Colourful Skies with watercolour : A beginner friendly class

1. Introduction!: Sky is the inspiration for so many. Calm sunrises, dramatic sunsets, overcast days, all these things can bring endless ideas for an artist. But capturing the same with watercolor can be easy or challenging depending on how much details we are going to add. Skies are my source of inspiration, too. Clouds, lights, shadows, colors, et cetera, they provide huge ground for experimentation. I have learned many things over the years when it comes to painting the sky, and here in this class, I have shared few tips and techniques with you. Hi, I'm Suchita. You're instructor for this class. In this class, there are five projects. They are simple ones yet provide lot of opportunities to learn. I'll be guiding you at every step and we'll be helping you to complete the projects. So let's not wait. Come and join me in this class. 2. Materials required: Okay. In this section, we shall see what materials are needed for this class. In this class, I'm using arches 100% cotton watercolor paper. This is of size A four, but I have cut the paper into A six size, and I'm using it for my project. I will talk about the colors in detail in the beginning of each project. But when it comes to brands, I'm using different brands like Windsor and Newton, White Knights, Daniel Smith, and also Michel Mission. When it comes to brushes, I'm using DaVinci size four brush for the initial washes. Size two brush for painting the skies and other details. For finer details, I'm using a rigor brush of size one. I have also used a flat brush from Windsor and Newton. This is optional. Also, we need a palette to mix the colors. I'm using my porcelain palette, and also I have used a porcelain plate. A jar of water for initial washes to mix the paint, for cleaning the brush, et cetera. Cloth towel or a paper towel to wipe off the excess water. Pencil and eraser for sketching. I'm using a masking tape to stick the paper to my table and also a pair of scissors for cutting the masking tape. A scale for drawing straight lines. Or if you have a card that can be used as well. I think that's all we need for this class. Let's gather our materials and start with our class projects. 3. Project 1 : Fiery sky - background: Okay, let's start with our first class project. For the colors, I'm using permanent red, golden, paints gray, and burnt tamber. Let's squeeze all these colors. By the way, you don't need to have the exact colors. Any shade that are similar to the one I'm using will be good. To start with I'm using Da vinci Casaneo size four brush to wet the paper, picking the clean water here and applying it to the paper. I'm gently moving the brush throughout the paper for even distribution of the water. This mop brush I'm using is very soft and it can hold quite a lot of water. I would say this is my new favorite brush. Next I'm taking the damnci sized to brush and picking the first color that is golden. Adding a little bit of water to just the consistency. And now let's apply this golden color in the middle, leaving some space to the top, as well as at the bottom. I'm picking more pigment and adding it again because we want to have the saturated look. And if you observe, I'm keeping this part lighter. This would give a nice variation to the tonal values, right? Next, let's pick our second color, which is red. It's a really bright color, and I'm applying it directly to the top region. Also adding some red color on this golden yellow. More darker pigment to the topmost region. It's like red on the top, yellow at the bottom, and orange shade in the middle of the red and yellow color. I think I will add a little more yellow next step is to blend all these colors. For that, I'm cleaning my brush, making sure that my brush doesn't have any extra water and blending these colors. Now, if you see my brush has picked up some colors. So I'm cleaning it again and wiping off the excess water. We should do that all the time and blending these colors again. For the lower part, I'm going to keep it lighter because anyway, we will add some details there. I'm applying some more red colour to the top and blending it. Similarly, picking a little more yellow that was left on my palette and blending with the red colour. Add more colours only if the paper is wet. Otherwise, they just don't blend. This is enough for the background. We shall wait for it to dry now and then add the details. Meanwhile, if you have extra water on the masking tape, remove it with a clean brush like I'm doing. Okay, then, let's meet in the next section to add some details. 