Create Unique Watercolors : Magical Lift-the-Flap Door and Seascape Painting

1. Introduction : Watercolors often feel like the perfect medium to add magic into one's life. Yet as time goes by, you might have noticed how easy it is for each new painting too quickly vanish into this fast-paced world. If this sounds familiar, I would like to help you. Hi, I'm Francoise Blayac. I'm a self-taught artists from France. I create realistic art with watercolor and mixed media. Overtime I have specialized into teaching online and locally. As above all, I love to experiment and share my findings with the world. When I started watercolor, I knew I wanted to create one-of-a-kind keeps sakes, fun collections to stimulate creativity by taking myself and others on a magical ride without necessarily selling or exhibiting my art. Instead, because I didn't know how, because it felt a bit scary to be different, I ended up quieting my urge for adventurous creativity. With this class, I want to help you uncover a new world of possibility for watercolor painting, and finally released to creativity hand break. That's why we're going to allow magic into our practice and create a one-of-a-kind lift the flat painting. I'll show you what supplies I use for this type of project. Then we'll practice techniques to paint a wet door that looks dreamy and magical. Specifically, we'll learn about the use of colors, white gouache, and textural effects for magical art. We will create a door with flaps and go on to painting a seascape that fits beautifully with the first painting in terms of colors, size, and overall aspect for an exceptional final project. Finally, we'll finish putting the lift of flat painting together, and I will give you some tips and ideas for future projects of the kind in the last lesson. This class is best suited to intermediate artists who have played with watercolors for a while, who feel ready to repeat it their art to this medium and to allow their inner creativity to finally takeover. Tell me, are you ready to allow a different kind of magical watercolor into your art? Because if so, let's get started. 2. Your Class Project: Our class project is made of two distinct paintings that are meant to merge into one illustration with flaps. We're going to work on each painting step-by-step, and you'll notice that even though this type of watercolor painting might look quite intricate at first glance, the DIY part of it is quite simple and minimal. However, I recommend not to skip any of the lessons as they're specifically tailored to this type of project. Lessons build on top of each other, and with each one, they're going to be small adjustments and tips to implement. Starting with sketches where I'll show you how to plan and adapt the sketch to lift the flap illustration. Color palette lessons will also teach you how to create harmony between two different paintings and maximize the magical effect when opening the flaps. We will proceed to create each painting and I'll show you what techniques I use to infuse magic into a piece of art. Finally, with both the door and the seascape, we will learn how to prepare for our final project and put it together. A suppliers list, photo references, photos of my paintings are available in the resources section when you need them. Don't forget to download them there. When you're done, please share your project to the project and resources section like so, and feel free to reach out to me if you need any help or extra information. Without further ado, let's get started and meet me next for a look at our supplies. 3. Supplies: To create a painting with a flap, all we need are basic watercolor supplies, a cutter, and some glue. The paper I use my actual watercolor paper, I cut out two sheets out of a large pad and you can go for a size of 6 by 8 inches like me for both paintings, or you can use something slightly bigger or smaller. Really want to make a huge difference. I always recommend 100 percent cotton papers like this one with a cold-pressed finish and a weight of 300 GSM. Other watercolor papers will work just fine. A major difference I notice is they dry a lot faster, which can cause blooms and other marks or hard lines to show even when you work fast. The colors might also spread and mix less easily because of that. But overall, don't worry if what you're using is different than what I have because with supplies, it really depends on preference and what you're used to in the first place. Next, we'll need some paintbrushes. My go-to are a couple of round and round and pointed paintbrushes. I think a minimum of one round paintbrush like this one will help. It can be a bit smaller than mine if you like. Then it is going to be useful to paint large areas or paint the base layer because there's no detail. Then one or two round and pointed paintbrushes will help with fine lines and drawing little things like the door knob in the first painting, or the boats on our seascape, for instance. Don't forget that you can download the list of the supplies in the resources section of the class, I made sure to include precise references to what I use in there. For our watercolor paints, we'll keep it simple with black, pink, yellowish green, and a bright blue. With practice, I've come to work with limited palettes as many artists recommend to do, and I can vouch for the fact that it helps focus on painting and even help create a certain harmony in the artwork, and I'm confident you will also notice with the experience on this class, that four colors is enough to paint gorgeous works. We'll prepare the mixes later in some of the next lessons. These are the exact art philosophy shades I'm using and what you could substitute them with. Although it really does not matter if your colors are not exactly like mine. Masking tape is very useful to tape each sheet onto the surface you choose to work on. I really enjoy and never have to worry about the paper moving around as I paint. Thanks to that. If you don't own such construction tape, scrambling washi tape will be an excellent substitute. A few paper towels and two jars of water like this one here will be useful as well. These are actually very basic watercolor must-have supplies as we need