Clock tower cafe

Here's the latest in my watercolor efforts.  I am learning a lot as I play around with the online tutorial that I've been following.  I thought I'd show the photo we were given to start with.  As you can see I changed it up a bit.

I wanted to see what would happen if I painted a picture of the clock tower where the tower wasn't the center of interest.  So the trick became how to hide the elephant (or clock tower) in the room.  Making the tower the same color as the sky helped.  (Or was it the sky the same color as the tower?)  In the original photo both are pretty grey.  Obscure it with trees.  Make another building neon orange. and add human interest to draw the eye to the new center of interest.  By using chairs and an umbrella I avoided having to actually paint people.

I like the way the blue sort of swoops from the bottom right up through the shutters.  Yellow sky?  Sure, why not.  I like yellow.  The orange is repeated in the awning and the building in the background to give depth and make it a little more cohesive.  Split complementary again.  Blue, red-orange, and yellow orange.  For some reason I seem to like this combination.  The trees are OK, but  I need practice on my tree technique.  I think I need to look at more trees more carefully.  I also need to remember to do the foliage first and add the branches and trunks in after.

I might have finished this a few days ago, but naps got in the way.  Thanks to my husband and friends who have made that possible.  (both the painting and the naps)  I am now officially three weeks behind in a six week tutorial.  It's ending this week, but I may try to do a couple more from the photos that have already been posted.  It's been fun to see what others do with the same photos.