4. Project 1 : Fiery sky - details: Now that our sky has dried, let's start with the details. I'm picking the burnt timber now. This is more like a watery consistency of mixture that I'm taking and I'm adding some mountains. Now with this brown, starting at the bottom left corner, I'm making mountain like shapes. Observe that I'm holding my brush loosely and it is slightly bent so that I get those not so controlled strokes, right? Also, intentionally, I'm creating these jagged edges to show the sharp areas of the mountains. I'm adjusting the shape here. If you prefer, you can add a simple sketch of these mountains and then fill the colors. Now with a clean brush, I'm picking the next color which is gray. Observe this time, I haven't added extra water. It's mostly the pigment in my brush. Now I'm applying this gray color randomly like some highlights. Some gray lines here and there with the tip of my brush. I note that my mountains are still wet so that when I add the gray color, it blends well with a brown color. Also, remember, at this point, we shouldn't add any extra water to the paper. I'm taking my rigor brush, which is size one brush. And now let's add some bits, picking the gray color, and here as well, almost like no water, only the pigment in my brush. I'm making sure that the brush doesn't have any extra water. And be careful here not to touch this. I'm resting my arm outside the painting. Now, only with the tip of the brush, I'm quickly making this shape. This is our flying bird. One more here. Just vary the size and shape of this structure. That will give us a flying bird. I somehow hurt my finger. I don't know when. I was preparing for the class and saw it was bleeding. Don't know what happened here. Sorry about that. We are done with our first painting. Now it's time to remove the masking tape. As always, remove the masking tape with an angle to avoid tearing of the paper. Yes, this is our first project. If you see the red color has seeped out, even though I had a masking tape, but I think it is okay. I will leave it as it is. If this happens to you and if you want to fix that, you can either use white quash or white marker to cover that. Hope you like that first painting. And in the next section, let's start with our second painting. 5. Project 2 : Tranquil forest - background: Okay, we are starting with our second painting. I have used the masking tape to stick the paper to my table. Let's take a look at the colours required for this project. We need paints gray. I already have some in the palette. Next is spiral scarlet. It's a orangey red shade. Then bit of a hookers green. And some indigo. These are the four colors we are using today. Now, our colours are ready. Let's start with the painting. I'll take my Dawnci size four brush and picking the clean water and applying it to the paper. We have to make sure that the paper is properly wet, so I keep adding water and distribute them evenly throughout the paper. Going over it multiple times will help the paper to stay wet for longer duration, and thus we get more time to work on the painting. Now taking my Dawnci size to brush and picking the first color that is pyral scarlet. And I'm applying it to the middle. I'm doing some uneven horizontal strokes. The red color looks too bright, isn't it? I'm picking the second color that is indigo and applying it to the top part above the red color. Also, I'm letting both the indigo and the scarlet color to blend. Do you see the muted purple color that is creating here? It's not too bright purple. So this would tone down the red color a bit. I'm washing my brush now and removing the water from the brush, and now blending these colors. I feel it would be nicer with more purple shade than this bright red. So I will add some more indigo and blend with the scarlet. Adding some red color and blending it. You can add more colours at this point, but you have to make sure that the paper is still wet. Now let's add some colours at the bottom. I'm picking the thicker consistency of green, and now making these vertical strokes at the bottom. These vertical lines are to depict the far away trees. The colours are spreading nicely and creating these smoother edges. I like it. Before this layer of light green rice, we have to add our next color, which is darker green. But before that, I'm adding a bit of pyral scarlet here because this area, it felt a little too white. Now let's add the darker green by mixing the indigo to the hookers green. I'm applying this color on top of the lighter green area, making those quick vertical strokes. At this point, the paper would be drying. At least my paper is drying, so I cannot add any more water than what is actually present on the paper. So the paint I have picked is really thick with almost no water in it. One more thing that I wanted to mention is that we shouldn't cover the underlying layers completely. The lower lighter green layer should be visible. This would show the far away trees and give depth to our painting. Now we have the lighter shade here, just the hooker's green. And then we added indigo to green to make it darker. And now with a rigger brush, I will add some more details. And this time, I will use more indigo and less green to have the darkest mixture. And here, I will add some pine shapes. You know, the paper is still wet and hence, there won't be hard edges. The pine shapes will smudge and create some blurry effect. I'm not adding the full length pine trees because, you know, it's like we see only the top part of the pine tree popping up, and the rest is hidden in the forest. I'll keep adding more trees randomly. Don't add them side by side, vary the size and shape as well to make them look more uneven. You can add more details to the trees that are closer to us. I feel adding these pins is always fun, and I keep doing it more and more. But we shouldn't go overboard here and spoil our painting. That looks good. Now we have to wait for it to dry before adding some details. 