to wet, rinse our paintbrushes, but also soak the extra water or paint off with a towel, depending on the techniques we'll be using. To draw sketches for watercolor painting, I use a basic pencil and eraser. This type of ruler is very convenient too and you will see how we use it for our lift the flap painting, what you have at home will be just fine. White gouache is my favorite way to place highlights. It's also great to create more of a magical feeling in a painting, and I'll show you how I use it to achieve that effect. I've had students substitute with white acrylic paint, which works except, so you know, it dries a lot faster and it's hard to easily create the translucent, magical look we can get from gouache. I use large tins like this one to mix my colors, and I like that because it's roomy, and I can also use it to pour the paint from the tubes and take my favorite colors with me wherever I go. Let's not forget a heat gun or hairdryer. Because if you're not patient like me and you prefer to keep painting rather than wait for the paint to dry between each stage, it will be very helpful. For the shore-to-do-it-yourself crafty part of the class, you will need a cutter or anything similar to cut the door open. I also use the backside of my watercolor paper blocks whenever I need to make sharp cuts because the cardboard there is very thick. This way, I'm sure I don't damage my desk, otherwise, scrapbooking math works great for the same purpose. Some glue would also be helpful, although don't worry, you really don't need such a large bottle. I found this one on my art store and I picked it because it works with multi surfaces like wood, cardboard, paper, and other things. Acid-free products are always best to avoid and damage our watercolors over time, and you will find those in the scrapbooking department if you're not sure about what to get. That's it for the supplies, so meet me in the next lesson, where we'll start sketching. [MUSIC] 4. The Door : A Simple Sketch !: [MUSIC] In this lesson, we're going to draw the simplest door sketch there is. So let's tape the paper all around with masking tape first. [MUSIC] Now, grab your ruler, pencil, and eraser, and let's start. The first thing I do to center my door nicely is decide where I want the bottom to be. Once you have that, trace a line and locate the middle of that line. It will be the middle of our door later. [MUSIC] I'm measuring how much I have between the masking tape and the start of the line. This helps in making sure that we have the same width above too. That's why I'm placing a dot further up to make sure the side of the door is straight. [MUSIC] I repeat on top to finish the door frame. Make sure to decide where the top should be and take into account, we'll be adding a little bit of wall texture above and all around, as well as the ground at the bottom. I know where the middle of the door should fall, so here's the last line. [MUSIC] The ground will be right there. That is all we need since with watercolor, we can add all the detail and cool nuances with paint directly. Intricate and detailed sketches are not that necessary most of the time. Remember to determine where the top and bottom of your door should be and to leave room for whatever you wish to paint all around to make a door painting a bit more interesting. Now, I'll see you in the next lesson for some color mixing. [MUSIC] 5. Start with Three Colors: Aside from white gouache, we need only three colors to paint the door. The ones I'll be using, are bright green, mine is called greenish yellow. Then a vibrant blue, and the one I have is Prussian blue. Finally, I decided to add black for strong shadows. In this class, there won't be much layering. We'll paint a beautiful door with minimum effort. This is why I recommend to make your green and blue mixes very creamy, loaded in pigment, but still runny enough that both colors can flow and mix together on paper. I pick up some water to mix it with the paint, but I'm careful to keep this quite concentrated. I usually love my paintings very realistic and detailed and I'd normally go with lighter mixes and then layer with more paint later. The reason why we'll be taking a looser approach with this door painting is because with the final project, there's quite a bit going on. This door painting, the seascape painting, and the door opening up. Besides all the loose techniques I will have used later on the door will contribute to the magical feel we want to convey with this project. For black, the mix is going to be different. First of all, I think it's nice to mix a little bit of blue to it, just so we can establish that connection between such a strong color and the door's main color, which is blue. To keep the door as the main subject in our painting, I decided the wall would be very light and minimalistic, which is why here the mix is very watery. We could take many different routes with this type of artwork. Whether it is a very loose or a very detailed painting style, in the end, we are looking for the different elements of the painting to contrast with each other, and that's when having a very light color to balance with our strong blue and green mixes comes in handy. Remember that there's no right or wrong in terms of what color or shade you pick or how you decide to conduct the painting itself. It is all about choice and preference. One project can lead to so many different outcomes. What can help drive decisions though will be to see what you wish to emphasize in the painting, and how you can mix your colors so there is contrast between each one of them. The way I went about it was to tie the black mix to the rest by adding blue in it, and also to add a lot of water to that same mix to balance with the vivid blue and green colors that we will add on the door. I will see you next to paint a quick base layer on our door. 6. Create a Base Layer: We are ready to start with a loose and magical base layer on our door. You will need two paint brushes, one to paint, and the other one will remain clean so we can add water splatters at the end. To make your job easier, I will suggest to use masking tape around the door so you can focus on just painting instead of trying to keep