Lately i’ve been working on trying to get more proficient in painting various kinds of edges — hard edges, soft edges and lost edges. Soft edges have always been a challenge for me. In part this is because if you are painting wet on wet with oil paints the probability of muddying up whatever part of the canvas you are working on is very high, unless you work very carefully and are either very clear about what to do or very lucky. So i decided to do an exercise focusing on soft edges, and painting clouds seemed like a good model. The reference photo is of a fiord in Norway. I still have a little work to do to improve the shape of a couple of the mountains, but otherwise i think this one is pretty much done.