Dance com seu pincel: pinte florais expressivos em aquarela

1. Introduction Video: [MUSIC] One of my favorite brushes that I use to paint expressive florals is a quill brush. I love the feeling of being in control of my brushstrokes, and I would sway the brush. I would flick the brush or add different types of pressure on my stroke. It's like dancing with my brush. The soft bristles of the brush allow it to follow my hand gestures. It may be a daunting or intimidating brush for beginners, but I'll be there to guide you step-by-step on how to use this brush and unlock your creativity. Join me today as we learn how to paint expressive watercolor florals. [MUSIC] Hi. My name is Joly, and I'm a watercolor artist based in the Philippines, and also known as Joly Poa on Instagram. I started as a beginner with no knowledge about watercolor, but with a lot of practice and an upgrade in some of the materials, I saw a huge improvement in my paintings. Today, I'm so excited for you to learn some brushstroke drills that will help you develop muscle memory in your hand and help you understand the full potential of using a quill brush. We will discuss how to hold a brush, how to control the water in your brush, and the differences between a quill brush and a round brush. You will also be painting some leaf strokes that we will turn into a beautiful leaf. To paint expressive florals, we will first learn how to paint some petals strokes. After learning all the skills that we need, we're going to proceed by painting four different projects. [MUSIC] The videos were all filmed in real time, so you can follow along as I paint. This class will guide you in exploring different strokes and help you interpret expressive florals in your own way. Let's start. [MUSIC] 2. Class Overview: [MUSIC] Hello again. This is the class overview, and we wanted to remind you guys, don't skip the materials part because I'll be discussing the art materials that I will be using in this class, and also the colors that I use for these paintings right here. Also we have a lot of brushstroke drills, so just prepare the paper because you will be practicing a lot. We wanted to share with you guys that when I was starting out, I really practice a lot and [NOISE] I use a lot of paper and sometimes it feels as if you're wasting [NOISE] paper. But then you're actually really not. Because if you don't practice, then nothing really will happen and you won't improve. So I do suggest that you practice all the drills and try to follow along as I paint. I've also included some photos of the painting so that you can try to print it out or save it in your tablets as a reference for you when you're painting. As a bonus video I'm also going to teach you how to paint this one. It's flowers. So just to give you an overview of the projects. Let's start with the leafy wreath right here. We're going to paint some leaves. Instead of painting the leaves one-by-one, I thought of painting them in a circle so we can actually create a wreath as the practice. Then let's go to this flower painting. Right here we are going to use an artificial flower as a reference, and I'm going to teach you how you can translate that into a painting. Then you also have a dahlia right here. I took a photo of flowers when I was Singapore, and I use one of those photos as a reference. We are also going to paint that, paint the dahlia in the photo and just translate that into watercolor. Then right here we have some delphinium, and we're just going to practice some pedal strokes and get your hand quite loose. I'm really excited about you trying this one out because it's very easy. Lastly, we also have this bright floral arrangement. Right here I'm going to mix different flowers and let you try a floral bouquet. I won't keep you waiting. Let's get started. 3. Materials: [MUSIC] Let's just talk about materials and I'm going to start with a paper. The brand that I'm going to use is Saunders Waterford, it's 100 percent cotton paper and the thickness is 300 GSM. I suggest using this type of thickness so that your paper won't get wrinkly when you're using a lot of water. We're also going to use cold press paper, which is really good for loose florals because it has a good texture. If you have seen hot-pressed paper in art stores, well, you can use that if you paint some realistic florals because the texture of hot-press paper is really smooth, and if you're going to paint loose florals, it won't look good in that paper. Also, this is a block style of watercolor paper. So as you can see, all the sides are glued except for this part because that's how you will take out the paper. The reason for this being glued on all sides is because you don't want the paper to get that wrinkly. If for example, you're painting landscapes or you're painting loose florals with a lot of water, you don't want your paper to warp. That will keep your paper in place. However, papers can be of course expensive, and