This will be just a quick post, as for once I've remembered to take photos of the painting as I did it, so it will feature in my other blog at www.robwighamwatercolours.blogspot.com. This is 'Lossiemouth Departure', watercolour, 50 x 34 cm. It shows an XV Sqn Tornado GR4A dressed in the XV Sqn Centenary colours getting airborne from RAF Lossiemouth after a storm has cleared. I really enjoyed this angry and windblown sky!

It's not often that I revisit scenes I've painted previously but on this occasion I couldn't resist it. We're back at Lossiemouth Beach, a few miles from where I live. Every time I have painted this beach previously, the painting has sold almost immediately - which is great news! But now that I am trying to include a range of professional-quality prints among my work, I wanted to produce another painting from which I could produce prints. In any case, I don't need much excuse to return to Lossiemouth, as it's so beautiful! Normally in the summer, it's pretty crowded but in this scene, a family has it all to itself - just the way I like it! I particularly enjoyed painting the spray from the surf, which characteristically hides the distant headlands behind its soft white veil.

I've chosen to produce the prints of this image to fit a 14 x 11" frame size, which is part of my on-going drive to keep costs down for my customers. This is a very affordable and easily available frame size, and I've kept my print prices down to the very bare minimum. Check out my Coastline Gallery to see!

This painting probably encapsulates everything I love about being an artist. It is a view of the River Spey, where it is crossed by the old Craigellachie Bridge. The 200 year-old bridge no longer carries motor traffic but it is still in excellent condition and a beautiful landmark. On the day I visited, the weather was cold and wet (the weather's forgotten it is supposed to be Summer here in the UK!) and very soggy underfoot. Although it isn't shown, the river is actually bending sharply to your left behind this viewpoint, so this view is very soggy indeed!

I'd been looking for inspiration because the grey skies were starting to sap my artistic morale, so I decided to make up my own weather! For me, painting is all about capturing the beauty of light, and I decided to create a strong sun behind the bridge and clear the skies of cloud. This is the result: 'Evening Light, Craigellachie', watercolour, 33 x 25 cm (13 x 10"). I have been able to play with nature and change Her mood, and present the scene as I want it. I could perhaps have changed the weather slightly with a photograph, but I could not have done this. That's what I love about painting - it's Summertime!

I'm incredibly excited this week to have taken delivery of my very own giclee printer, which now sits in my studio. Giclee is a professional printing process used to produce artist's prints; they are inkjets with many more colour cartridges than normal printers and they work at very high resolutions. In this way, they can produce very high fidelity work, at an incredibly small droplet size, with a much larger range of colours than normal printers can reproduce. The most important difference, though, is the ink. It is pigment-based, rather than dye, and so produces results which are extremely lightfast. If they are properly framed behind glass, the prints are expected to remain in good condition for 75 - 200 years! Just like my watercolours, I'm using archival paper to ensure you will receive a high quality print which will last and last.

This is the first painting which I have produced my own range of prints from and they look absolutely beautiful: 'Covesea Lighthouse from the Beach'. I hope that by printing my own work in the studio, I can bring you the best quality prints at the best price possible. In line with this idea, I will size my prints from now on so that they will fit off-the-shelf frame sizes available from many commercial outlets. This will save customers money on framing costs, making my prints even more affordable !