Where the water falls ~ Somersby Falls

Somersby Falls - The beautiful Central Coast (Brisbane Waters National Park) - Mixed Media on paper

I was so inspired by our walk, I couldn’t wait to start painting when I got home.

We had a very inspiring walk in nature today. Friends had been recommending Somersby Falls and the accompanying bush walk as a great outing since we’d moved here, so we were keen to go and take a look. It was more beautiful than we had expected. The falls are located in the Brisbane Waters National Park on the beautiful Central Coast of NSW, part of our backyard now.

I took a lot of video footage of the various levels of the waterfall, but I managed to capture a still photo that I could use as a reference from when I got home.

As you can see in the above photo, there are many layers to this mixed media work.

I started with a pencil sketch on paper, (which is actually Kraft paper) and quickly moved to sketching with a couple of Caran D’ache Neocolor Aquarelle water soluble wax pastels ~ interestingly I only own 6 colours and the two that I used were Russet and Black. They’re just like using watercolour but they have more pigment. Very fun to work with, I must get some more colours! I used the russet on the rocks and roughly outlined the rocks with black.

Once this layer dried, I grabbed a couple of tubes of acrylic paint. The colours I chose were: Burnt Umber, Payne’s Grey and White, a mix of Matisse Flow and Golden Fluid brands. Painting in the darks and mid tones first, but as always, I couldn’t wait to add some white to rough in the water as well.

Once again, I let this layer dry and while that was happening, I found my folder of scrap coloured papers and chose some gold tissue paper (this is actually acid free tissue paper that I have painted with gold acrylic paint) and a textured green paper that looks like it’s almost be painted with a bright green watercolour. I’d forgotten how much I love collage….and it was at this stage that I realised how different my approach was today compared to yesterday’s acrylic painting.

So you guessed it, the green paper ended up the top as a base for the trees and I used the gold tissue paper to create a focal point on the big rock in the foreground. I wanted to give the impression that the sun was hitting the top of the rock and causing it to glow. I also added some gold paper to the upper right hand corner where there is a tree trunk and the top of the rock platform. My favourite glue to use in collage is Liquitex Matte Gel medium, but gloss could have worked quite well too .. it may have given a glossy appearance but after my last experience where I found the acrylic slipped around a bit, I chose the safe and trusted option.

Then my favourite part….I slowed right down and added in the detail. More white acrylic paint for the water combined with a white posca pen for the finer white drips of water and highlights on the tree trunks. I grabbed a thin charcoal stick and added in some more defining lines and blended in the shadows. At this point I did also use a mix of Payne’s grey and white to create a lighter grey for some mid tones on the rocks. Then a mix of ultramarine blue and white for patches of blue sky.

While that layer was drying, I went digging for my pastels which seem to have disappeared for now but instead I found a box of almost new oil pastels … it was like discovering a box of chocolates. So exciting! I used a dark green to block in some more of the trees branches and added in an ochre colour to highlight the sun on the leaves. Oil pastels are so lush and I’m getting the feeling that I shall be using these again soon.

I’ll probably spray the artwork with a matte fixative tomorrow, but for now, I’m pretty happy with the result and will definitely create a larger artwork from this study.

If you’re an Instagram follower, I did create a Reel using a few of the short videos of the waterfall and rainforest vegetation including some very cool fungi growing on a tree.

Shortly after this very serene photo, I slipped off a rather large rock and landed with a great big smack on the rocks below. My daughter heard me slipping and saw me land….she assured me it was very graceful…I’m not so sure about that. I carried on with a bleeding elbow, bruised hand and ankle …nothing was going to stop me from doing the whole walk. (A quick note here: I wouldn’t recommend doing the walk straight after rain and make sure you are wearing appropriate shoes).

It was a really inspiring walk and I highly recommend it….the National Parks and Wildlife have graded it as easy but there are a lot of steps. The good news is that the first part of the walk is flat (if your knees don’t like steps) and you do still get a good view of the start of the falls. A nice place to take a picnic lunch (when it’s not school holidays…it can get quite busy).