I’ve started:

I cut out a piece of muslin as my base – 34″ x 30″ to give me lots of potential border space. Marked out the actual dimensions 20″ x 30″; have marked the horizon (the shore across the bay) and an indication of the land. For the moment I have laid a strip of green fabric to show the bank the guys are standing on (it’s autumn, so the immediate foreground will likely be a more brown colour).

For the moment, the paragliding pilots are paper cutouts 11″ tall just to give me an indication of how the overall composition might turn out. I can tell I will likely foreshorten the sky since I think the pilots appear just a bit too small for the scene – but those dimensions will easily be adjusted once I’ve got water, land, and sky applied and thread painted in place.

So now to paint water and sky – it’s a windy dark day so both will be shades of grey-blue.