6. Project 2 : Tranquil forest - details: Okay, everything has dried. Now it's time for detailing. I'll be adding one or two trees here, taking my rigor brush for that. And let's pick some paints gray. At this point, I don't have any sketch. Gonna loosely draw some tree shapes. So starting from the bottom and slowly moving the brush upwards, this is our tree trunk. Let's stick on it at the bottom. You know, I did not add the sketch for the tree because I wanted to make it loose. If I have a sketch, it would be more like filling the colors and not so much freedom for the brush movements. But if you like to have a sketch of these big trees, I have it attached to the projects and resources section. I'm dragging this line all the way to the top and reaching the edge of the paper. I'm increasing the size of the tree trunk at the bottom, and as it goes up, it gets thinner. Next, I will add branches of different sizes and shapes that are emerging from the tree trunk. To add the branches, I'm using the tip of my brush. I'm choosing a starting point here and dragging the brush in different directions. Wiggle the brush a bit so that we get those went uneven lines. Also, lift it quickly at the end of each stroke. In that way, you can make the tip of those branches quite thin. You can also add small thin lines here and there to depict small branches. I think I will add one more tree, again, picking the same gray color, starting with a trunk. Let's make it thicker. And then I'm slowly dragging the brush upwards. We have to adjust the thickness here. As you know, the lower part of the trunk has to be thicker, and as we go up, it should get thinner. I'm also adding some branches at random places. You know, it's okay if the branches from both the trees overlap. Actually, that looks quite nice. I will add some more small branches. I really like this rigor brush for painting those branches. Previously, I was using some different brush and always had problems creating thin branches. Sometimes, you know, it's not the technique but the tool to be blamed. Before finishing our painting, let's add few birds with a gray color. I'm quickly painting some shapes like we did in the previous project. I want the focus of this painting to be on the trees, not on the birds, so I kept these birds quite small. That's all to our painting. And now let's remove the masking tape. Okay, this time, I managed to get a clean border. That is good. We have successfully completed our second project. Do give it a try. In the next section, we shall start with a brand new one. 7. Project 3 : Peaceful sky - background: Welcome back. Starting with our third class project now. Let's look at the colors we need today. I'm using gamboch. A tiny amount is enough. Next, we need paint's gray. I already have it here. Next, I'm taking indigo. It's here already. And then the fourth colour is quinocridon rose, squeezing it here. Let's start our painting with a simple sketch. I'm using a small card to draw lines. Now we need to add a pole. The sketch is quite simple, starting with a vertical line. And another line that is close to the first one. And now let's add some horizontal lines on the top of the pole, drawing the first line and adding the second line parallel to the first one. Let's give some thickness to these two lines. So I'm drawing parallel lines to both these lines. One more line here in the middle of the pole. Maybe a small box here. We will fill this sketch completely with gray color, so we don't need to worry about keeping the sketch lighter. That is all for this sketch. If you notice, I have left some space at the bottom. There I'm going to add some bushes, as usual, starting with the big brush and applying clean water. Here, we are using the technique called wet on wet. The paper would be wet and we will add colors on the wet paper. Now, make sure that the water is evenly distributed without any blobs of water. I think mine looks good, and let's add the colors now. Starting with our first color, that is new gamboge, and mostly applying it to the bottom like this. I'm making glue strokes here. And then I'm washing my brush, cleaning it, and picking the next color, which is inocrdonrose. You know, this is one of my favorite colors. I use it a lot in my skies, especially because it blends nicely both with blue color and yellow