Watercolor Basics
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Watercolor Basics
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Re: Watercolor Basics
#2It's kind of funny to read that. It's a sort of rationalist's advice in that it seeks to match a consensus bell curve. Much of it is good advice but there are lots of exceptions that ought to be tweaked through subjective practice.
BTW here's a favorite little project.
Go to your local craft store and buy some tube watercolors in the hues you like.
Get an altoids tin and a lego flat base that fits inside of it. Flip the base upside down and put it inside.
Get some lego bricks, turn them upside down, use needlenose pliers to extract the circle part so there's room to squeeze in your paints. Use a twist-pull motion and it's easy to get those plastic bits out.
Squeeze in the paint, let each color form a mound at the top of the brick (this'll shrink), and put them outside to dry.
As you get new watercolor hues you like, add/subtract to the palette lego set.
With any extra room in the tin, fold up some paper towel or cut a sponge to fit.
(BTW if you plan to sketch outside, be careful about doing so in front of cars, or if you're sketching cars, use a large pad and not a small one. I've had a person go off on me for "writing tickets" in free parking zones when I was sketching a lovely coupe...)
Re: Watercolor Basics
#3Kudos for getting this page together. I've only ever had mediocre results with Cotman watercolours which can give muddy results and I absolutely disagree with buying cheap paper. When I started buying the most expensive watercolour paper I could afford (300 gsm) my watercolour practice got much better. Obviously that is just my experience and people have to work out what works for them. I'm on Instagram @chloegilbertartist and if you scroll you will get to my watercolours.
Re: Watercolor Basics
#4GurneyJourney.blogspot.com is a treasure trove of great advice and information.
Re: Watercolor Basics
#5GurneyJourney.blogspot.com is a treasure trove of great advice and information.
james gurney is a great artist and I find his youtube videos instructive, although mostly it seems like he paints with gouache over casein and no matter what you might hear, gouache is NOT similar to watercolor even if they're both water media.
Re: Watercolor Basics
#6Those choices are bad: watercolor supplies need to have be of high quality to not frustrate the painter. Otherwise you'll have bad result (destroyed paper for example, oversaturated or muddy color) and will have to fight every bit.
When I was studying illustration, our teacher would advise us to avoid those kind of kit and paper.
I've tried the one from children: that's not a pleasant experience.
Last thing: watercolor is one of the hardest technique you can try. You need to be able to work fast, be precise and not overwork it.
Re: Watercolor Basics
#7There are some of these pieces of advice I don't agree with, but that probably don't matter until you have some experience and know the difference.
Paints section
bricks not tubes is not a rule I'd ever follow, and many nice paints are only available as tubes. You can make bricks out of tubes as well.
More money up to $30 for what? One paint tube? A paint set?
Check pigments - what does that mean to a beginner? Nothing.
Brush section
list of rules, including a rule about no rules, is a little ridiculous.
natural vs synthetic does matter - different brushes can hold differing amount of water which affects how you paint, especially in watercolor where you don't want dry edges if you want to blend sections together. They also hold shape differently, even different natural fibers hold shape differently.
a medium round might be "all you need" without considering frustration or different techniques, but you might get a lot less frustrated having different brush shapes, and open yourself up to using different brush techniques the round won't work with.
Paper Section
Definitely don't buy paper just because its cheap.
Open it up feel the paper - for what? Until a beginner knows what they like, what area they feeling for? It's advice that doesn't help anyone do anything.
Medium heavy...relative to what? Depends on how much water you plan on using too.
paper size...depends on what you want to make. "postcard to printer paper sizes" might be ok for some things, but its small for something hanging on a wall.
trust your gut, trial and error - those are opposite recommendations. "make mistakes until you get it right" is not really advice.
I do recommend watercolor blocks, especially if they hold all edges of the watercolor paper so you have to worry less about stretching.
>old school / fun / unecessary -> this is not advice, it doesn't even mentioned what its talking about.
100% cotton paper is not "unnecessary/unnoticeable". It is definitely noticeable in how well the paper holds up to water and repeated washes, correcting mistakes, etc.
>paper weight is in lbs or gsm usually - is that advice?
>if it feels thick enough it is -> again depends on what you're intending
Other materials
Needs to recommend a hair dryer (if working at home) to speed up wash drying
The whole painting advice section is sort of...not a good way to learn any graphic discipline - graphic disciplines should be shown/demo'd graphically.
Re: Watercolor Basics
#8from original post person - added some basic somewhat pertinent history - thanks for all the upvotes / stars / unsolicited criticism ;^)
> ## 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
Re: Watercolor Basics
#9GurneyJourney.blogspot.com is a treasure trove of great advice and information.
james gurney is a great artist and I find his youtube videos instructive, although mostly it seems like he paints with gouache over casein and no matter what you might hear, gouache is NOT similar to watercolor even if they're both water media.
He does have a course called “watercolor in the wild” though I can’t vouch for it as I only draw in charcoal.
Re: Watercolor Basics
#10Those choices are bad: watercolor supplies need to have be of high quality to not frustrate the painter. Otherwise you'll have bad result (destroyed paper for example, oversaturated or muddy color) and will have to fight every bit. When I was studying illustration, our teacher would advise us to avoid those kind of kit and paper. I've tried the one from children: that's not a pleasant experience. Last thing: watercol…
Yeah, "brush quality doesn't matter" is horrid advice. My watercolor teacher required us to buy only one brush, a pricey squirrel hair. The difference between that and a cheap acrylic brush is so great they shouldn't even have the same name.