the paint off the area that is meant to be the wall Let's start with green that I'll keep towards the bottom of the door. I attached the reference photo I used for this. You can find it in the resources section. You'll notice it's quite different than the painting I came up with. But there are elements like these bits of greenish moss that I kept. We want to work fast so this paint doesn't dry on us before we add blue. Because ideally, both colors should be able to blend and intermix, and that will only be possible if they're both wet. Don't be afraid to overlap both colors. It's one of the best techniques I use for realism because this will lead to creating new colors. The more variety you can create out of a limited palette, the better for realism. We really want to avoid an area that's just a solid blue and another one that's just a solid green right next to it. We need some a connection between the two. Let's not wait for this to dry and splatter clean water with the other paintbrush to get some blooms to form on the door. This watercolor effect will contribute to making the door look more dreamy and weathered to. You will see we will cover up some of those blues later when we add details. But there will be some of them showing through still and it will be beautiful as we're heading towards a painting that's not quite loose, but not hyper-realistic, either. Just dreamy and realistic enough to look dimensional and eye-catching. Let's try this completely before moving on. Your takeaway from this lesson is to remember and overlap colors when working with a limited palette to create different tones of color in a painting. Use splatters of water when the paint is wet for added texture. Let's meet next to paint the wall and the ground. 7. Paint the Wall & Ground: Let's spice up this door painting a bit with the addition of a wall and ground. We'll still need the two paint brushes we used to previously, one to apply the paint and one to blur hard edges and places for more of a loose look. We're using the light mix of black and blue. Remember, this is what helps us tie all colors together in a very subtle way. You can play it by ear here and completely let go. I like to brush color on paper and loosen up the hard edges with my other paintbrush. That other paintbrush needs to be clean, wet, and, just damp. If it's very wet, you will see huge blooms happening which is fine if that's the effect you want to go for. If you have a hard time to assess if your paint brush is too wet or not, the best is to wet it normally then dab on a paper towel once or twice so the towel soaks that extra water up. After this, you should be good to go if you want to use the same technique as me. On my painting, you can see part of the paper is still showing when I apply color. This is because my brush is not overloaded with paint. It is not dry but not full either. Notice, I'm using the side of it to paint and I press slightly which helps in preserving some of the paper. It's a cool way to create a sense of texture in a painting. Here too, if you find you're not getting that look, that too much paint gets deposited, it means your paint brush is too wet. Try and dab it on a paper towel again, you will see some of the paint gets sucked up at the towel. You should get the same effect as I as long as you don't press hard, and that you use the side of your paintbrush. Let's make horizontal strokes where the ground is. Before this dries, pick up some of our blue mix and less at that at the bottom of the painting. It will help distinguish the ground on the wall and add a bit of variety here. I enjoy making splatters on such loose paintings. You can make them with any color of your choice. Here, I picked blue. I like that some of them will dissolve a bit into the wet ground, while others will stay sharp because there the paper was dry. While we're at it, let's add some on the door too for added texture and an even better impression of a weathered and mysterious old door. It's looking beautiful. Let's try it. Remember to play with different techniques for texture, whether it is using a paintbrush that's not too wet so some of the papers specs shows for your strokes, or you can also use splatters on wet, dry paint or both. See you in the next lesson and play some shadows. 8. Place Subtle Shadows: [MUSIC] With this lesson, the door will start to look more dimensional, thanks to shadows. They will be the dark touch we need to balance with mid and light tones, and also the highlights we'll add next. Let your paint brushes ready. I'll work with these two for most of the lesson because they're most precise, and I will also use the large brown one I have to make splatters layer. First, we're going to draw the metal parts that are visible on this door. Notice, it's absolutely fine to add it to the sketch after you started to paint. Especially when you know the lines will get covered up easily, because we'll use a dark color. I do this sometimes for silhouettes for the same reason. We don't need those metal parts to be super straight. On the contrary, to have them slightly tilted can add to the abandoned door look that we're looking for here, since this is going to be the gateway to the dreamy seascape that is coming up. [MUSIC] Let's remix a little bit of blue. Add black to it just enough to get a dark blue shade. Remember, this is what will make those shadows pop and the painting look more impactful. We need contrast from the blue color we used previously. With a fine tip of my paintbrush, I add this mix at the bottom of the metal parts to create a shadow. I personally dislike hard edges, so I soften them with a clean and damp paintbrush in the same way we did previously when painting the wall. But you're welcome to leave yours untouched if you prefer. [MUSIC] I'd like to show the door is not completely leveled with the wall, that it is slightly further back. So I'll add some of that mix on the sides too. It will create an impression of dust and help separate door and wall from each other a little better. [MUSIC] Let's paint the line that marks the separation between each door panel. Now, the knob. I soften the bottom of it with clear water just to create a subtle shadow there. We need