color. Now I'm blending the quinocridon rose with yellow. Let's pick our next color. As you guessed, it is indigo, and indigo will go to the top part. We have yellow and blue color in our sky. We should make sure that they don't mix and create green color. That's why I'm using the quinocrodon rose in between, like a separation. Adding some more indigo to the top region as we want that part to be dark. Now we shall blend all these colors. That's the main step. For blending, I'm cleaning my brush, removing the excess water and move these colors, especially around the edges where there is a transition from indigo to Queen Rose and from queen rose to yellow. I think our sky needs a bit more color because this painting, when it dries, looks much more lighter than this. Some quinocridon rows are in the same colors again at the same place. Then picking the indigo and adding it to the top. Blending these colors again, we shouldn't miss that. For some highlights, I'm picking the rose color and adding some lines. You know, these lines would be visible even after the painting has dried. Also, for the bottom part, I'm adding slight yellow shade. Not too much, just a hint of yellow. Remember all these works when the paper is wet. If the paper is drying, don't try to move the colors. Now we are done with the background. Let's meet in the next section to add details. 8. Project 3 : Peaceful sky - details: Everything has dried. Now for the details, I'll be using only gray color. Here, with my Dawnci sized to brush, I'm picking the gray color, and I'm applying it to the bottom. These are like bushes. You know, I'm holding the brush almost at the end. This will give me loose strokes. We will not go for a lot of details here. Just want to suggest that there are bushes. If you observe, I'm wearing the length of these bushes as well. Some are small, some are large. Now with the same gray color, I'm adding some dots and lines with the tip of my brush. This is to suggest that there are some leaves and twigs that are popping up. Like I said before, I'm just using the tip of my brush and touching the paper, quickly lifting it. And that way, we will get these tiny dots. Now to make it more interesting, I'm taking my smaller brush that is rigor brush. You see I'm washing it. It's a clean brush, and then with a clean brush, I'm dragging these colors. This will create thin lines. These are like branches popping up. The same brush, let's add some dots to show smaller leaves. I'm using the existing color on the paper. I'm not adding any extra. Look at those teeny, tiny leaves that we've painted. I won't be able to get the same effect with a bigger brush. These bushes are right. I think we can move to the next step. Next is to fill the colors for the pole. Again, I'm using my rigor brush, picking the gray color. And filling it inside the sketch that we made. Doing it slowly so that I won't go outside the sketch. Make sure that the bottom part of the pole blends with the bushes. It should look like it is covered by the bushes. Keep filling the colors in each boxes, starting with the horizontal lines now. I'm carefully adding thin lines. We don't want those lines to be too thick or too prominent. This step is going to take some time. We should apply the color slowly so that it doesn't go outside the sketch. When I do the color filling like this, it brings me a lot of good memories. Those days when we had our sketchbooks with all kinds of drawings like fruits, vegetables, flowers, and then we colored them. I had a big box of sketch pens. There were literally a lot of colors that I couldn't even name. Those days were really nice. I Once we have filled all the boxes, now it's time to add some thin lines to show the electric wires crossing each other. These lines has to be as thin as possible. So go for the smallest brush you have got. With a tip of my brush, I'm starting from the pole and adding small lines like this, one more line from here to here. Again, I'm using the tip of my brush, starting at the edge, dragging the brush all the way and reaching the pole. Let's do that one more time, starting at the edge and adding a line towards the pole. Let's add some more lines crossing each other. That I think would be interesting to see. If you find it difficult to add such thin lines, you can also use a black ink pen or a marker pen for drawing these lines. Maybe some lines from the top and going downwards and continuing on the other side of the pole as well. One more starting from here and moving towards the pole, then towards the other edge. Maybe I will add some small lines in between these two, like this. Before finishing our painting, we have to add some small birds sitting on these electric wires. Here, I don't have any sketch. Simply adding a silhouette of the bird. You can also mark it with a pencil and then fill the colors, so it's okay. Go for whichever method you prefer. Adding the second bird now. I took the reference of the first bird, but still my second bird got bigger and fluffier than the first one. Now I'm trying to adjust them so that they both look similar. I will stop at this point. You know, too much detailing will ruin this. So I have finished the painting. Now let's remove the masking tape and see how our painting has turned out. Always pull the tape outward so that there is a less chance of damaging the painting. This is our beautiful evening scene painting. Hope you had fun painting this. Let's meet in the next section and start with our next project. 