watercolour questions so beginner, I'm almost afraid to ask

How about painting something each month and making a calander?  How hard is it to make painting into printings?  

These last few months, I've pretty much borrowed every watercolour book from the library - some several times.  Thank goodness they got rid of late fees this year.  

Last week, they gave away a free pencil in exchange for a positive note that we pin up on the bord.

Maybe it's just the result of my dyslexia, but I've had increasing social anxiety writing in public - or showing my handwriting.  Almost to the point where it's a full-fledged panic attack if I have to write - or worse, sign my name - in permies.  

I took a pencil anyway.

This week, I'll sneak back in and put this on the notice board with the other notes.



It's a really nice pencil, so I hope they won't notice if I take a second one.  It's not my best work, but maybe it's worth two pencils?  

1. A transparent yellow ochre:  Transparent yellow oxide (Daniel Smith) is my pick.
2. Brushes:  The premier watercolor brush is made from the tail hairs of the kolinsky sable, a mink that lives in Siberia.  The hairs are naturally tapered at the end and form a beautiful point, but the thicker end of the hair forms a belly to the  brush that holds lots of water.  It releases water slowly.  They are perfect brushes for watercolor.  There are many synthetic and synthetic/sable blends now that work well too.  
3. Regarding colors in pans: Some rewet better than others.  Winsor Newton sells pans and tubes because they use different formulas for the two.  The pan paints have glycerine added to them.  Glycerine and honey are humectants - they absorb moisture in the air.  They keep the paints from getting too dry.   I just buy Winsor Newton tubes and stir in a few drops of  glycerine to make pans. I also add glycerine to other brands for pigments that get too hard to rewet.  And yes, that varies by pigment.  Some are really difficult.  
4. For most paintings, it makes the most sense to work with dry colors and rewet them.  If working really big, it's easier to get enough of each wash mixed if they are wet to start.
5. Getting to know pigments is key - transparent, opaque, staining, granulating.  As you are already finding, it depends on what look you want.  Artist grade paints have fewer mixes of pigments and more "traditional" pigments with distinct characteristics.  
6. Paint brushes come dipped in gum arabic, which is an acacia tree sap.  It is also the binder for watercolors, gouache, and soft (chalk) pastels.  
7. Gouache is similar to watercolor.  It was traditionally used for advertising art, as its matte finish was easy to photograph.  The colors used to have white fillers to make transparent pigments opaque.  The pigment particle size is larger in gouache.  It keeps the pigment on the surface of the paper. They weren't worried about lightfastness.   Winsor newton gouache has stayed more traditional.  M graham, and Daniel Smith are two brands made for artists today. They are lightfast and have limited if any white fillers.  
8. Paper: The best paper is made from cotton.  Cellulose papers work fine too. Paper is soaked in gelatin water (sizing) to add some resistance to water absorption.  Some brands also spray the surface with sizing.  They all act a little different depending on the treatments.  More sizing = less movement.   140 lb is a good weight too work with.  Thinner than that, and it's just a wrinkly mess.  Thicker = more expensive.
9. Blocks: I buy Strathmore 500 ready cut paper in 8x10 and 11x14 and padding compound adhesive and I clamp and glue edges to make my own blocks.  They are cheaper than buying blocks and I get my favorite paper.  I have also glued up Arches in this manner.  I also make my own sketchbooks using these papers.  If working bigger, you need to stretch and tape it.
10.  If you hate your hot press paper, use it for colored pencils.
11. Watercolor ground - very useful if you scrub away too much paper and need to fix the surface.  Can also be applied to any surface to make it almost like watercolor paper.
12. Watercolor Scrubbers: Jerry's artarama.  
12 Mask: Test it out.  Some rip some papers.  Very handy sometimes.  Also painters tape, a clear wax crayon, and scrubbers are useful for getting and keeping highlights.

"More sizing = less movement"
This isn't right, sorry.  More sizing means more movement across the surface of the paper.  Pigments travel and blend better with more sizing.  Less sizing means more soaking into the paper.
But it also depends on the paint - certain pigments travel more.  The binder matters too.  

On another note, your progress is stellar.  Thanks for the updates.

