(dog obviously using acrylic not watercolor)

Watercolor Basics

Some personal stuff that I observed help frustrated and talented art students over 10+ years making, learning and teaching art professionally for no reason. Geared towards developing an everyday open-ended watercolor practice for expressive observational painting more than old-school illustration. Put together for a dev friend who bought some paints.

⚠️ All super-subjective and a work in progress, adding more as I think of it...

Recently Added --> Exercises! 🎉

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Paints

• keep it simple
• buy brick sets / not tubes
• more money only helps up to ~$30
• check the pigments on the paint bricks
• if they list actual pigments it's good enough
• red flag if all the bricks are light / chalky looking
• red flag if the bricks are round / don't have pigments listed
• they might work a little but you'll hate painting
• just buy this / my mom bought it for me

Brushes

• brushes are all doomed
• buy them on sale / follow your gut / no rules
• like magic wands / lightsabers maybe
• natural vs. synthetic hair doesn't matter
• keep plastic tubes if brushes have them
• rinse / wring out / re-shape by hand often
• reshape gently when cleaned out and moist
• aim for original shape of brush
• a medium round (the pointy but wide-ish one) is all you need
• 3-5 sized flats (the flat square ones) help
• don't leave them in water ever (ever)
• when they lose their shape keep them for scumbling (rough painting)
• when they still keep their shape be gentle with them
• these are probably fine to start with / better to buy in person

Paper

• get what's on sale / cheap
• open it up / feel the paper
• medium heavy is good enough
• postcard to printer paper sizes are good
• trust your gut / trial and error
• hot press means smooth surface
• cold press means rough surface
• they're both fine / go with your gut
• watercolor blocks you use one sheet at a time
• prevents paper warping a little
• old school / fun / unecessary
• loose sheets are fancier
• tear them into sections with ruler to keep nice edge
• rag paper means fancy 100% cotton
• old school / fun / unecessary / unnoticeable
• paper weight is in lbs or gsm usually
• 90+ lbs is a good rule of thumb
• if it feels thick enough it is
• this is cheap and fine / my students always used it
• this is fancy and also fine / I use it for painting and drawing

Other Stuff

• squeezable water bottle / with plastic nipple thing
• dixie / condiment cups for water
• blotter paper / paper towel / ripped pieces of thick paper
• for negative marks / drying out overly wet paper

Painting

• keep your paper dry or moist not super wet
• cool effects possible with wet paper but...
• wet paper can be hard to control / frustrating
• use paper towels to control wetness
• paper towel wadded up in same hand as brush always
• use paper towel as much as brush sometimes
• add paint / dab off moisture with towel / repeat
• paint shapes not lines
• abstract shapes / areas of shadow and light
• don't fixate on size & location of shapes
• zoom WAY in on subjects
• draw a box with pencil / ruler to paint in
• force shapes / objects to fall off edge / zoom in
• no un-broken edges
• use chromatic black / mix dark brown and dark blue
• any dark complimentary colors can work
• dont use color at first / just chromatic black
• don't let yourself think about objects / people / things
• turn off brain / eyes and hands only
• just abstract shapes of light and shadow
• let your palette and paint bricks get dirty
• dirty watercolors make natural colors
• clean them with paper towels and water occaisionally
• add details / color after all this if desired
• erase dried paint by re-wetting / using blotter paper
• spend as much time looking at your subject as you do looking at your painting
• look up / look down / look up / look down
• find one tiny color / shape / highlight / shadow etc at a time
• don't think about what it is
• think about color and value (darkness) as separate
• think about value (darkness) as relative / on 1-10 scale
• the darkest thing you can see is 10 / lightest 1 etc.
• think of color as relative / warm and cool
• red / orange / yellow are warm
• blue is cool
• purple and green can be either
• whats the warmest thing you can see / whats the coolest
• use as few colors as possible / or none

History

• history is cool but optional
• watercolor originates from africa / the middle east
• where gum arabic comes from traditionally
• it was used to produce ancient artworks / maybe prehistoric
• it reached europe in the middle ages
• used for spooky illuminated manuscripts
• gum arabic is the traditional binder in watercolor
• fun fact you can eat gum arabic and they use it in desserts
• it smells delicious
• dont eat your watercolors
• all paint is primarily pigment + binder
• oil paint uses oil as its binder
• acrylic uses acrylic
• watercolor uses gum arabic or synthetic replacements
• its special property is its water solubility
• it remains semi-soluble even after drying
• but it resists increasingly as it ages
• thats why you use water with it
• also why you can layer etc
• good to know maybe
• obvious wikipedia link for watercolor
• less obvious wikipedia link for gum arabic

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Some Exercises

Some favorite exercises I used to use in my art classes. A lot of these pretty regularly got students who hated everything they painted to make something they felt really good about. These can be done individually or mixed and matched.

⚠️ Still adding to these and cleaning them up...

One Color

• paint something with just one color
• pretend like you're drawing not painting
• optionally choose a color that looks dark
• some classics are alizarin red, pthalo blue, raw umber (NOT black)

Two Colors

• choose two colors that are dark when mixed together
• mix a decent amount together to be as dark as possible
• again pretend like you're drawing not painting
• complimentary colors are not required
• some classics are ultramarine blue and raw umber or alizarin red and pthalo blue

High Contrast

• choose a single dark color adding very little water
• try to zoom way in on your subject (see tight frame exersise)
• try to paint only with 100% colored areas and 100% white areas
• try to not use any soft fades / gradients
• try to have only sharp edges
• try not to paint lines / outlines
• try to find the weird shapes of individual shadowed areas and individual light areas
• optionally do a light pencil sketch to start
• optionally use a single bright (unfrosted if possible) light bulb in a dark room on your subject
• optionally use a bright / complementary color instead of white

Tight Frame

• draw a box lightly with a pencil
• leave a medium or large margin of blank paper around it
• do a light sketch of whatever you want to paint
• zoom way in on your subject matter
• make sure every feature or object is cutoff by at least one side of your box
• no objects should be completely visible in the frame
• consider working with just one or two colors (see above)
• optionally make a viewfinder by cutting a 2-5 centimeter rectangle out of dark paper or cardstock etc
• you can use the viewfinder at armslength (roughly) to find good compositions
• viewfinders are awesome

Simple Still Life

• a still life can be anything thats not a landscape or a portrait
• often its a random close arrangement of three or more objects
• at least two of the objects should probably be touching
• definitely consider combining this with another exersise