Beautiful Wolf in Snow - How to Paint Animals Step by Step Art Class with James Corwin

1. Step-by-Step Wolf in Snow Painting Art Class Introduction: Hi, I'm wildlife artist James Corwin, and I am so excited about this painting. We will be painting a snowy wolf. I will take you step by step through this painting demonstrating here on the canvas, and then giving you a prompt on your video that tells you when to pause so you can complete that step. When you're ready to move on, press clay. We will be using about 2 hours to complete this painting and we'll be using these acrylic colors, the titanium white, raw umber, ultramarine blue, cadmium red, ivory black, and cadmium yellow. I like to use acrylic because it's very easy to work with. The colors dry fast, and as we build up the layers of paint in this lesson, we want those layers to dry quickly so that we can move on to the next steps. Also, it wipes away easily with water. If you make a mistake, you can just dampen your paper towel and wipe it away. We're going to be using three brushes today. We're going to use this large flat brush, medium flat brush, and a small pinky brush for all that wolf fur. And I also have a cup of water for rinsing my brushes and a paper towel for drying them. All right. Well, shall we begin? 2. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Drawing out the Grid: You start, take out your small pointy brush. We are going to draw out a grid on our canvas, this is an 11 by 14 inch size canvas. With my pure black, that's the ivory black. I'm going to draw a very faint line dividing my canvas in half. Now, I want these lines to be very thin and transparent so that they don't show up in our final painting. And a line going across the canvas horizontally. I'm just eyeballing where these halfs of the canvas are. Now, we're going to come to this first half and we're going to eyeball where the thirds are so that we get three equal parts. Again, on the bottom, and then draw a vertical line connecting those. We do this grid because it allows us to find our way around to drawing this wolf so that we aren't just free handing it on an empty canvas, but we have some reference points. But we need to establish those reference points in a grid first. I'm dividing this half into thirds now as well. Okay. Now we're going to come to this bottom half and do the same thing, but horizontally, dividing it into thirds. And again in this upper half. Great. That's a grid we're going to work with, and then we're going to start drawing our wolf within that. Pause video now and complete this step and then we'll start drawing the wolf in the next step. 3. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Drawing the Head of the Wolf: Continuing to use our black and our small pointed brush. Let's draw out our wolf. We're going to come up to this first section up here and find a halfway point between here and here. We're going to draw the back of the wolf, but our destination is over here one, two, three lines down. We're going to also cut that in half from here here. We're going to draw big arcing line that connects through this point down here. So the slope up the back is a bit level right in here and then starts to slope down even more as we get down to that point there. Now, once we get down to this point, we're just going to drop straight down into that box and right here. Here's halfway between here and here, and then halfway again, we're going to cut that in and that's going to come all the way to this line here like that. We're going to come to this section on a vertical line. We're going to come between here and here and cut that in half. We're going to do a slope that goes to this point here, like that. Another one that goes from here to here halfway. We're going to arc this down to that point there and then that line's going to continue all the way to here. Then again, coming halfway halfway here, it's just going to poke out beyond this line and then come to that line there, which is level to this line. That's going to slope down to here. This one also slopes down there a little bit too. We'll just add that in there. Then we're going to bring out some of our snow right in here first. We're going to count up one, two, three sections and find a halfway point. This is just going to come into this box about halfway, drop down, unloms line all the way to here where it drops down again about a quarter of the way down. Comes to our center line a little bit of curve from here to here halfway, it's just going to slope down to that and then just run along that line. Do these steps here and then we'll continue drawing out some more of our wolf, but I just want to get caught up with that for now. 4. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Adding Snow Lines: All right let's draw some more of our wolf. We're going to come to this section one, two, three in and divide this third box in half. Then over here, we're going to also divide this in half, but then this half and half again with the quarter mark. Because this nose gets tucked behind the snow, we're going to just drop this down. Then this is just going to come down and slope behind the snow here. We're drawing in the nose right now. If we come back to this line here and cut that in half, you can just bring that up and this up to that same level, which is middle of the box here. Then within this box, we're going to come just about this line about a quarter of the way. It's going to drop through that half line there, and then drop all the way down, just touching the snow. Same thing halfway from here to here, down, touching into that snow. Then about halfway, you can trw this rounded box that we made for the nose and then do a black dot there for the nostril. Break. Draw that nose, rewatch that if you need to, and then we'll put the eyes into the next step. 5. