Here I am back with another recent painting about a person thinking. The thinking process for me is related to a specific pose of the body and that’s what I trying to reflect here in this watercolor.
Below is the video
Thinking – a video in which I demonstrate how I completed the painting featured in this post.
Thinking – watercolor on paper 2020
This painting is done mainly with wet on wet layers of colors. Also, before the last layers of color, I delineated the figure in order to emphasize the main features – I know this is a naive way of painting, but I liked. After this, I enter one more layer of color mainly to regain the pigments of color that were lost during the wet washes. Also, this time I also dried the layer using a hair dryer, but as I mentioned before in other videos, this is optional, you can just let the painting dry by itself, the only thing with it, is that you have to wait until the paper dries.
Hello, here is another video on how to paint layer by layer with watercolors. Before I explain more in details the process, I would like to talk about the paper I used this time to work on this painting.
The paper I used this time, is a paper sold by Canson – this brand has very good watercolor papers but most of them are a little pricey, which is normal, because they are high quality… but for this demonstration I used a very inexpensive Canson paper that is sold in most craft stores. Here is a picture of the paper for you to recognize it – just in case, you want to try it too:
This is another image of the watercolor paper I used for this painting demonstration.
In a previous post, I showed how to paint a watercolor layer by layer; this time, I am using the same technique – painting one layer, then, a second, and a third, and four, and… as many as you want for your desired final results. I used the technique to paint the still life that you see in the picture at the top of this post. And, the video below shows how I did it. Enjoy it!\
Here is again, the picture of the completed painting.
Still life with apples – watercolor on paper 2020
I did the painting using different layers of color, which is one way to do it. Some people prefer just one wash of color, and that is fine too. The layer by layer – in my opinion, intensifies the colors, and make the painting really colorful. But again, it is a matter of taste, one layer (or, one wash); or, layer by layer.
Long time, I did not do layer by layer watercolors because I did not know about different types of watercolor papers; I thought that all watercolors papers were the same, so, I was very much afraid that after adding more, and more layer of color, which means also more water, the paper will wrinkle ruining my entire work. Now, I know that there are several types of watercolor paper, and the highest quality, and highest grain will hold more water, and allow you to add layers, and layers of color, and do other fun techniques too (as I mentioned in my post II of this series), scratching the paper to obtain certain textures, and additional details.
Now, I will continue with my comments about watercolor’s paper. This time, I wil share my opinion/experience with two other types of watercolor paper; but this time, I want to share my points using this YouTube video.
More options of watercolor’s paper
The video above shows two more options of watercolor paper available in the market: one is from Hubby Lobby – it is the Master’s Touch brand, and the second from Stathemore that is sold in most Art and Crafts stores. The following are two pictures of these mentioned papers:
The Master Touch’s brand – watercolor paperThe Strathmore’s brand watercolor paper pad
How to easily paint in watercolor – materials
I want to give the viewer some tips on how to paint in watercolor:
1. Be sure that you use a paper that holds enough water without creating lumps. Examples of this type of paper have been given previously (above).
2. Pencil to do the sketch: any type of pencil can be used to prepare the sketch; I use blue watercolor pencil, which makes the lines almost invisible after the layers of color are applied.
Keeping mind the two tips mentioned above, I did a step by step You Tube video of how to complete a short watercolor project. This video is available here.
This is a time lapsed video of the process, the final product is shown below.
Here is the final product of the small painting showed in the video. The painting was done using the Master’s Touch’s (brand) paper mentioned above.
Flowers – done with Master’s Touch materials: tablet watercolors and paper – January 2020
Simple Painting Ideas 