Last month at Open Studio, expert watercolorist Cheryl Bryan presented this example to our group. The lesson was about painting in shadows.
I wanted to do this lesson, but felt that painting five cherries was not enough subject matter to keep my interest. So I chose this reference photograph, to supplement Cheryl’s example.
Initial sketch:
Lots of masking fluid added:
First washes, background and beginning to paint the subject.
To get this subject to work, each cherry must be painted individually, with multiple colors of paint worked in.
Most of the painting is finished, masking fluid removed.
Finished:
The cherries look luscious, but my favorite thing is the bowl. What a dreamy color!
When I returned from Wisconsin last month, I made a vague suggestion about painting a watercolor of sand hill cranes. They are very impressive birds. In Madison the cranes are so acclimated to humans that they are not bothered with our presence. We even saw a couple with a dog on the leash approach resting cranes, and the birds never budged.
Because I think this will be a difficult painting, I decided to start with a simple close-up of a sandhill. This photograph was snapped by Bill. I zoomed in when did my edits.
This is a nice profile shot.It seems the bird is showing up its “good” side!
After making a quick pencil sketch, I used the printing technique learned on Wednesday. This time I stamped the background with bubble wrap and some rug grips using three earthy colors: yellow ochre, burnt sienna and ultramarine blue.
Once that was sorted, I painted the subject. It was a simple matter to follow the lines and colors of the photograph. I was careful to leave a little white. Masking fluid allowed me to represent the wispiness of the feathers.
After a few relaxing hours I was finished.
Time for a Crane
I wish all my watercolor attempts would go this smoothly.
In addition to the ochre, sienna and blue, I used alizarin crimson, carbazole violet and a little quinacridone gold and white gouache to bring out the eye. Painted on Arches hot press paper.
5/08 2022: Happy Mother’s Day all. I’ve been mulling about this painting for the past two days, not satisfied. It seems to me a little flat and unfinished.
So today I addressed the bits that bothered me. In the photograph, the light is strong, making crisp dark shadows and bright highlights. The light in the painting was too subtle. To fix this, I brightened areas around the face and beak with lifting and then applying white gouache. Once the highlights were as light as I could get them, I moved to increase the depth and complexity of the shadows. In particular, the gradation of the shadow along the bird’s body was inadequate. I added another layer, feathering the shadowed area over a larger section of the torso.
Finally, I looked over the background, deciding that the bright white section on top of the head just drew the viewer’s eye up and out of the picture plane. I painted it out with a wash of light tan paint that blended into the existing background color.
These adjustments may seem like not-so-much. Perhaps a big to-do about nothing.
I feel that the changes made the difference between a bland copy of a photograph and an interesting portrait with shadow, light, texture and all the compositional elements working together. To me, my crane is now more vibrant, existing in three dimensions instead of two.
I have been saving this image from Unsplash for the time when my skills were sufficient to paint it. I think I’m ready now.
There are several challenges:
Painting the pink flower with shading and without losing its delicate transparency.
Making the background black enough while keeping the crisp edges of the foreground.
Rendering the texture of the leaf in the foreground
It took me a few days and several stages.
Pencil outline of the flower and underpainting of the leaves. I added some colored pencil on the foreground, but these lines completely disappeared under subsequent glazes.
Before I proceeded to the next layers, I reserved the edges by coating them with masking fluid.
First layer of paint on flower and background, second glaze on leaves.Second layer of paint on flower and background. Once it dried, I rubbed off the masking fluid.
Final painting. To render the curves of the foreground leaf, I decided to add a dark color band which doesn’t exist in the original photograph. I used a blue Prismacolor pencil to draw in the delicate veins which are visible between the large ribs.
I like the glowing look of the flower. The crimson petal tips really come forward visually. I’m happy with the foreground leaf. I’m wondering if I need to darken the leaf in the background.
Maybe I will wait a day and see how I feel about it.
Painted on Fabriano Studio cold press paper with Winsor yellow, quinacridone magenta, alizarin crimson, prussian blue, viridian, gold green and sap green.
I’ve been practicing painting squirrels. Here is my reference photo of a cute one perched on a stump at the forest’s edge. It is found on Unsplash.com and was taken by Yannick Menard
Yannick Menard on Unsplash.com
He’s so little and fuzzy. Here is how I interpreted him with my watercolors.
Completing this painting in my sketchbook was a real confidence builder for me. I think now I may be ready to paint squirrels that were photographed in our backyard.
Daily Fiber 