way more definition at the base to suggest some tiny gap between the door and the ground, and also better distinguish the wall from the ground. [MUSIC] Let's use that dry brush technique again, where the paintbrush has to paint, but it is more dry than it is wet. Remember, you can dab it once or twice on the paper towel to get rid of excess paint and water. This is giving us some [inaudible] texture for the ground. When you press more, you'll be able to deposit more paint and make this effect less visible, less papers specs showing, which is good too for natural looking textures. I like to use my clean and damp brush here again to make some parts a bit more blurry. I find it's really nice to mix and match different effects as you can see. It's pretty spontaneous. That's why I invite you to have fun with this and just add texture with all the techniques I showed you. It doesn't really matter if our grounds look completely different anyways. You can also implement lines. Here, I added mostly horizontal lines, but when you add more like these, it will strengthen the idea of perspective of a path opening up in front of the door here, for instance. [MUSIC] Let's play with more splatters, mix and match water splatters and paint splatters depending on the results you would like best. [MUSIC] I almost forgot the bolts on those metal parts, and after that, we're done. [MUSIC] Make sure this has dried before you move on. Remember to use a dark color to make shadows stand out, and mix and match different effects, splatters, strokes with a damp or dry paintbrush. We are almost done. Let's meet in the next lesson to add texture on the door. [MUSIC] 9. Add Textural Effects: [MUSIC] In this lesson, we're going to add some texture to our door. Have one paint brush ready for this. We're using the same technique as before, and it's called the dry brush technique. It's when a paint brush is paint, but it's still dry enough that the tooth of the paper easily shows through. Remember that also depends on the pressure you choose to apply. Less pressure leads to more texture, while more pressure leads to more regular strokes of paint. Let's use our blue mix. You can have this to be the vivid blue shade or the one we mix to black. Notice I always use the paintbrush on its length to get a better textural effect out of it, rather than using the tip. [MUSIC] We're going to overlap green on top of this door and phases only. Watercolors are transparent most times and you can see here how overlapping green on top of blue helps us get a new shade of color. [MUSIC] If you'd like, you can add vertical lines to suggest planks. It's better if the line is broken and even, it will look more natural. Let's clean and perfect them straight lines. [MUSIC] This is enough to suggest planks, and that's all we really need. [MUSIC] Let's add a few hinges. [MUSIC] Now you can dry this if you're moving on right away. Although since we added very little water in this step, I trust this will dry on its own in a few minutes. Remember, watercolors are mostly transparent and you can layer a color on top of another at any stage in a painting. Let's meet next for the final part of this painting, the highlights. [MUSIC] 10. The Magic Touch !: [MUSIC] Replacing the final highlights in this lesson. I'll be mainly using this paintbrush for the fine point, as well as white gouache for a magical effect. White gouache will come balance all of the colors, it will add a nice translucent glow if we want it, but also nice and sharp highlights. Have another paintbrush at hand, clean and damp to fade any hard edges. I prefer to use white gouache as pure as possible, even though it's still convenient to mix some water into it, just so it's easier to paint with. Let's take care of that metal parts first and highlight the top of them. I like to run a clean and damp paintbrush in this area to make the paint more translucent there, it really adds to the magic. [MUSIC] You can use the dry brush technique with white gouache in the same way as watercolors. We're going to add a lot of paint on the edges once more to make sure they really look like the wood is worn out there. [MUSIC] I'd like to add a few whites patterns on the ground and the door. Remember, white gouache gets easily translucent with water. Here you want it just liquid enough that the splatters come out of the paintbrush easily. If they don't, you need more water. But if they do and they dry very light, then you need to add more paint. [MUSIC] Remember to use white gouache for highlights, but also for a nice magical look. [MUSIC] Congratulations on finishing the door. You may share it as such in the project and resources section or move on to the next lesson to learn how to turn this painting into a flap. [MUSIC] 11. Finish the Door: [MUSIC] This lesson, we'll teach you how to finish a painting that is meant to turn into an illustration with flaps. Grab a cutter and the hard surface you need to cut the door open without damaging your workstation. We need to cut the bottom, the top, and the middle of the door so it opens up. Try to be careful and remain on the main lines. It's okay if it's not entirely straight though, as after this, the door will remain completely shut anyways, which means someone else might not even spot little flaws. [MUSIC] When you're done, you're going to get your ruler and place it on the side of the door. But we need to bend the paper. I found this is as really effective, especially with a small and sturdy metal ruler like this one. Watercolor paper is really thick and not an easy to bend otherwise. [MUSIC] Now, if you're like me when I started these flaps, you're realizing we have a problem as the back of the door is blank. This means we need to paint the back now, so let's repeat each step we did previously. It doesn't have to be done in the exact same way though. We don't even need to refine it very much. [MUSIC] I'm quickly adding green and blue like we did before. Make sure to get white spaces all around the ones that could show when we opened the flap. Don't forget to overlap the paints. I'm doing this really fast as you can see. I just want to base layer down and get to the next step quickly. [MUSIC] We're going to dry