one way to save up on paper is to buy a large sheet of paper instead of buying a block like this. You can buy one one sheet and perhaps just cut it into smaller pieces, just like this. Next up, let's talk about brushes. In this class, we are going to use the brush called a mop brush, or also called a quill brush. We're going to use the brand called Raphael and in this use 803 and size that I'm going to use is size 30 and I'm showing you now the other mop brushes that I have and we will discuss them separately in a different video. In order to assist us in some of the paintings, I am also going to use this black velvet brush in size 6. This is a round brush and not a mop brush, but understand that some of you might not have a mop brush. An alternative to a size 30 mop brush is the silver brush black velvet in size 8. This is a round brush. For the paint, I am using the ShinHan PwC and this is a Korean brand that is an artist-grade watercolor paint. They come in tubes and I just squeeze them out in the small half pants and I put this in a metal tin. Then you'll need a mixing palette, so this is just the lid of my metal tin, but alternatively, you can use a ceramic palette or even just an ordinary ceramic plate to be used as your mixing palette. Here are the colors that we're going to use in this class. I'm going to use permanent yellow light, permanent rose, crimson lake, sap green, hookers green, burnt sienna, sepia, indigo, cobalt blue, cerulean blue, ultramarine, and permanent violet. But of course, you can use any color that you like. I'm just giving you a rough guide of the colors that you will be using in this class. We also need a tissue paper to blot out the excess water in our brush. Lastly, let's prepare a jar of clean water. [MUSIC] 4. Quill vs Round: Now let's talk about the quill brush versus the round brush. This is the rough size 30. Let's talk about the shape first. This is the shape of the brush. As you can see, you have a fat belly over here and it tapers down, right up to this tip right here. You can clearly see the curve from here going to this part. I'm going to show you now a typical round brush. This is the Princeton heritage. We can clearly see the difference in the shape of the brush as you can see right right. This portion right here looks a bit further and this one right here looks thinner or more curved. Let me get another one. This is the Neptune series. This Neptune series mimics a squirrel hair brush. It also has a big belly, but when you look at the tip, it's also different and it looks rounder compared to a mop brush. I feel like this round brush is the closest to a mop brush. This is the black velvet. It's a mix of squirrel hair and synthetic hair. I'm going to put it side-by-side [NOISE] so you can see it. They do look similar so I guess if you're not ready to use this mop brush, you can try using the black velvet first. But I would suggest trying out this quill brush because it will really give you a different experience and I feel like it just gives more expressive strokes. Now when it comes to the painting, experienced this quill brush, it just follows your hand gestures. It follows the way your hand moves and like I always say, you just dance with your brush and this brush really follows your hand. There's no resistance every time you paint, there's no bounds because this brush is very soft. As opposed to using an ordinary round brush, this round brush gives you more control and you get more perfect-looking strokes. This is also good for beginners but if you want to try a more expressive stroke, I would suggest using a quill brush. Let me just show you what it looks like when we stamp this brush on the paper. You get the pointy tip. This is the Neptune. Now you'll notice that the quill brush has a more slender tip, it's pointier, and it's thinner on these two sides compared to round brushes wherein the tip is rounder. This is just a comparison just to show you guys the difference. I hope that this video was able to enlighten you regarding the differences between a quill brush and a round brush. At the end of the day, choosing a brush will be different for everybody. 5. How to Hold a Brush: [MUSIC] Now, let's talk about how to hold a brush, and we've talked about this in my previous Skillshare class. This was from my first class called From Blobs to Blooms, and you hold it like a pen, just like this. Usually, you can start with holding a brush right here in the middle. Just hold it comfortably like this, and if you are going to paint something with really small details and you need to focus, you can hold it quite near the bristles. I know that some of you might be worried because there's a wire over here, and it does hurt if you rest that portion on your finger. What I do is that I never let this part rest on my finger like this, so I make sure that this part faces upwards or away from the finger so that it doesn't hurt. Then if you want to paint something quite loose, just hold the brush at the end, right here, so that you can freely move. If you want to paint some expressive strokes, I do suggest that you don't grip your brush with too much pressure like this, so just hold it loosely, but not lose enough that it will fall off from your hand; just lose enough so that you can just dance with your brush and move along the paper. 