First layer…somewhat loose

I thought I’d give everyone a bit of a peek behind the curtain this week when it comes to my paintings and sketches.

On the right is my first layer of a painting I did for #worldwatercolormonth sponsored by www.doodlewash.com, whose daily prompt was “Blossoming”. As this is a “loose” painting, meaning I’m not trying to make it a photo-quality work, I used a large quill brush on 300# cotton paper. The idea is to just get a rough outline of the subject.

Essentially here I used two colors, the coral pink of the flower and the green for the leaves.

Step two: Add contrasting colors

The next step is to add contrasting colors. Normally, like most watercolor artists, I will work from light colors to dark but in this instance I actually added yellow over the coral pink as I wanted a subtle look since on the flowers the yellow is quite subtle.

I realized I should have come down a bit lower on the paper with the blossoms and had left quite a large empty space. What to do? Thank goodness the vines below my blossoms had leaves as well and were a bit lighter so…problem solved!

Inking in

On to the next step—let’s add some ink. I’m using a dip pen to ink in the outline on the leaves and blossoms. Using a small nib I can add just enough of an outline yet it’s not so overwhelming as to distract from the color and shapes of the blossoms and leaves.

Since I use a dip pen I’m going to be careful not to drop ink as I go from the bottle to the paper and work my lines carefully. As this is a loose painting I’m also not going to draw straight, continuous lines if I can help it as I want to try and keep the painting a bit more whimsical.

The final result

The final step is to add a bit more color for contrast and to keep the painting colors as close to natural as possible. I’m not worried so much about the shape on this one but I do want natural colors. I get more whimsical with shapes in another piece.

I also added a bit of spatter to liven it up a bit just for fun. I need to work on spatter a bit. That’s the final result there and just for fun I’m going to show you the photo I worked from.

Painting a LOT of paintings over a 31 day period I’m learning a lot and can see areas I need to improve. As I mentioned on my fly fisherman post on Facebook, I’ll be going back after World Watercolor Month and redoing several of my pieces so I can improve my skills. In the mean time I hope you enjoyed a peek behind the curtain.

The photo I used for this painting is from Ilene’s photography and is below…now go make some art!

Straight out of the back yard

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Filed under: Botanicals • Mixed Media • Watercolor

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