9. Project 4 : Sunset and stream - background: Welcome back to our fourth class project. I'll take you through all the colors that are needed for this class. I'm using six colors here, starting with the paints gray, which is already in my palette. Next is Nu gamboge, which I have it here. Then indigo, which is here. I'm using the hookers green light, which I have it here. Next is quinocredon rose, which is also here. And one extra color that I will use today is olive green. We shall start with a simple pencil sketch. You know, I'm leaving the two thirds of the space from the top and I'm adding some hilts, okay? I hope this is visible and now in the middle, let's say there is a small stream flowing in between the hills. The distance between the edges of the stream, it looks shorter at the farther edge, and it gets wider near to us. I'm keeping these lines lighter because then it is easier to correct the mistake. Also, you know, these lines can be visible at the end, which we want to avoid. So to hide that, I prefer to have a lighter sketch. Okay, that is all for the sketch. It's quite simple, isn't it? We just added hills and a small stream flowing in between. I will lighten these lines a bit with my eraser. Now let's start with the first step that is wetting the paper. I'm picking the clean water with the help of my big brush and applying it as usual. Moving the brush up and down and making sure that the paper is evenly wet. It's important to wet the paper, but also at the same time, the paper shouldn't be dripping with water. Okay, now let's paint the sky region. I'm picking the lightest color first, which is yellow. Applying the yellow around the edge of the hills. I'll not cover the entire lower part with yellow color. I'm leaving some white space as well. Then I'm washing my brush and picking the next color, which is quinocydon rose, and I'm applying it above the yellow. I'm not going to blend these colors so much. Let it show some pure yellow and pink shades. And now for the top region, I'm applying the indigo. We have to blend these colors, but I'm doing very little blending today. I'm softening only around the edges. I'm cleaning my brush often to avoid unwanted color mixing. I would like to make the upper part more darker, so I'm adding the indigo again. Now, you know, this is a stream we have added, and we have to add the same colours as the to sky as reflection. I'm starting with a yellow color that is our new gamboge, and then quinocldonose color. And then we have to add the indigo now. After all these colors have been placed in their position, we have to blend them. Blending these colors with a clean damp brush, adding more pigment if required, and blending them again. Like I said before, main thing here is to remember not to add extra water, remove the excess water from the brush every time after the wash. Here we can go for a lot of details like reflection of the hills in the water, rocks, grasses, trees, whatever. But I wanted to keep this really simple. So I'm not going to add other details here. Also, when the paper is small like this, it's really difficult to add a lot of details. Okay, I have been adding the same colors again, indigo, pink, and yellow and blending these colors. Remove the extra water from the edges if you have any. Now let's wait for this to dry and add some details in the next section. 10. Project 4 : Sunset and stream - details: The colors have dried here. Let's add the hills now. Again, I'm using the size to brush and picking the olive green color. Adding a little bit of water to adjust the consistency. I'm taking this milky consistency of olive green, and I'm applying it here. You see? Observe these jagged edges I'm making. They are to show some faraway trees or ridges along the hill. By the way, my paper is completely dry at this point, we are adding the color to the dry paper. This technique is called wet on dry. I'm stopping it halfway now. Similarly, I'm adding the olive green color to the hills that are on the left side of the stream as well. Be careful while painting around the edges. We don't want the stream to be covered in green. Here as well, I'm stopping halfway. Now, before this layer dries, I'm taking the hookers green adding it here. You see? This way, hookers green will get mixed with olive green color. Now, we shall do the same thing on the left side as well. Again, be careful around the edges. If you prefer take a smaller brush to apply the