Lesson One: Watercolor Wet on Wet and Wet on Dry Practice

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hey everyone welcome back to another video today we are going to be going over some watercolor basics to get you started with learning how to paint with watercolors.
This will be a FREE Watercolor Beginner’s Course, so if you are interested and not already signed up for my email list, take a second to sign up so you know right away when the next tutorial goes live.

FULL VIDEO TUTORIAL AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS POST!

Alright! Let’s jump in and get started.
So the very first thing we’re going to do we’re going to do is one wet on dry and then we’re going to do one wet on wet.
The first we’re going to do is we are just going to take our large size 12 round brush and we’re going to load up that brush with water. Once it’s nice and wet you’re going to go right into that blue paint mixture, adding a lot of water to make a very fluid mixture.
Then I’ll fill up my brush with that very wet paint mixture, and with that we are just gonna go right onto our paper and with easy brush strokes we are just going to paint straight down the page.

I did use painter’s tape to separate these two sections in my Windsor Newton Journal, but you don’t have to do it. It is nice

to be able especially with these practices to use up only one page with two different practice paintings.

So at the very end there I did go back into my paint and I added a little bit more to my brush just to get all the way down the page.

Now you’re going to see that this is a very even wash of the same color.

It has the same gradient value and that’s what we want.

While this dries we’re going to go to our other side and you’re just going to get to see the difference between working wet on dry and wet on wet.

On this side we are first going to take clean water and we are going to full up this entire side with clean water.
Next, I’m going to dab my brush off on a paper towel and I’m going to go back into that blue paint we used earlier.
And I’m just going to start tapping this in and repeat the same process on this side. But instead of painting on a dry surface we are painting on a wet surface and we are just letting the paint bloom into the wet areas on the page.
It’s also creating a very pretty gradient value where it’s starting dark and it slowly transitioned into a lighter value. This is cause because we started with more paint on our brush, and as we painted we end up with a smaller amount of paint on our brush.

Let these two paintings dry and then we’re going to come in with our smaller brush and we’re going to create easy tapping motions to make some trees in our foreground.

Putting those two easy practices together are going to create two very pretty paintings that are really going to make you feel like you can do this!

Then I’m going to go take my Indigo paint right on top of that section that is completely dry, we’re just going to start in the center with out trees. You don’t have to be too precise with this. As I paint downward my paint starts fade a away into a gradient, so I am I’m coming going back into my paint.

I already refilled my paint on my brush and just tapping in again. I’m trying not to go too wide too fast, and it’s okay if there are gaps. These gap will give a natural highlight to the trees.

We are now going to come over to the left side and I’m just going to start painting a medium size tree. And we repeat the same painting process as we did before to create this final tree in our painting.

To finish off these paintings we are going to have a little bit of fun with this practice. I’m going to take a lot of loose paint and I’m just going to tap my brush over my painting to add some fun splatter effects. I enjoy it and I think it adds a little something to a basic exercise. I love to do that with a lot of my paintings just to spice it up at the very end.

and there you have your first beginner project. I will be putting out a series on beginner watercolor tutorials, so either sign up to get all the news on when the new tutorials go live! Everyone on my email list will be the first to know and have access to these tutorials!

FULL VIDEO TUTORIAL

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial, if you did I would love to hear in the comments about what you’d like to see next on this blog. I hope to see you again, soon bye!
by Kaitlin

2 thoughts on “Lesson One: Watercolor Wet on Wet and Wet on Dry Practice”

  1. Pingback: Lesson Two : Watercolor Gradient Wash Tutorial | Reflecting Creation
  2. Pingback: Lesson Three: Watercolor Palm Tree Tutorial | Reflecting Creation

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