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Drawing the Face: Let's continue with the Is now. Coming to this line here, this is our third column three lines down. Divide that in half and then half again, and then come to this line, divide that and half and half again. Then from here to here also do in half, we're going to get accurate eyes here. I'm bringing that up. That's where the corner, my eye starts. This is where the other corner ends. These are almond shaped eyes. Or little footballs. We got that one. Now, we're going to divide from here to here and half and then half again, and then half here and half again. From here to here, we're going to start that I. Then it's going to come in and drop down again and create another little football. Then within that, you can just round out the pupils or the eyeball, I should say, inside. Then you can put a black D hut up in the top and that's where the pupil is. But we'll be able to bring more of that out. This just nice to see where it is. Well, I'll let you get caught up with those eyes and then we'll start working on more of the wolf ears and stuff. Go ahead and do that now. 6. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Adding Ears: Let's put in the ears. Coming up to this corner here where our ears going to start from here to here, just find that halfway point there and our ears going to pass through that point into our head. Now it's just going to run down this line all the way down, but still we want to curve back into the head. Right about a quarter of the way. That's half and then half again comes down. There's just a little bit of an ear lobe right there too, so we can put that in. Then it's split down and that just intersects right to that point there. Now for this year, we're going to come up to this line here and we're going to divide that in half. Then from here to the top of the head, we're going to divide that in half and then half again that year is going to start there and go through that point and then drop more drastically down into the head. Then it's going to come up and then drop straight down onto the head. Again, there's just a little bit of split here that runs through that halfway point down into the head. Next, I want to bring out some variants of where the dark fur will be. I'm going to come into this line here and about a quarter of the way to the end, bring that and it's going to wrap up and through this point here and then back down into that line. Same thing here from here to here about halfway, it's going to wrap up curve going through this point. And then down this time is close to about a quarter. Actually, we'll just make it down to this line here and then off. Then everything above in this area will be gray. This will be more white. You do that and then we're going to add in just a couple more things to our wolf and then we'll be done drawing it out. 7. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Drawing the Legs: The last things we need to do for our wolf in the drawing portion is come back to this snow bit here and just run it off down to that corner there. And then also put in the pas, which are going to start from this line here and run down to that point there. That's one of them. Then the other ones from that point down to here or close just running off the canvas there. Great. Do that quick step and then we'll start putting color into our wolf. 8. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Putting in the First Layer of Dark Paint: Well done on drawing the wolf. For the pinking portion, we're going to start working dark to light. Pull out that medium sized slap brush, and we're going to put in our darkest areas of our wolf, starting with the black and just a little bit of that blue. It's just a very dark black blue. That's going to go right here behind the ears to start. This paint can go on. Some of these colors can be transparent, they're going to go on transparently, but that's okay because we'll be able to put in some more layers to build up the opaqueness of the color. It's a little bit right up in here and you can see I'm already bringing out my fur texture just by using the bristles of the brush to carve in the paint. Be it goes on transparently, you can see the brush stroke. That's why I'm using that to my advantage by carving in that fur. The direction of the brushstroke is very important as well because that's going to bring a realistic look to that fur. It were going straight up and down or the other direction or horizontally, it wouldn't look natural. The direction of the fur brings out the natural form of the body. I'm just laying all this paint and color in where the darkest areas of the fur are to start. H. We're going to keep working with this color, but I'm going to switch to my small panty brush. I have more control in these detailed areas. That's going over those lines for my eyes to darken them. But just leaving the eyeball still unpainted, Then lastly, right here into the nostrils of the nose. Beautiful. That's all we're going to do with that first layer of dark, do that step and then in the next step adds more layers. 9. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Adding a Layer of Gray to the Face: For this next step, we're going to return to that medium size brush. We're going to make a lighter blue gray for the mask in the forehead. I'm going to take my white and actually just bring it in and add it to that color I was just working with. If it's already dried, that was black with a little bit of that blue, but now I'm adding white to it to lighten it up to make a medium blue gray by taking black, mixing it into the white to make a medium gray, and then bringing blue into it to give it more of a blue tone. And this color going to paint all into that mask area here above this line. Again, being very mindful of my brush strokes and the direction that they are going so that I can create a natural look to the fur. I fans out from the top and then as it reaches the sides of the face here, it falls down. And I'm breaking up this line a little bit to softening it. Great. That's all I'm going to do with that color. Do that step now and then I'll meet you in the next step. 10. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Painting the Nose: Since we're working with that black blue color, we're going to use our small poinky brush and revisit that color but make a different shade of it by taking our black and adding blue to it. But this time, just a little bit of white. It's not as light as this and not as dark as this. That's going to be here in our nose. Feeling in that area around the nostrils, just to get that base color in there. Perfect. Do that step and then I'll meet you in the next one. 11. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Painting a Layer of Brown Fur in the Back: We're going to add some warm brown for wolf now. Heating that medium brush out again. We're going to take our raw umber this time and mix it with some white to lighten that up a little bit. I'm going to make it a little darker. Want it to be a darker brown to start. I actually just bringing a hint of black just to make it a little bit more gray. Great. Starting here between the ears. I'm going up and over, but leaving a bit of white here and between Then another band appear to get this fur cacture I'm doing, I'm just using the blade part of my brush going straight on and then as if I'm taking grass, and then I'm Sorry, I had to get that in there. The direction on my brush strokes, again, is very important and you can see the direction that they've been shifting. Copy that in your painting. I want to extend some of these out because it was a bit more long fur in the back here and some up in here I want to bring out. Then there's this color right here into the ear that little split area that we need there. Just bringing some of that brown in. Then lastly, right here into the middle of the ear. Great. Maybe a little bit of warmth right in there too in that middle of the ear. Beautiful. All right. Go ahead and mix that color and then I'll meet you in the next step. 12. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Adding Light Tan Fur: We're going to keep working with this color, but we're going to add white to it to lighten it up. Taking white and that raw umber, create a lighter version of it now and start to bring out some more variations of color in the wolf starting here. This is going to go all the way down to the nose now a little bit under the eyes. Give me a little bit here under the face just so we can start to get rid of those black drawing lines and the grid lines. Now, adding even more white to that color can go here in between and paint in those white spaces with that color. Don't worry too much about losing some of these breast strokes that we already have in. We're going to be bringing those back out in future layers. We're just looking to get all of our color down onto our canvas, getting rid of that white canvas so then we can start building up our layers. All right. I'm going to leave then these other wet spaces for the next step. Do that now and then in the next step, we're going to be adding a little bit more white to the color. So keep it wet. O. 13. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Adding a Layer of White Fur: Okay. For this step, we're going to take the white and bring a little bit of that light Raw Umber into the white. But really, it looks quite white on the palette still and just a slight off white on the canvas, as you can see here. Breaking up these lines and areas so it looks more fur like. Painting no dark drawing lines. Break up this just a little bit. And lastly, up here in the ears. I love it. I can start seeing the wolf fur coming together. All right. Do that step now. O. 14. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Painting the Legs: For this step, we're going to use our small pinky brush and take our raw umber with just a little bit of black and a little bit of white to make a medium gray brown color. We're going to paint some lines here into the paws just to break up that white just a little bit. I'm going to add a little bit of blue to the color for these back ones. Just so I know that that's a different leg. I'm just breaking that up there with that color so I can let that dry and go over it then with this white color. We're going to go back to that white that we're just using in the face and paint that right over that color. You can see it's created this nice effect here where you can still see bit of the fur coming true. But then the white softly over it. Do that step now. 15. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Painting in the Background and Snow: For this next sep, I'm going to use my largest brush and take my white and bring in just a hint of that blue, a hint. Because we want it to read as white and you can see, as I put it on, it has a little hint of that blue in there without being too blue. It's not even a baby blue, an off white. I'm going to bring that into the background here getting rid of those grid lines and even bringing it into the buy I wolf a little bit so I can break up that black drawing line. It only takes just a hint of that color. It's easy to overdo. Okay. And lastly, this color goes in right here that little bit of snow. For this one, you can add a little more blue to it if you want. So we know it's snow and not sky. This stuff, however, is pure white. We're going to rinse off that big brush and just go right with that pure white and paint it in there, getting rid of those lines. We'll be able to do more layers too. No worries if you can still see those lines. Can probably hear my cap wondering, Where are you? Where's dinner? Well, she's already had dinner, but I should be out for dinner. But I'm putting in a late night into the studio, and that's great. All right. Cool. All that we have left for our on your painting is the eyes. We'll do that in the next step. 16. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Painting the Eyes: For our eyes, we're going to use our small pointy brush and the raw umber was a little bit of the red to make a red brown. That's going to go right here inside our eyes. I find it look like beady red eyes right now. That's at all scary, but don't worry, we're going to be adding some highlights into there and getting rid of that red. We're just working dark to light. If you want your wolf to have blue eyes or yellow eyes, you can do that too. Four. 17. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Adding a New Layer of Dark Fur to the Face and Details in the Nose: All right. Let's move into Addi's new layers into our wolf. This is second go around now. And all these colors should be dry, which is why we use acrylic paint. And we're going to start with that small pointing brush again, taking black, mixing it with blue to revisit this dark color. But this time, I'm going to add just a little bit of white to it to lighten it up. So it's darker than this, but lighter than this. I'm going to begin to pull out some more fur but finer details now on a edge a little bit more black to that. And This gets darker right here in the center of the face with smaller brush strokes as I work my way up, this forehead just scrubbing that color in. The paint starts to get gummy and sticky as it's drying on you, you can add a little bit of water to it to help make it flow more easily on the canvas. Uh, Just going over that area just a little bit more. Also breaking that up just a little bit. Then also this color into the nose one more time. But this time, I'm going to add a hint of white to that color to it up a shade so that I can bring out the nostrils more and get some three dimensional shape to the nose. That goes right over the top. Then again, some more highlight right here on the top. With a little bit more of the white catching the light on that side. I think that's all we're going to do with that color right now. All right. So do that step now. A 18. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Adding a Second Layer of Dark Fur to the Back: It's off that small pointy brush. You're going to revisit our raw umber with a little bit of black in it and some white to lighten it up slightly a little bit more black back into that and again, bring out these hairs here between the ears, slightly pulling them. Up. Me across the back. Great adding the browns. And 19. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Adding Another Layer of Paint to the Background: Take out that biggest brush again. Let's use the pure white to bring out another layer in the snow and finally get rid of those grid lines. Then use this color to add just a little bit of glue to it. Add another layer into this snow patch and then the background. I don't know what that was. Okay. I love that. You want to work on the eyes a little bit. Let's be that in the next step. Love that. You want to work on the eyes a little bit. Let's be that in the next step. Down in there a little bit too. We'll just add that in there. Then we're going to bring out some of our snow writing here first. We're going to count up one, two, three sections and find a halfway point. This is just going to come into this box about halfway, drop down. Run aloonms line all the way to here where it drops down again about a quarter of the way down. Comes to our center line a little bit of curve from here to here halfway, it's just going to slope down to that and then just run along that line. Do these steps here, and then we'll continue drawing out some more of our wolf, but I just want to get caught up with that for now. 20. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Detailing the Eyes: Taking out that small, pointy brush. Let's take our black and add just a little bit of blue to it and a little bit of white to make a dark blue gray and paint that into these eyelid areas now. And I want to bring down this eyelid more. So I'm going to take white Just run it right off at that. Great. Now I'm going to take tear black go around the eye one more fine. The eyeball and the pupil. I'm going to take blue and add it to that black blue color we're just working with just a little bit more blue, a hint of white and just put it right there in that pupil. I'm going to rinse off that brush. Take my white, a hint of the Raw Umber and paint over that red ever so slightly. But you can still see a bit of that red in there. Rinse off that brush one more time and take pure white and put a glint of light. There glint of light right there. And one red up here. And on the edge. Actually, tunnel down this white dot just a little bit. Fun. A more Black in here. Cool. Starting to come to life. Rwatch that section if you need to. There is a lot in there. 21. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Adding Highlighted Fur to the Face: Let's keep using our small pointy brush. Take the black and make a lighter gray with it this time and bring in just a hint of blue. This lighter blue gray, maybe a little bit more blue, a bit more black. You don't want it to be too light. We can begin to bring in the lighter hairs now into the forehead lightly brushing them around being mindful of the direction of our brush strokes. U uh, a you can see the areas now where I've left it a little bit darker and put in those lighter fur there, follow along with that. Then we're going to add some fur into the background into the back of the wolf and the next sp. Some. 22. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Adding Highlighted Fur to the Back: Salt that small pinky brush. We're going to use pure white, and you're just going to get a little bit more here on my palette. And we're going to do a layer of lighter fur over the back here. And I'm just very lightly brushing this color on to break up that brow a little bit more. But you can still see through it or through the white. Brown shows through that white, which is great. It's what we want. Okay Great. And all we have left to do in the following step is putting snow on our wolf. 23. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Adding Snow to the Fur: We can keep using our small pointy brush and appear white. Let's put snow onto our wolf now. It's going to start here in the forehead with some bigger globs that go into smaller little dots. I'm just randomly placing it in here. But still going with the direction that my brush strokes are going. Continuing up into the back my ears down the nose. And on top of the nose, Hang out a bit. I like that snow there just to break up that blue ort. Make it look like chunky snow. Okay. Well, I think that's just about it. I don't want to to overdo the snow 'cause that can easily happen. So I'm gonna leave it at that. And I like that. Alright. Do that step, and then I'll meet you in the closing. 24. Wolf in Snow Painting Class - Closing Remarks: Wow, what a fun painting. I love painting wolves and there was a lot of fur texture to practice on in this painting. I hope you enjoyed it, and please share your pekings with me. I would love to see and I hope you'll join me in a future painting video. Thank you so much.