color. Now, again, we have to add the darker tone before this layer dries. So I'm taking the indigo and mixing it with hooker's green to get darker shade of green, and I'm adding this darker green on these hills. But I will not cover everything with this dark green. This is more for highlights. Let's do the same on the other side. I'm adding some lines here and there. We have to blend these colors now. As you know, with a clean damp brush, I'm doing the blending I'll slightly blend these colors, and also I'm making sure that the underlying lighter colors are not completely covered. Then I'll pick the indigo directly, and I'm adding more highlights, especially to the foreground my previous layer hasn't dried yet, so these lines will not create hard edges. When we add lighter and darker shades like this, it brings more character to the picture. It doesn't feel too flat. Now I'm taking the gray color with the rigor brush and highlighting the edges that are facing us. For example, this edge, if you see, it's facing the viewer, right. So I'm adding the gray color to give some thickness to this edge. Imagine standing in front of a stream. Wherever you stand, you won't be able to see every edge, every curve, right. In our painting, I'm assuming that we are looking from the center due to the curve the river is taking. On the near end, we can only see the left edge but on the farther end, the river has went again, and there we can see the right edge. Hope this makes some sense. Slowly adding this thin line with a gray color. Now I have increased the thickness of this right edge too. And on the far end, the stream just disappears around the hill. You know, both the edges will look like as if they're merging and becoming one line. That is how the perspective works. At last, as usual, I'm going to add some birds picking the gray color again with my rigger brush. And like we discussed before, draw some shapes in different directions and sizes, that would create our birds. Yes, we have finished our painting. It's quite simple, isn't it? We didn't go for too many details here. I wanted to keep it as simple as possible so that it's not intimidating to attempt this. This is the final look of our painting. Do try this and share your finished work with me. I see you in the next section where we shall paint another cool project. 11. Project 5 : Desert sunset - background: Welcome to our fifth and final project of this class. I'll start with a simple pencil sketch. It's just a line that I'm adding to know the separation between the sky and the ground. That's enough for the sketch. Now let's talk about the colors required for this class. We need Alyzarine crimson, squeezing it to my palette, then yellow ochre, then dioxyzine violet. Next I'm taking the indigo. For the ground part, burn timber and paint gray for adding the highlights, and that's it for all the colors. As the first step, with the help of my Dawnci size four brush, I will wet the paper with the clean water. Use the clean water here because if the water you are using already has some colors in it, that might result in unwanted colors in the painting. I'm moving the brush up and down to make sure that there are no blobs of water. Okay. Now I'm taking the smaller size to brush, and let's start with the first color that is yellowcrePicking the nice and juicy mixture of yellowcre and I'm adding at the middle in here. Even though yellow ochre is an earth pigment, it can still go quite well in the sky painting. I use yellow ochre a lot, especially in winter skies. I just love the feel it gives, you know? All right. Now let's wash this, and I'm just dragging the yellow ochre down a bit. No extra color, moving the existing color downwards to create this gradient look. Next we shall take our second color, which is Alizarin crimson, adding little water to get this milky consistency of mixture. And then I'm applying it on top of the yellow ochre. I'm letting them overlap with each other and create this peachy color. I will add some more of the crimson to have a vibrant sky. Meanwhile, I also move the crimson down and blend with the yellow cre, next I'm taking this purple color. But if you see it's too bright and I want to mute it down a bit by adding some indigo to it, now we shall add this to the top part of the sky. One more time, we shall add the same colors in the same way. I'm picking the yellow ochre, applying it to the lower region. But I'm leaving some lighter areas to have a nicer gradient. Then let's take the Alizarin crimson and apply it near to the purple shade. I'm blending this crimson and purple. Now I want to wash my brush and pick the crimson again and add it near to the yellow ochre. I'm washing my brush because my brush has picked up the purple shade. If I add it directly on top of yellow ochre, that would create muddy brown color. Now let's add the indigo mixed with purple to the top region like before. And I'm just, like, blending them with my clean brush. Slightly moving the purple to mix with crimson creates kind of pinkish purple shade. Next, we have this yellow ochre that needs some softening. I'm cleaning my brush as it had purple in it and softening the edges here. If you see the colors are not moving so much, that's because the paper is almost dry in my case. I'm adding a little more yellow ochre and blending everything. We have completed the background. I will meet you in the next section where we shall paint the foreground. 