Mountain Sunset Nebula

I have always been fascinated by the images of space, and in particular the photographs of nebulas which are clusters of stars with beautiful shapes and light patterns.
This is a nebula which looks like a mountain with the sun setting behind, hence the name Mountain Sunset Nebula.

Mountain Sunset Nebula

I am still mastering this technique. It's not easy to gauge the timing and the amount of water vs pigment needed to maintain areas of light vs dark. The technique has similar challenges as watercolors: It's hard or impossible to erase mistakes without making the correction obvious and ugly. And it's easy to overdo the pigment and/or the water. In addition, you have to watch for areas that are becoming dry and rewet them if you are still blending. It seems it's better to start with a sponge painting with little pigment that is as close to the final shape as possible, and then add fluid, or soft-bodied, paint to those areas we want to highlight. Then add water slowly, only enough to make the paint flow but not so much as to make rivers. I did a second painting where I used both more pigment and more water and it was very difficult to control and I felt I was actually wasting the pigment, as light and darks were fighting and mixing unnecessarily.