6. What is a Quill Brush: [MUSIC] What is a quill brush? One of the characteristics of quill brush is that the bristles are held by this plastic and it is bound by wire and that keeps it in place. Another characteristic of a mop brush is that it has a big belly. It means that it can hold a lot of water, but at the same time it can keep a very pointy tip. When it comes to the sizes, the smallest size that I have seen is the size 3/0. The next size that's bigger is 2/0, then you have 0 and so on. The bigger the number, the larger the brush is. Don't worry if your quill brush looks like this. It's not really pointy when it's dry, so it just looks fluffy. But when the brush is wet, it will look like this. For beginners, I do recommend using this size 3/0 so that it's not overwhelming because the bigger sizes will also hold lots of water and sometimes as a beginner, it's difficult to control the water. I would suggest using the small size first and then when you're comfortable with that, you can move on to a bigger size. With a quill brush, you can do some washes like this will be able to cover a big area because this quill brush can hold a lot of water. You can also create some fine lines and create some expressive strokes. This reminds me of using a Chinese brush for Chinese painting. The brand that I'm using is the Raphael brand, and this is the series 803. I'm using also the quill brush with the squirrel hair bristles. You can also find Kolinsky, but I like using squirrel hair because it's very soft and it's really good for loose florals. But I know that some of you might not want to use animal hair. An alternative would be to use synthetic ones and I have found this, this is the Da Vinci Casaneo and this is synthetic. The thing with synthetic bristles is that it does work like squirrel hair, but of course it's only similar, it's not exactly the same. But I'm still showing you guys some options just in case you want to use this. Another brand that makes synthetic quill brushes is the Princeton Neptune line and this is a very big quill brush. This is size 6, as you can see, this is size 0 and this is size 6. The smallest size that they use is actually a size 4. I hope that they can make smaller sizes in the future. But it's also good. It holds a lot of water and it also keeps its point, which is really good. Now let's move on to another video where we will talk about the difference between the mop brush and a regular round brush. 7. Controlling Water: [MUSIC] In this video, we're going to talk about how to control the water in your brush. So let's try dipping our brush in this water jar. I'm going to show you what it looks like if there's just a lot of water in your brush. This seems to be one of the problems of beginners. I'm going to lift my brush and let's try to just see what it looks like up close. As you can see, it's just full of water and it's just swelling. It doesn't have a point anymore because there's just too much water. We can just try to tap on the side of the jar. Let's see if there is an improvement. It seems like you've got a point right there. You can actually use this brush to get some paint. Or you can also try to tap it one more to get out the excess water. Notice that you still have that belly, it still has lots of water, but you can keep a good sharp point. What does it look like if you don't have enough water? Let me just intentionally dab the excess water. As you can see, if there's not enough water, it will be very difficult to paint with this brush, and you can also bend it like this. That means that you don't have enough water in your brush if you can bend it like this and it doesn't come back. I also wanted to show you guys what it looks like if you have like a lot of water in your brush. You'll most likely be creating a puddle. Like this, so you got a puddle right here because you had a lot of paint. But if you tap the excess paint, you get a more even wash. But if the paintbrush is too dry it will look like this. I'm going to intentionally just plot the excess. You will see that the brush is very dry, and you get all those white spots that you were not able to cover with your paint. Also your brush will look like this. [MUSIC] 8. How to Mix Paint : [MUSIC] In this video, we are going to learn how to mix your paint and water. I'm just going to rinse my brush and just tap the excess water on the rim of the jar, and let's grab some permanent rose, and just switch it on the palate. I'm making sure that I have mixed the water and paint properly. As you can see, it's quite thick