Montana Barn With Foggy Trees In Snow
Painting Wet on Wet - An Essential Watercolor Skill
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Skill level: Intermediate / Avg. Time: 2 - 3 hours
Essential Skills You'll Learn In This Lesson
- Painting wet on wet is an essential watercolor skill. In this lesson, you'll get plenty of guided practice and see first hand how the amount of water and paint make different effects.
- Limited palette - Find which colors work best and how to mix red, yellow and blue for the whole range of hues you'll want for your painting. Using a limited palette of only three colors will automatically give your painting a professional look!
- Masking - When working wet, masking makes the job so much easier. Perfect straight lines are a snap when you save the barn roof with masking tape and it only takes minutes.
- Scraping - Scraping out far away trees is quick and easy with a little practice and good quality paper. This lesson includes a brief scraping demo, but for more info check out my youtube video. (And please subscribe to my youtube channel to never miss a new video)
- Lifting out - rewet and dab or use Mr. Clean's Magic Eraser (available in your neighborhood grocery store in the cleaning aisle.)
- Spattering - for falling snow
Materials:
- Paint - Cobalt or Ultramarine Blue, any Red, Yellow and opaque white (I recommend Pro White by Daler Rowney)
- Paper - good quality paper is recommended
- Brushes - this can be done with any brushes
- Misc. - masking tape, backboard to place paper on, paper towels, Mr. Clean's Magic Eraser, razor blade, hair dryer (for people like me who can't stand to wait)
Your Instructor
I'm a self taught artist and I love teaching!
My story is simple.
I showed a lot of interest and talent as a child, but my parents discouraged art as a waste of time. I spent my adult life as a nurse and raised a family - pretty busy. While I was home with the birth of my daughter, I bought a cheap set of watercolors and fell in love with the bloom of color. I told my husband, 'I'm going to keep painting with these until I get really good.'
Back then, not many painted realistic watercolors, so I practiced and tried things until I worked out my own style. It took a lot of trial and error,
. When I entered my first art show, I won two awards and was told I'd have to enter the professional category and not beginner. That frightened me soo much, I didn't enter again for years.
When my work began selling, I entered more shows with more great success. I worked very hard and became a full time professional artist and teacher.
Although my work has been recognized and featured in major exhibitions, books and magazines, I'm very down to earth, and just love painting.
No one has 'all the time in the world'. Paint now. You're never too old, it's never too late. Any bit of time you can practice will improve your skills.
And yes, this cowboy is a watercolor painting. (Reference photo used with permission by Diana Robinson)
Have fun and learn from a master - sign up today!
Frequently Asked Questions
I hope your painting turned out great! If you'd like to share your work in this lesson, email it to me at [email protected] and I'll add it to the student paintings. If you have any questions, comments or need help, just comment on this lesson and I'll get back to you shortly. Your satisfaction is important to me.
Feel free to share your painting online, show it at art shows, or sell the painting or prints. Many students paint to fit in inexpensive, easy to use mat sets and sell their work. Student Sue recently earned a First Place on her painting at the county fair.
Thank you for being a student!