this. That's when a heat gun comes in handy to speed up the process. Now, let's draw the metal parts, either not in the exact same place as the others. It really isn't a problem. This is really not about perfection, but having something that looks alike and cohesive in the end. [MUSIC] We're going to work with two paint brushes again, one to paint the shadows, one to fade them into the rest of the door. [MUSIC] Let's add the bolts. We need a handle as well. I try to have it close to where it was on the other side, but I doubt anyone will be checking to see if we have it in the exact same spot. So don't worry if it's not perfect. Now, we're drying this again to move on to the next step. We need to add shadows on the side. I want to add them on top or the bottom here because we won't be seeing what's around this on this side. [MUSIC] It's time to add texture with a dry brush technique. First, a dark blue. [MUSIC] Let's add green. [MUSIC] A few lines now to suggest the panels. [MUSIC] Before we paint the highlights with white gouache, we need to make sure this is dry. We're going to add the white paint on the metal parts. [MUSIC] Don't forget to highlight the knob once more. It's really important, it really makes everything pop more. [MUSIC] Finally, we need some texture with a dry brush technique. [MUSIC] I almost forgot a few splatters and that says we're done. [MUSIC] Remember this side does not need to be as refined as the other, just very similar. When we open the flap later, our eyes will be drawn to the new painting beneath it, not the back of the door. Talking about the new painting, we're starting on it next. Feel free to share this finished door to the project section. Otherwise, see you in the next lesson. [MUSIC] 12. Seascape : Draw the Sketch: [MUSIC] In this lesson, we're going to draw a sketch for a seascape and I want to show you how I make a second painting fit the one that has flaps. You will need the second watercolor sheet we prepared in the supplies lesson. Because this is no ordinary watercolor painting, first let's grab our door painting and check how big the seascape hitting needs to be to fit inside the door. Let's make sure both sheets are on top of each other and place a small pencil marks around the door opening [MUSIC]. Once you have this, a safe way to go about the second painting is to make it slightly bigger than the size of the door opening. This way, we are sure it's going to fit and we want to end up with blank spaces all around. [MUSIC]. I have the size of the seascape now, it doesn't really matter the lines aren't entirely straight as we want to see those edges anyways, but we can still place and glue the flap as we wish once both paintings were completed. [MUSIC]. Remember a reference photo for the seascape is available in the resources section. I'm looking at it as a sketch to make sure I placed the main elements accurately. Let's determine the horizontal line first. Imagine I would divide the sheet into three parts. This leaves us with two lines and three distinct parts. Oftentimes in art and photography, horizontal lines are placed on one of those two lines. You will rarely see them placed right in the middle, although sometimes it happens. This has to do with something called the rule of thirds and a picture being more appealing when the main elements are placed on one of those lines or one of the focus points is connecting places where each line meets another. The original photo was a lot different than this and for the purpose of the painting, to see the boats better and turn it into a portrait photo, I cropped it. So the horizontal line and boats will be placed around one of those strategic areas. The rule of thirds helps with the painting to look more harmonious, more pleasing to look at. You can use this to crop any photo for your left the flag illustrations. The boats don't need to be placed extremely accurately, but it helps to look at the way they're positioned. [MUSIC]. Very important though, for the lift, the flat concept makes sure that second boat on the left is not too close to the edge. Remember, we will reposition this painting in a slightly smaller door opening, so we want to make sure and have the main elements show. Notice that while the top one is straight, this one here it seems like it's pointing upward slightly. This is why I used a ruler to help sketch it [MUSIC]. Let's do this again with a third boat. Don't worry, they don't look perfect, simple sketches never look that great to begin with, and in this particular case, we'll be painting the boats with a very dark color, which means we can fix the shape later as we wish. Notice I'm not drawing all the details. In watercolor landscapes, the main elements are usually all you'll need to start painting. We can add to a painting later with the details, shadows, and highlights. [MUSIC] Remember not to limit yourself to certain photos when you paint something to fit inside a lift-the-flap illustration. You can crop pictures to benefit your painting and to do that, you can use the rule of thirds. In the next lesson, we'll take a look at our color palette once more and add something. So let's meet there [MUSIC]. 13. Add One Color: Previously on the door, we worked with blue, green, and black. To keep our palate limited, I suggest we add just one more color, pink for the sunset in our seascape painting. Let's remix our colors for this second painting. There's a lot of sky and water showing. Let's first mix blue for the sky. Then for the water it's nice to have tones of green added to our Persian blue. I'm going to mix it in different proportions. A dark mix made of mostly blue and some green and another made of mostly green and some blue. I make them creamy once more so they can intermix nicely. It will still show vibrancy when they dry. With these three different mixes, we have a nice variety of tones to add to our painting. The reason I picked the blue and green for the door painting, was because I knew they were important colors in the seascape. It was a way to make sure both paintings looked connected once completed. Connected, but not too much. We don't end up with a monochrome painting. That's where pink comes in. This is opera pink, but you're