and pigmented paint and I have coated my brush with the paint. Now let's just try to swatch it, and you will notice that if you loaded your brush properly, you will get a nice wash. As you can see, it's a very pigmented mixture. Let's introduce more water to our brush just to lighten the color. Because in watercolor, we don't really add white to change the value. We can add some water to create a lighter value. As you can see here, this is now a lighter pink, it's a lighter permanent rose, and let's dip our brush one more time in the jar, and you'll get a very soft pink color. I'm going to teach you another trick. Sometimes you'll see a puddle like that in your painting, so don't leave that, try to absorb that excess water. I am just going to rinse my brush, and just blot the excess water in my brush on tissue paper, and I will lightly touch that puddle, so what I'm doing is I'm absorbing the extra water on the paper using this brush. There you go, we're done. 9. Brush Stroke Drills: [MUSIC] In this section, we are going to do some brush stroke drills and this will help you loosen up your hand and also help you get to know more about your brush and the brush strokes that you can do using this quill brush. I just put here some tapes, but you can definitely just draw some squares on your paper. We are going to start by painting some thin strokes over here with light pressure. Then let's just grab some paint. Use any color that you want. To paint some thin strokes or thin lines, you can put your brush in an upright position and you can also use your pinky to help you balance your hand so that your hand won't get a little wobbly. Let's start. Only the tip of the brush is touching the paper. You don't need to paint a straight line, we're just practicing the pressure that we put on this brush. We want to start with a light pressure and when you put light pressure on the brush, you can create thin strokes. In this square, I want you to put a little bit more pressure. We are just practicing these strokes to help you understand the strokes that you can do. I'm going to paint thicker strokes. I'm just gliding my hand on the paper and just dragging my brush across the square. Now let's paint another set and this time let's add more pressure. This should be thicker than the second one that we did. This is the last square and I want you to press your brush fully on the paper so that we can create a broad stroke. Just press it and just drag. You'll notice that your bristles will also spread as you press your brush onto the paper. Good job. Well, now you can see that when you apply more pressure to your brush, you can create a broader stroke and when you apply really light pressure you can create very thin strokes. Let's now move on to another drill and this is something that I taught in the first class, From Blobs to Blooms, but you're going to do it again now as a refresher. We're going to paint the thin and thick line. In one stroke, we are going to vary the pressure. It's like painting a leaf. You start with a light pressure and then just slowly press and drag, and then leave, then slowly press. Then drag and then leave. In one stroke, you get a thinner part and a thicker area. Now let's do it again and I will paint it a little bit faster this time. This is just a fun way to understand your brush and how it just spreads when you press it on the paper. Let's try another one where I'm going to paint a thin stroke when I'm going upwards, but when I'm painting downwards, I'm going to paint a thicker line. Then going upwards, I'm going to paint a thin line. Then as I go downwards, I will slowly press the tip of my brush to create a broader stroke. Let's try it one more time. As you can see, it's only this area that flattens when I press it. This is also a good way to practice some brush lettering if you're into that. We're done with this exercise. One way to loosen up with holding a mop brush is to do this style, which I call the fringe. I am just going to tilt my brush and just move in this manner. Only the tip of my brush is going to touch the paper so that I can create some thin strokes. This is actually a really fun drill and don't be too pressured about making it perfect. We are really just doing this as an exercise and just to loosen up, think of it as a warm-up exercise. You don't really need to fill in the entire page. We're done with our brush stroke drills. Let's move on to painting some better strokes. 