Watercolor Animals for Beginners - Bunny

1. Introduction: Hi. My name is gonna and I'm a self taught artists from Venice, California off to work with different mediums such as oils, watercolors in ink and I primarily focused on creating cute and kind characters in this class will be focusing on creating a baby animal was water colors. I'll walk you through the process of how to find inspiration, how to creative first rough sketches and clean them up. How to find the color palette and how to finally paint your baby animal was watercolors. Please post any questions you have. I'll be here to help you along the way I can wait to see your projects. Thank you so much for taking this class. 2. Where to find inspiration: great place to look for inspiration and for references for your baby. Animals are interest in Google on the doors. They have a lot of different boards that I create for every single project that I work on. I have here one called baby animals where I've been a lot of cute and adorable animals. And I used them as references. Full load off my paintings. Ah, for this particular class, we will be using this cute bunny. And, um, if you don't have to injury so you don't use Pinterest, you can always just use Google. Ah, if you search for baby animals and Google, you will get an overload of cute nous and definitely no shortage of inspiration. So go ahead. Um, begin animal that you would like to paint, um, ideally, save it somewhere on your desktop so you can use them as a reference. I'm sure you know to do that, but just in case you can do control, click. All right, click, depending if you use Microsoft and just save image as, um, money on desktop, and then we will use this image for our sketch 3. What you need for this class: Hi. For this class, you will need a few things. First thing first, you would need a sketchbook. Just do your off sketches. Ah, and then clean them up. I recently bought the sketchbook. Um, I like it a lot because you can easily rip the people off. Has a lot off a lot of leaves in it. And it was very inexpensive. I don't remember how much paid for it, but, um, I like the sketchbook so far right now on any sketchbook will do whatever you find in your heart store. Don't spend too much money on it. Because again, those gonna be your rough sketches. Most of the time, you will just throw away the paper. All will not even used them. This is for practice. Ah, you will need pencils than a razor to sketch with any pencil will do. I personally usually start my sketches with hard core pencils like four age and to H. Because then I don't have to worry about, um how much pressure I applied to the pencil. And then for outline I usually used to be, Which is means it's much softer core HB pencils will define. And then you will need in a razor. Um, I got this razor because I like how much control you have when you raise gives you a chance to I raise closer to the line, and it's a clicker one. So, like this one, um, next thing you will need something to paint on. So there are a lot of different types of paper that you confined. I use, um, Windsor and Newton culprits. Paper blocks and arches, Hot press beat part blocks. They're called blocks because they are on the leaves are not separate. They're attached. So you have to put a palette knife to, um, somewhere on the side. It's right here. So you put a politics over here, and then you cut the papers through, um, same ghost with hot price pressed paper, and I'll show you the difference so you can see that call Cold press paper has a lot of the texture than hot pressed paper. It all depends on the style you go for and the subject that you painting. I like to use cold pressed paper for all of my baby animal paintings because I like the texture it gives me. But you don't have to spend a lot of money on paper. I recommend to start his class with something cheaper like this. What a color a pen Did you combine your local our store? It's pretty inexpensive, but it's a good quality. It's very sick paper, which is good because for what colors you needed to be fixed. It can absorb water better and a dozen rip, and it has some subtle textures. So it's a great parent to start with and, um, experiment and play with. So next thing you will need water colors you can start was very limited palate. I have this travel palette that I use. It only has 12 colors. It's Wednesday, Newton. It's really good quality. And I think about on Amazon. Um, it's You don't need a lot of colors for this cause because again, we gonna be painting a baby animal. And most animals don't have 50 different colors in their makeup. Ah, then you will need something to use for mixing your colors. If you buy palette like this, you could use these spots for mixing your colors. Or you can buy palette like this. It's a ceramic one war you can just use in a ceramic plate or bowl that he have at home. As long as it's pretty flat, you can ah, mix your colors on it. And finally, you will need a glass to hold your water, paper towel and brushes. I have here two options, so this is a little bit. This is a cheaper version off brushes. I think it's called You Tracked. It says 02 in six. There, round brushes their good. Um, I still use them and I still paint with them. I like them quite a lot. And then I have high end brushes. Ah, same sizes 02 and six. This is the Vinci on on. Ah, these store are serious. Seven wins. Very Newton. There are more high end brushes, but you don't need to spend a lot of money on the brushes. In the beginning, you can just started this, um, cheaper option that you can find in your heart store. And for this class, depending how big? Plan to paint your baby animal. Ah, you can just limit your brushes. Two sizes, zero to and maybe six. Um, but that's about it. That's