A Garden for Sara: CTC Unit 14 Watercolor Tutorial

The Road Not Traveled.

I never thought this painting would turn out so well. My Knight in Shining Armor took photos for us. He made many a comment, as he snapped away. Phrases like "deformed butterfly" were uttered. Do not despair! Carrie gives clear instructions and if you follow them, your butterfly will transform into 2 roads heading off into the distance.

Please note we are using the paper vertically. This helps your road look more natural.

Supplies: the eye dropper helps, I would suggest a medium round brush as well.

Day 2

Just a little bit of paint to start with, as you can't put it back into the tube!

Now it says to lightly draw the road, for you I made it bold, so you can see where the lines are leading. I chose to have them go off the sides of the paper you can choose where ever you like your road to go.

Add water and loosen up your paint before you start, this will help later. Don't use the paint straight from the tube in this step. Wet paint will help you do the next part.

Once you are done painting working quickly drop water to make sun spots.

See how the drops are lifting the paint off the paper.

Now scrub the spots and lift the paint away. I blotted my brush on a paper towel,
to keep it from getting to wet as I worked.

Using a clean side of a paper towel now blot the spots.

See how nicely they lift up.

Again use water to wet your paint. this is a new tube for us and boy it was thick. It took quite a lot of water to make it smooth for us. Boy did it have great color!

Fill in the rest of your painting. This is going to create a great under painting for your hills.

Work the paint evenly and neatly.
I think If I were to do it again I'd make the top
a gradient working light at the top and dark where the road is.

Here are the girls at work!

Like??? Sweet Potato's dashed lines!

drip

drip, drip.

Little Miss Sunshine is clearly pulling ahead of her sister, finishing in record time.

Sweet Potato skipped the scrubbing step and jumped right to blotting to try and catch up.

Day 2 is all done! Set aside in a safe place to dry.

Day 3

I used Brown, Ultramarine blue, 2 greens and a yellow paint.

I mixed yellow with light green, dark green with yellow,
dark green with blue, and light green with blue.

This gave me many shades of green to choose from.

Using the round brush I attempted to make hills.
I wonder if I had hidden the road it would have been more understandable earlier.

Do not be discouraged at this point in the painting, you may be saying "How is this ever gonna look right." but really it will turn out all right in the end.

Here a medium brush would have made this step go more quickly.
Don't worry about filling in every inch as you do have the yellow under painting helping you along.

I started on each side working with medium wet paint curving the strokes to make "hills"

Finished filling in one side then went back to work on the dark side.

Sweet Potato was cracking Light side Dark side Star Wars jokes the entire time.

Recall how you have made trees in the past.
Just make the trunks and first crotch of the tree.

Add lots of trees on both sides. Here it is fine to use paint straight from the tube. If your hill is still wet check out my tip below for drying the paint quickly

On the light green hill, create dark green shrubs and ferns.
For ferns add a line of paint then stroke at an angle up on each side. Do about 3-4.

To add shrubs you can dab with the top of a brush

or use the side of your brush to make leaves.

Put in lots of shrubs and ferns it is ok to let the background show through
as that is how bushes are in real life.

Light side has been invaded by the dark side!!!

Now the the dark side add in some Jedi bushes... I mean light bushes.

Here is a close up of making a bush.

Here I dashed off some ferns but I thought they lacked personality.

Adding in a bit of darker green over the top gives them more depth.

Wow it now looks like a road! Our Darth butterfly is now a happy road in the hills.

Keep reading for a tip on drying wet paint.

Here go the girls.

Sweet Potato used really wet light green paint. When she went to paint her trees it was too wet!

Pull out your handy dandy blow dryer. Set it to low heat/blow you do not want it blasting just a gentle breeze. Dry the paint, keep the dryer far enough away, so you don't move the paint around.