The Flickr Odonataofeurope Image Generatr

Hairy Dragonfly (Brachytron pratense) male by willjatkins

Quite flighty in today's sunshine, RSPB Otmoor

Downy Emerald (Cordulia aenea) teneral by willjatkins

Purbeck, Dorset

Recommendation for a Cheap Hobby... by willjatkins

A dismal dreary day set me thinking about the cost of my hobby of watercolour painting wildlife and wild flowers vs my hobby of photographing wildlife and wild flowers... The painting equipment which has easily lasted the course of winter orchid painting - 35 completed A4 paintings cost well under £100. Each little pan of pigment is around 5 quid, but they have lasted me for over a decade. I am just starting to run out of sap green, undestandable when you think that's the base for trying to represent chlorophyll... Paintbrushes are around a fiver each and last for around six paintings (they do need replacing regularly because the pointiness gets lost sadly). Then there's a pad of A3 paper, around 20 quid and of course each A3 sheet makes for 2 separate A4 paintings. Finally the cost of pencils, erasers etc for roughing out the painting ahead of the watercolouring part and some now antique Wilko reading glasses (1.5X magnification) now sadly essential for close-up work at 2 quid a pair. Divide the cost by 35 winter orchid paintings and that's around a couple of quid for each picture's production. I'm not counting labour, of course... How does that stack against photographing the 35 orchid species last summer? Without going into details, consider the cost of the camera equipment and mileage and there is clearly no comparison. So painting wins, right? Well of course it's not so clear-cut after all. If you want to paint things that you have seen for yourself, then you're going to have to do the photography in the first place! Finally, there's the small matter that my camera will take 35 fine quality photos of orchids per second, rather than 35 mediocre quality orchid paintings over 5 months : ) Nevertheless, water colour painting has to be one of the cheapest sorts of craft/art out there, and way cheaper than oil painting. Which suits a cheapskate like me just fine!!