all. You will need to start this class 4. Creating a rough sketch: when I start sketching, always tried to break down the subject into simple shapes and forms. Since we are working on a baby animal, try to break a reference image into ovals and circles I usually start. It was drawing oval for ahead and then move on to the body. Here. The bunny's head is at an angle, so I'm trying to capture it. Next, I draw a bigger role for the body and roughly sketch out to pause. As you can see, I play very little pressure on the pencil during a rough sketches. We didn't want to commit to what we draw yet, so it makes it easier to your raise. Next, a draw the ears. Before I put any features on the face, I likely draw across where the vertical line will tell me where the nose will be placed and horizontal line for where will later put the eyes. Now I can start adding details to this catch matting the miles the cheeks in the nose, and now, using denounces my reference point for where to put the ears. Um, I also realized that the right ears too low. So what I'm gonna do is I will raise it and place it a little higher. - Now that I'm happy with the general outline of the hand, I'm going to work on the body and the pots. This bunnies really fluffy. So I'm guessing as to where the paws are. Keep in mind that we will not sketch. Differ. We will paint it. So the point of the sketches to capture the general shape and features off the subject. - I tried different chase for the eyes and he decided not to goes there. Realistic are. But it was the as I usually used for all my baby animals. And now I'm putting more pressure. My pencil talk line, the final sketch so that we can easily transfer it to the paper we will paint on. 5. Transferring the sketch to watercolor paper: in this video, I'll share you two ways of how to trust for Europe. Sketch to the paper You will paint on here amusing life table If you have one, all you need to do is to put your rough sketch on it and put the paper you will be using for painting on the top and the very lightly transfer. The sketch to the paper did not apply too much pressure to the pencil because it might show through the water colors and might leave indentation on the paper. - Another way to transfer your sketch to the paper is by using your windows tape, the rough sketch to the window and the watercolor paper on the top so that you don't have to hold it and again lightly draw your baby animal on it. Uh, - and I'll be ready to paint our baby animal. 6. Picking and mixing colors: Before we start painting, we need to figure out which colors we will be using. There's bunny isn't brown tones, so I will be using my brown colors in the palette. Amusing burnt umber, burnt sienna and yellow card. Always try the color. C. Makes a scrap paper so you can see how they will look on paper. Look at your baby animal image and find the predominant color. I love mixing colors, but I always tried to limit how many colors and mix it. If you end up adding a lot of colors, mix will be muddy. So first put the colors on paper as they are, and then put on paper your mix. Start light and have fun. This is my favorite part, mixing of finding the shades that I like at the end of the day. It's not about how realistic this baby animal will look, but enjoying the process and finding your own style. 7. Painting the baby animal with watercolors: was watercolors. You always want to start light and slowly build up your shades and tones. So I'm starting with the water and mix, and I'm putting it where I see the darkest places on the firm. I'm working carefully, and I did not cover the bunny fully was the pain. We want to be able to use the paper for the brightest white because even if you tried to use the white collar, it's still one lonely as wide as the paper. If you feel like you put too much collar than grab a piece of paper towel bullet up and lately pat it where you want to remove the excess of pain. I also used this technique to give Dexter. I'm using science to round brush and in putting light, wash over the darkest patches of for Take your time here. I also consistently go back to my mix and that cholera, depending on the part I'm working on this bonus for has variations in brown color, and I'm trying to capture it now that I'm working, adding details to defer a switch to my side. Zero brush and a slowly start adding light strokes. Now I'm painting the knows, the mouse and the I also make sure before I add them that the area is dry. Otherwise they would become a block. I'm not using wet on wet ticking here so full of simple rule. Start light and let it dry, meaning before you start working on the next layer, make sure the previous one is dry and make sure you start was water down consistency off the car off the color because you can always make a darker Now I'm using a little bit of Chinese white color to soften up some of the spots. Take time to look at your progress and compared to the reference image and see what airing . It's more attention if you made a new mix of colors, always tried on a scrap paper first before painting with it. Now our bunny is done. I decided to make the I darker. Since I didn't have the blood color in this ballot, I didn't want to mix it. So I decided to use a simple black in Japan to accentuate the I. And if you have a white ink pen, you can add a small spot on the ad to make it more alive again. These steps are not necessary. This is where your own style comes into play. I like to add some details with color pencils or pens, and for this banana decided to add some white stacks. Offer was wide. Pan is well, It's very saddle, but it gives more texture and it's fun. Now it's your turn. I can't wait to see your progress in your projects. Thank you again for taking this class.