I'm slowly starting to paint from life by choosing interesting things on the farm and documenting them.





The drawing part seems to be the biggest stumbling block for me.  Some of that is my lack of skill at drawing and I suspect a big part of that is some vision issues I've been having these last few years.  

But also, I'm not a big fan of prissy flowers like daffodils.  They are too showy and scream "look at me" but when we get close they have so many flaws that I wonder why they make so much visual noise.   But that's what's blooming on the farm at the moment and it's interesting to really look closely at a flower like this.  I also painted a different one in oil pastels to see what I could learn.  That was much harder as I seem to be getting better at values with watercolours than other mediums.  

Willows on the other hand were fun to play with different shading and edges.  

Both of these are done with gansai tambi (Japanese Watercolour) paints which act a bit different from European-style watercolours.  I'm using these because I want to get more confident mixing on the paper and glazing.  

Kind of cool this is now a problem... but how to fix or prevent?

Instead of using carbon paper to trace from a print-out,  I decided to try my hand at drawing.   Which means erasing.  Where I removed the unwanted lines, it damaged the sizing of the paper so it absorbs more paint in those spots.

Can I fix half way through the painting?

Is there an eraser that won't do this?

Other ideas that don't involve carbon transfer paper?  

The easiest way is to do your underdrawing with a neutral colored watercolor-pencil. I like tans, peaches, greys, and low saturation blues for that usually. The pencil marks melt away into your water as you paint.

Can watercolour pencils erase,  or maybe there is a way they don't have to?

I'm still making a lot of mistakes with my drawing.

They're iffy with that... What might work is to work out your drawing in pencil, draw out the final pic in wc-pencil, and then erase off the pencil. I'd do a couple tests on a bit of scrap first, some with the pencil underneath, some with it on top, using different wc-pencil colors that appeal to you.

If your wc-pencil goes to water really easily, you might just want to use a wet brush and wash it away too.

That's a neat trick.  I'll give it a go.

At this stage of my watercolour journey, I'm okay with pencil lines showing.  

The biggest problem I'm having is the damage the eraser does to the paper.  I wonder if there's a solution for that?  Is there a special eraser for watercolour paper?  Or maybe I'm missing another idea that would eliminate the issue?  

My go-to are those white rectangle "magic rub" erasers. Most of them have "1954" on them, some of them say Prismacolor or Sanford or Faber on them. They're good at erasing graphite and some inks, and generally don't rip up paper surfaces.

Do needed erasers work without messing up the paper sizing? Those you don't rub with, you just press and lift so they are gentler.

Jenny Wright wrote:Do needed erasers work without messing up the paper sizing? Those you don't rub with, you just press and lift so they are gentler.

I could give that a try.

I suspect I'm going to have to sacrifice a big piece of paper to do some samples of different eraser/pencil combinations.  

The other day someone gave me one of these Forever Pencils.

I was doubtful - if it lasts forever, why does it come with a dozen extra tips?  

But trying it out, it writes somewhere between an H and an F pencil with very little pressure.  It also erases easier than a regular graphite pencil.  But these Forever Pencils aren't graphite, they are a metal alloy, usually with some tin in it.  

One of the big problems with graphite and painting is that graphite is a lubricant.  I can see it in watercolour as the pigment shies away from the pencil line.  In acrylic painting, graphite can migrate to the top layer after only a few decades.  

This is going to be something fun to experiment with to see if forever pencils would help solve some of the issues watercolour has with regular graphite pencils.  

Good for you to take up such a wonderful hobby! If you can create that depth of roundness in the vase already, you are much better at it than many, many people.

I have two resources for you.

Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain by Betty Edwards will give you the drawing techniques learned in art school, but with a methodology that provides that information faster, clearer and in layman's terms.  I was privileged to take the course with her protégé in Japan many years ago. It was marvelous. In two weekends of study I learn an incredible amount. You are inspiring me to drag out the book, paints and brushes!

A Google search how to use watercolors provides a wealth of information including the relative toxicity of the paints.

Best of luck with this, and please continue to post your creations.  If I can find them, I'll post my "before and after" attempts at a self portrait.

The advantage of watercolour painting on lesser quality sketchbook paper