12. Project 5 : Desert sunset - details: Now it's time for the details, so I'll add the ground part. I'm picking my DaVinci sized to brush, and then let's take this burn tumber. It's a vibrant arch tone, which I use quite often in painting grounds and mountains. Now, picking this burned timber and I'm directly adding it to the ground part. It's just like filling inside the line we added. Look how rich this pigment is. I must say, all the pigments like ochres, umber, sienna, et cetera, that are provided by the brand, Windsor and Newton are quite vibrant. Now to add some variation to this brown color, I'm picking the paints gray and adding some highlights. I'm darkening the foreground with a gray pigment. Now with my rigor brush, I'm picking the burn tumber. We're going to add some cactus plants. I'm starting with a small vertical line, making it thicker, and now I'm adding a small branch, connecting it to the main stem. These branches, they don't get thinner as they go up. They have almost the same thickness all the way. I'm picking the bun number again and I'm adding a small one in the horizon. As it is small, it appears to be far away, isn't it? And also, I'm keeping it lighter just to make sure that it's not so prominent. Next, we shall add a big one at the center, making this vertical line, which is more prominent this time, adjusting the thickness of it. Also the edges of this type of cactus are blunt. So I'm trying to mimic that somehow. Now let's add some branches again, branches that are protruding from the main stem. Also, some branches from these secondary stems too. I'll add one more. Now on the left side, I'll add another branch emerging from the main stem. Like we talked before, it should have the same thickness all the way. Now you see just by wearing the height of each cactus, we can create depth here. Here it feels like the largest one is near and the smallest one is really far from us, right? Now, picking the gray color with my rigor brush and adding some highlights. I'm adding some gray lines on each of the stems that we added. This I'm doing only for the front prominent cactus. Now it is time to add some texture to the ground. So I'm taking my rigor brush, and it has a point end, if you see. With the help of this, I'm going to scratch the paper to create some lines. It kind of shows that the ground is not too smooth and it has some texture in it. You can skip this step if you want, but I wanted to show you this anyway, like how it is done. Next I'm taking a flat brush, which is from Windsor and Newton. And with a dry brush, I'm brushing some paints outwards. The thing is this detailing works only when the colors haven't dried. But here in my case, it's a little bit late, you know, the colors have mostly dried. Still, on the horizon line, you can see there are some grass like structures that are formed. Anyway, both these detailing steps are completely optional. I just wanted to show you that this can be done. So we have reached the final step of our painting that is painting some birds, picking the gray color. Adding these tiny shapes. This is exactly like we did in all other previous projects. Vary the size and direction of these shapes, and thus we will get at flying birds. Add as many as you want. I'll go ahead and add one more. Okay, that's it, guys. We have completed our final class project. I'm removing the masking tape now. I had so much fun painting all the five projects. Hope you also enjoyed the class. Thanks for joining. Meet me in the next section where we shall summarize what we have learned. 13. Final thoughts!: We have finished these five beautiful projects in this class. First was very simple. We painted the sky, just added some mountains and some flying birds. The second project got bit more detail because we went for pine forest and tall bay trees in the foreground. Third project, I think pose some challenges of painting these thin electric lines. Fourth one was not very detailed, but as there was a stream, we had to understand the reflection and perspective. And the fifth one had a lot of colors in the ski, so we had to do the blending. Also, we created depth by varying the size of the cacti. In this class, we have talked about variety of topics that would help you along your watercolor journey. I would recommend you to try all these projects and then apply your own ideas on top of it. Please upload your creations in the project section and leave a review. Thank you so much for joining this class. I see you in the next class.