welcome to use another shade. Pink is opposite to green and blue green on the color wheel. In other words, it's the best contrasting color to add to this illustration even though in my left photo that color was yellow. When someone opens a door, they should get a sense of both paintings being connected through the use of blue, green, and black. But pink will surprise them in a good way. It will make the seascape stand out some more. Lastly, let's mix a little bit of blue to a lot of black and make it very creamy, almost on the thick side. This will be used for shadows with the trees and boat silhouettes. It's important they pop and we achieve them by making the paint as opaque as can be. Remember to use color wheels and explore color theory for mesmerizing lift the flap illustrations. Help the paintings look like they're connected with one or two main colors you will use in both of them and one or two extra for the second painting. It's important to keep a limited palette so the final illustration looks harmonious. Even more so because we have two paintings. Next, we'll paint a quick base layer. See you there. 14. Paint the Base Layer: We're ready to apply a base layer on the whole sheet. It will be great to block the main colors in. Have two paintbrushes ready at least. One to wet this sheet and apply those colors and another to make finer strokes to paint the main house and reflections. Let's wet our paper with clean water. When I do that, I like to insist a bit so the water can seep into the fibers inside the paper. It will make it easier to work on wet with the paint drying fast. The reason why in this painting I wet the paper first is we want to cover the whole sheet in one go. If we paint on dry paper like we did for the door, it will dry so fast we will get harsh lines. For skies and water, working on wet paper is much more appropriate since we can avoid that effect showing up and instead get all colors to blend smoothly. In the door, it wouldn't have been as important because even if we had had line showing, that would have contributed to the weathered look in some way. [MUSIC] I like to start with a lighter color here, pink. This way if I don't rinse my paintbrush well enough, it won't impact the other colors as much as they would affect this pink. [MUSIC] Plain blue for this guy seems adequate. Remember everything is a personal choice and not a truth you have to go by every time you paint. You could very well decide to mix pink to your blue to make it more purple or add black to make it darker. Just depends on what you're looking for in the end, something dreamy, something more dramatic. [MUSIC] In the water I try and add all the blues and greens we mixed to make it look more interesting. As seen on the reference photo, the bottom of the water is much darker than the top so that's something I try to keep in mind. It also contributes to depth to have those parts of the water that are closer to us look darker. [MUSIC] Let's switch back to this guy and a paintbrush that will be more precise. We can start adding an impression of clouds and add color because watercolors dry so much lighter than they look when wet. While the paper is still wet, it's a good idea to take advantage of it and keep working on strengthening the shapes and colors. However, don't worry because if you feel this is drying, please stop painting, let it dry and come back to it later. This is what we will do next actually so it's okay to pick up where you left off them. Don't be afraid to make movements with your paintbrush for clouds. Just swipe the paintbrush, frankly on paper, or tap the tip of it for a more subtle crouchy. Let's increase color intensity here with that darker mix of blue, the one we added black to. [MUSIC] As we're refining the top, you can see the bottom looks a bit pale so if your paper still is wet, let's keep going with pinks first. [MUSIC] With the edge of the paintbrush, let's start adding some reflections. [MUSIC] And now I want to emphasize to see colors a bit better, and once more, I use all of the blue and green versions we mixed previously. [MUSIC] I think this is a good base, quite pale still, but we have a nice color foundation to build on top of. Make sure it's completely dry before moving on. [MUSIC] Remember to take your time when wetting the paper. It will stay wet much longer. Painting on wet is best for skies and water that look smooth and natural. Keep applying color while it's still wet in order to end up with a nice foundation. We're ready to work on this guy a bit more so let's meet in the next lesson. [MUSIC] 15. Refine the Clouds: In this lesson, we're going to refine the colors and clouds in the sky. If you're happy with yours or you prefer lucid style, it's an optional step. Now I personally like to do this to add some depth and realism to my paintings. When we're refining part of a painting like this, where you have a clear horizontal line, I suggest add some masking tape there, just so you're able to paint freely without worrying about getting paint on the scene. Let's wet this briefly. I'm using one of my paint brushes with a fine tip since it's easier to create detail on such a small scale. As always, I start with pink and add more there. Then we can start switching over to blues. Notice I overlap a blue into pink and places to build a natural sky look where we have many different shades showing. Let's add dark blue now, mostly towards the top for depth. I'm satisfied with the sky so let's try it. Notice how I got paint underneath the masking tape. It happens sometimes it's not always easy to avoid it and it's very random. Usually, the paint will still be wet since it crept underneath. I hurry and wipe it off with a paper towel. Remember a second layer of sky is completely optional and depends entirely on your style preferences. Use masking tape to keep horizontal line looking clean and defined. It's time to add the ripples in the sea, so see you next. 16. Add the Ripples: [MUSIC] We are ready to add ripples in this lesson. Get one of your round and pointed paint brushes as we will make good use of a fine tip here. Notice on the reference photo that the back of the sea is far and light enough that we can't distinguish