cutting around the flowers, and dropping in stronger colour where needed. Great courage is needed now as I drop in the Alizarin to create the 2 background poppies. Then once that wash is dry it is a simple process of putting in the darker sections of the poppies and the centers, removing the masking fluid and painting the buds and stalks. What a great days work!