Winter 2018 Watercolor Class

Watercolor: Water and Rocks

I was a bit delinquent last week and didn't get the blog done for the water demo we had in the Watercolor Plus class and my Monday watercolor class just did water so this post will cover both the water demo and the rock demo to get us caught up

Water: The basics

The first thing we learned was how to use dry brush to create the impression of water with light sparkling off it. This technique can be use by its self or on top of other light washes. This is also a good technique for creating old wood or hair or grasses so it is not just for water.

The key to this is in its name: Dry brush.
You need to be sure that after you rinse your brush to squeeze the excess water out with your paper towel before you load your brush with paint and again to squeeze at the base of the brush after you load it to get out the excess you might have picked up with the paint and also to gently spread the bristles apart to have splits along the edge.

When you apply it to the paper, use very light pressure on your brush to get the effect you see above. The harder the pressure on your brush the more paint will come off.

The second method we used was wet into wet. First I wet the paper so the paint would move as I put it on, next I added a series of light washes and it wasn't just blue. I used my ultramarine blue, sap green, purple and even burnt sienna where the shore would be because water isn't just blue, look at the photo below to see how many colors are visible when you stop to look at water and if you were there, you would see even more, a photo just doesn't see what our eyes see.

Let the wet of the paper along with a slight elevation of the top of your paper help you blend your colors using long horizontal strokes and try to avoid stripes, add in some extra water if you need to.

Look at the different colors of blue, the lavenders, there are some reds from the kelp below and greens near the shore. Don't be afraid to add these colors to your water when you are painting it will make your water look more real.








I also did another one trying to do a more active type of water but it really didn't look much different than the one above so I'm not including that here, though if I wanted to I could change the one above from calm to turbulent if I wanted to, it is all in the brush strokes. 

There are many ways to paint water these are just a couple of examples, look in magazines or other artists' work to see how they handle water and find what works for you.

Rocks!

I have decided to use another photo I took from the same area I too the above image because it is simple and covers everything we have been doing in class: Sky, water and rocks. so for the rock demo I used the rocks from the scene we will be painting. 

Concentrating on a part of a subject that may give you problems when you are doing the actual painting, is a good way to learn about your subject. Doing a study or doing sketches helps you familiarize yourself with the thing you might otherwise see as a problem, so this is just a study for the larger painting.

First I sketched in my rocks with a #4B pencil. I used the #4B so it could be seen by the class normally I use a #2 so the line are minimized at the finish of a painting.

While I did include some of the smaller rocks, I didn't sketch in everything because I can do that with my brush as I am painting, this is just to remind me where the rocks go.

This is actually taken after the second wash the first wash with that very light tan color made with sienna and blue (burnt umber will also work) and was a very light tint I put OVER ALL THE ROCKS. I did not just paint the light areas (I did leave some white at the top) all the rocks and all their parts had this first wash.

The second wash was the same colors just a bit darker and this is where I started  differentiating between rocks. Starting where I knew the shadows to be on each rock, I tapped the color in.

Close-up of the rocks. See how it is darker in the shadow areas? Also notice all the texture, that is from my tapping in the color. As I worked to the light side I added water to my brush instead of paint to help lighten the color. I also painted around areas i wanted to leave the lighter color.

I put on at least 4 layers of wash, each time starting in the shadow area with a slightly darker color (add more blue rather than the sienna so your shadows look cool) and leaving parts of the previous washes to create a sense of light and to make shapes in your rocks.

As you can see I used the layers of wash to create more than the original rocks I had sketched in. Just by adding shadow shapes, I could carve out more rocks or create holes in the rocks or cracks. I also took my liner brush to add some smaller cracks.

Now we are going to put it all together and we will be painting the scene below.

Keep painting and I will see you in class.