the ripples much, so we'll just start below the second boat. Make sure and add some water to your paint mixes so those top ripples stay light. It will help show they're located a lot further than the ones at the bottom of the sheet. The closer something is to us when we're looking at it, the darker and more detailed they will be as a general rule, and here it's true for the top of the sky and the bottom of the sea. We can see those elements better than what's far away towards the horizon. That's why. My lines aren't straight because I noticed this is the way it is in the photo. It matches the second boat being pointing upwards. Remember how we do it earlier, and that all has to do with water movement. [MUSIC] I used to dread painting the sea and ripples. I find it doesn't look nice when painting it and looking at it from up close. Maybe you're feeling the same way right now. I noticed however that when it's finished and we take a step back, it looks much nicer. I'll show you tricks also to improve the overall look of a sea with ripples. I pick up darker colors as I moved down and I try to use several of my mixes. It's not always one single color. [MUSIC] I'm done and as it is now, it's looking off compared to the rest of the painting that is very light and free of any details, but that's because we're not finished, so don't worry. Here's how to improve the sea very easily. Let's just glaze more sea colors on top of what we have done. The ripples we just painted should dry very fast. If not, please let them before moving on. I start with the reflections. I want to make them more obvious. This is why I wet the top quickly. Let's add blue first. [MUSIC] A bit more blue to even this out up there and make it look a tad busier so it's not as bland to compare to the rest of the sea. We want to keep moving down before this dries and we already have a drying line forming, so let's glaze paints on top of the sea directly. First, a light mix of our sea colors. Remember we're going darker as we move down, but the top needs to stay quite light. Then you can add more green or blue, doesn't really matter. We're doing this to intensify the colors in the sea, but also as a way to make those ripples we just added blending a bit better into the sea. With that paint we're glazing on top, we're going to achieve this effect. You can keep refining this as you wish. If you'd like to see the before and after, scroll back to the beginning of the lesson and it will be obvious how much nicer and natural the ripples are looking now. I like to think it's one of those sneaky and secret little techniques to improve something that looks too harsh and not realistic enough. I really love to use it. [MUSIC] Let's dry this. Remember that ripples are best painting with paint brushes to have a fine tip. A cool trick is to glaze the sea colors on top of the ripples to make the water the deeper, more natural, and realistic. Go darker as you reach the bottom of the page. You're getting close to finish. The next steps will be easier as we get to paint the detail and make little tweaks. You already completed most of the painting. [MUSIC] 17. Place Strong Shadows: [MUSIC] In this lesson, we're going to spice up this painting with strong shadows. In fact, we're adding silhouettes and they'll serve as the dark tones in the painting. Grab your paintbrush with a fine tip, we'll need it. We're going to work with a thick mix of blue and black. Let's start with the trees that are located on the horizontal line. You can be as random as you like here or detailed or a little bit of both which is what I'm trying to do. I'm adding a little palm trees, but if you want, you can keep yours looking like a mountain or just trees. [MUSIC] I choose to work section after section, I find it's easier to mirror what I just did on top, on the other side of the horizontal line since we're seeing a reflection of the trees in the water. To better get that impression of a reflection, I suggest to add a little bit of clean water in places below the line. It's very effective to blur the silhouettes as you can see. Let's keep going all along the line. [MUSIC] Look at how pretty it's looking already with the trees. Now, onto the boats. The first one is just a shape, it's very dark all over. [MUSIC] Again, let's make a reflection of it and blur it a little with water. [MUSIC] For the second and third boats, I'm going to add a little bit of our plain blue mix on the top just because it's lighter on the photo, but it's not a must because we can always make the dark blue lighter with a coat of gouache later. [MUSIC] Don't worry if your boats don't look exactly like mine, as long as we have the overall shape of a boat and impression of reflections and a very dark color to balance with all of the colors in this painting, you're doing an absolutely amazing job. In watercolor is completely possible to tweak and improve a painting, even correct little mistakes despite what we often hear. With this painting, you should be able to, because we did start with very light colors, so if there are changes to make, it is easier to do on top of light washes of paint. If you're having any problem doing so, please feel free to reach out in the project section or discussions so I can help you out. [MUSIC] I love to add the finest details, the poles, and ropes, you'll see how that nicely finishes the boats. [MUSIC] Notice I'm altering the shape of the boat and the reflections on purpose. You can pretend your hand is shaking to help that effect. With that, we can easily tell that part is just a reflection in the water. [MUSIC] Remember with this lesson that the trees or mountains that are located on the horizon line will look better and they're a bit random, not even, and similar everywhere. Use irregular strokes and water to blur the silhouettes for reflections. I'm excited for the final steps, we're getting very close here. Let's meet next and intensify pinks. [MUSIC] 18. Intensify Pink: Pink is our contrasting color here, and we want to make sure it shows. We're going to add some. To do this, despite the fact the painting is almost finished and shadows were added, we're using the same technique as we did earlier, since we're going to glaze