CTC Watercolor Tutorial Unit 25

Unit 25

A very fun wet working watercolor, we are doing clouds on wet. If you can work quickly you can get the cloud effects the first time. If your like us in a very dry environment I'll show you how we achieved similar results after the fact. 

Day 1

All your supplies, Please note today we are working vertically. 

Prep your paper by tracing the quarter on some masking tape. 

 Carefully cut out your circle. Like those scissors? I have had them since first or second grade :-)
They are OLD! 

 Put the tape down in the upper right hand corner. 

If you want your painting to dry flat tape down the edges. 

 About 2 large pea sizes of Dark blue and a large pea size of grey,
or a smidgen of black and some white to make the grey. 

If you need to, this is a good time to mix up the grey. 

 Wet down your paper... and Now I know why Little Miss Sunshine was giggling like crazy Sweet Potato was making funny faces the whole time. 

Lightly dry off the pools of water but leave it wet wet.
Since we are blogging ours dried out to much but have no fear!
I'll show you what should have happened. 

 Make some grey clouds in the sky... and even if you start out with puffy kid clouds...

 You can add bits and bobs till they look like "real" clouds.

Keep making clouds Don't put a cloud over the top of your moon, you will see why later.

 I was thinking about those anvil clouds we get right before a thunder storm.

 Don't forget to break the boundaries, Like my cloud in the upper right it give your painting a more realistic look.

 OK my water is really dirty if your not using 2 water sources change out this water.

 Ahh nice and clean!

 Ok my paper dried on me again! working really quickly I added water to the white dry parts of my painting.

 Opps caught some cloud.

 But look at the edges! The paint is drifting in the water and making a very realistic cloud.

Work fast :-) paint in the blue background it too will drift and float it will look so cool!

 Paint!

 keep going

 Like the energizer bunny!

 Ok here is Sweet Potatoes cloud painting I wonder if she thinks it's Cloud City?

Here is Little Miss Sunshine's painting at end of day one. 

Here is mine. Put in a safe place to dry 

Set up time 5-10 minutes, painting time less than 10 minutes. 

Day 3 

 Mix up your light grey paint save some white for your stars in another well.

Make the clouds near the moon lighter. Remember the light of the moon is lighting them up! 

 Really think about how the moons light would reflect as your paint this.

 Now use your tooth pick to make dots of white to be stars.

 Don't put to many around the moon as the moons light tends to wash out all the but brightest stars. See I put a really bright star next to it... can we say oops turned into a star.

 When you are done you can peel back the masking tape and reveal your bright white moon!

If you had painted over your moon the clouds would be blocking the light and the moon itself and it would look really funny right about now. 

Little Miss Sunshine painting away.

 Adding dots.

Sweet Potato making those close clouds light grey. 

See how small the dots are, but man they do look like stars when it is all said and done. 

My finished work of art. 

Sweet Potatoes. Little Miss Sunshine didn't take a finished photo... himm and she is the photographer!

Set up time 5-10 minutes Painting time less than 10 minutes. 

CTC Watercolor Tutorial Unit 12

Day Two

I love using masking tape to do its job, that is mask the surface of a painting. 

Here is day 2 & 3's supplies. I happen to have some sliver paint so I got to use that in stead of grey. I did not have purple so I had to create that. 

 After you have taped down your paper, decide how big you want you moon to be. I decided I wanted it to be about 3 tape width wide. If you want a VERY large Moon you can tape an area down use a glass, trace around it then use a Exacto  knife to cut away the excess. Since I was in a bit of a time crunch I cut mine out. 

 Snip, Snip, I tried my best to make it round. 

 All cut out I placed it where my fancy decided. 

 Rub the edge down firmly so you get a good seal but not so hard you can't get it off later. 

 Aizarin Crimson and the dark blue Just a smidgen of blue to start. 

 After i mixed in 2 smidgens of dark blue it was heading to far toward brown,
so I added a tiny bit of black to it, to make the color more rich. 

To be sure I liked it, I tested it on scrap paper. 

Now I whetted the paper, can you see my reminder arrow, I always forget to switch paints!  

 Once its nice n' wet blot. 

Again I'm using the rag as I'm to cheap to buy paper towels.  

Paint in the sky line purple.  

 1/3 from the bottom paint in the blue. Don't forget to overlap your colors. 

Needs a bit more blue then I can let it dry. Set it aside in a safe place to dry,
 and clean up your brushes and pallet. 

Day Three

 Carefully peel the tape up if it rips don't stress to much. Mine did a tiny bit and you can't tell. 

 Lovely white patch where our moon will go. 

 Notice how I left a white ring around the moon. 

I really want my moon to feel like a sphere so I shaded the outside slightly darker than the inside.   

 For trees further away I made them smaller. This one reminds me of a thorn tree. 

 I started another one middling. 

I'm getting better at using the tooth pick to make fine lines.
A bit of a twisting motion seems to work best for me. 

 I decided to start another tree that will break the edge of the painting.
It's good to break the edge to give the observer a feeling that your looking at a larger venue. 

 Now take a look at your painting, 

 Add in as many twigs as you can stand. 

 Now think about the light, how will the moon shine on the tree... See how the tooth pick is pointing? 

 Where it is pointing is how the light will fall on the tree trunk and branches. 

 The moon light shines on the sides and tops of these branches. 

 Himm it will catch the tips of these boughs. 

 As well as these branches. 

 For the tree on the edge of the paper I picture it shining almost horizontally. 

 I took this photo after the paint dried, it is easier to see how the light is falling. 

 Little Miss Sunshine working hard. 

 Sweet Potato decided not to mix up her own paint and just used the leftovers. then she had a mishap with a tree trunk. with a bit of creative thinking we turned the square tree into a house with smoke coming out of the chimney. She was sad she messed it up. She also didn't cut out a circle for the moon, but it doesn't look awful as she claims since she did put a round moon in the white space.  It is "ART" I suppose She could have square trees if she wanted to be "modern" I'm just not sure I'm ready for that. 

 Little Miss Sunshine's completed painting.
I love how she is learning to break boundaries and she has such sleekness of lines. 

My finished art work. I love stark trees against the sky, its one of my favorite things to paint. 

I hope you enjoy painting this as much as I did!