more paint on top of what was done. To make sure there are no harsh lines simply wet the sheet, as long as it's completely dry from the previous lesson, you're fine. We have shadows here now, a strong dark blue color. Make sure to be brief and avoid a lot of back and forth as this might lift some of that dark paint. The goal is to wet the whole sheet as fast as possible. We don't need a ton of water there. Now, let's add pink where we want it. I want more on this sky and on the top of the sea. I'm keeping mine quite subtle still, I could have made it a lot stronger by adding more paint in the mix. We're going to need to let this dry. Remember it's possible to intensify one or more colors even when the painting is finished. Just make sure and wet the whole sheet to avoid drying lines and do it very quickly so the previous layers remain as intact as possible. I'll see you in next for a few beautiful highlights to brighten up this seascape. 19. Add a Few Highlights: [MUSIC] In this lesson, we're going to add more magic to our illustration with some highlights. They will look dramatic on such a painting because the silhouettes are so dark. We're still using a paintbrush with a fine tip here. I prefer my gouache to be fresh, so let's squeeze some more out of the tube. Remember, it's best to use it almost pure for stronger highlights as it easily gets translucent when water is added. Here, the highlights will be minimal but strong, so just a tad of water we'll do enough to make it easy to paint with gouache. If it's too thick, it can be hard to paint. We're going to add a little bit in the poles, whether they are real refractions and some at the top of the boats and on the ropes will be enough here. [NOISE] It's okay if all of the pole or a rope is not highlighted with gouache, I actually find it looks better, more realistic when just a few sections are highlighted. Inside the boat, we're adding a little more so you can add some water in places to make it less opaque. [MUSIC] Remember to keep most of the highlights on the darkest areas in the painting for maximum effect. A little goes a long way. A few touches of paint can be enough to add a touch of light and magic to a painting. [MUSIC] Next, let's put the flap illustration together. Meet me in the next lesson. [MUSIC] 20. Make the Magic Happen !: This is the satisfying moment we've been waiting for to put our illustration together and lift the flap. Congrats for making it till here. You will need both paintings. Papers are the same size, so if your seascape painting feels like it aligns just fine to the door flaps, you can glue it now all around and leave it as such. Otherwise, if both sheets don't align nicely, an option is to trim the edges from the seascape painting while leaving enough space for the glue. Now you're able to better center and place the seascape painting as you want it behind the door flaps, especially if it didn't align properly in the first place. We're going to go ahead and add glue. The only issue now is the back is not very pretty since we can see two different sheets have been used for this. I'm going to show you how to fix this in the next lesson, so see you there. 21. Presenting Lift-the-Flap Art + Inspo: In this lesson, you're going to learn how to make any left the flap illustration look nice and polished. Whether it's part of a sketchbook, are meant to live on its own. In case you were unable to have both sheets aligned very well in the previous lesson so that when we glue the paintings together, it looks like we're looking at one single piece of art. You can buy colored paper, here I picked craft paper. Make sure to cut out a piece that is the size of the back of your final illustration or even a bit bigger. We're going to glue it at the back and conceal the fact we have made two paintings to create our illustration. It's a nice way to finish the work to make it look polished. Either paper at the back shows when we look at the painting from the front, we can still easily trim it all around. What I like to do to make sure the glue does its job and the paper stays flat and nice, is to place the illustration underneath a pile of books, something heavy, preferably. I would not use this lightweight pack of paper but books that are much heavier. Let it sit underneath overnight for best results. In this sketchbook I created two lift the flap illustrations. Here I had this envelope conceal the little DIY arrangements I made with paper and glue, it looks neat and polished. With this one, I made the flap and the statue painting separately. I glued them in the sketchbook, the sketch book page was not affected by it. The back of it was intact to use for another painting. In this little sketch book, I used the craft paper method and it's looking nice and cohesive. There are a lot of different things we could try, maybe add papers of different colors for a more colorful look. I was happy to be able to share this lift the flat watercolor painting system. I hope you enjoyed learning about it and I can't wait to see your beautiful illustrations in the project section of the class. See you one more time for final thoughts. 22. Before You Go: Congratulations for completing your first lift-the-flap project, I hope this has helped you fuel your creativity to soon create your own one-of-a-kind watercolor paintings. In the class, we learned how to sketch, pick colors, and paint to create magical artworks that merge together into a beautiful painting with flaps. I'd love to know your thoughts about this class and how it helped release your creativity handbrake. Please share this as well as your project in the project and resources section. Also please leave a review as it helps potential students to know the classes are right fit for them, and it helps me learn how I can improve and whether to offer more classes in the similar theme. Remember you can follow me here on Skillshare to stay updated about my future classes, and also find me on Instagram and YouTube for added lift-the-flap inspiration and behind the scenes. You can also use the hashtag createwithfrancoise if you want to share your work there as well. Thank you so much for taking this class with me today, and see you in the next one.