10. Petal Strokes Part 1: [MUSIC] Let's start painting some brushstrokes that will help us in painting some expressive florals. Let's start with a very thin C stroke. I have paint in my brush. Let's start with a light pressure and then we're going to slowly press our brush and the only part that will move is just up to here, as you can see that it's bending. Let's try it. Start with a light pressure and then press, and then just slowly lift it. I know that this will look funny and not make any sense at all right now, but trust me, this is a good exercise. Then you can also do that upwards. Start with a light pressure, almost like you're painting a line, then just press, then drag, then lift. You can always just attach a tail. Let's try it again. This exercise is also applicable to painting like an outline of a rose. I'm just going to quickly show you. We can pay something like a diamond shape as a center and then I'm going to paint the strokes that we did here and I'm going to paint all around. You can also turn your paper so that the angle is easier for you. I'm just going to slowly build the petals. This is also going to be part of an intermediate class that I will release after this basic class. It's nice to get to know this stroke as early as now. I'm just going to alternate the petals. You can see in one stroke, I can do a variety of pressures. You can see that some will be thinner like here and then it can go a little thick over here and then thin again. That will make your strokes quite expressive if you can vary the pressure. I'm just slowly filling in some of the white spaces. I think that we are done and you can add a stem over here. Now let's try stamping with our brush. I have some paint on my brush and I'm just going to press it on the paper to create a mark. By doing this, I can create a pointy tip and then I have a round shape right here. Let's try to paint a simple flower using this mark. With just a very simple stroke, you can actually create a flower. This can be a filler in your bouquet. Then you can just add some stem and you can also paint some leaves just using the stroke. Let's try that out now. Let's paint a stem and just press our brush. It's easier if you can just rotate your paper. There you go. It's a very simple mark and yet you can create so many things out of that simple mark. Of course, you can always go back and fix some of the strokes. Another variation is to try to sway your brush and you can hold it right here at the tip. Instead of just stamping like this, you are going to try to sway. You can sway to the right or to the left. Then we can also create a flower, just an imaginary flower, by combining all of these strokes. Just have fun and just build more petals. Then you can, of course, just put the stem. This is just an exercise for us. Of course, you can also paint different colors on this flower so that it doesn't look flat. But for this exercise, we just did one color. As you can see, it's that easy. You just need to dance with your brush and just sway your brush and change the angles. Let's paint some more sea strokes. We can try painting with a light pressure and then just press it. You can see that I am flicking at the end. Let's do it again and then just flick. It doesn't have to look perfect. It's okay if you have some imperfections right here, you're just going to practice. We can also move upwards. Then let's try to paint on the other side. Then upward. You will be able to create different strokes and this is really nice because you can create a flower from this exercise. Later on, you're going to paint [inaudible] using these strokes. I'm going to start right here and just press and then lift and this will be my center. Then let's paint another one. You can sway your brush and just have fun painting. Then you can also add petals if it feels like it needs more petals. Don't worry about the shape for now. This is just an exercise and we'll do more exercises later for this type of stroke. [MUSIC] 11. Petal Strokes Part 2: [MUSIC] I'm going to show you a painting of a dahlia. As you can see, I painted some wispy strokes like this. Let's try that out. We're just going to vary the pressure in one single stroke. Start with a light pressure, and then press and drag your stroke. Press and drag. It's usually easier if you paint it quickly instead of painting it slowly. Let me show you how I painted this on the dahlia. You're going to have a separate video for this flower, but I just wanted to show you the effect so that it's easier for you to understand why we are going to practice this stroke. Going to paint right here and I just wanted to separate the petals here. Let's add a bit more over here. Now it has more definition because of the stroke that we did. I'm just going to absorb the excess paint. That's the effect. When you're painting expressive florals, it's very important to paint quickly. Let me just show you some strokes which are similar to the blue strokes that we did earlier. You can do it quite fast. I'm going to show you what you can do with these strokes. You can also paint it in this manner. Then also try to paint it in a curve form like this. This is something that I use for the center of my roses. I just press it right here then just drag and lift. Let's try to paint a simple flower using these strokes. Sometimes you can actually just paint dots or lines. Let's try to paint rows. As you can see I'm painting quite fast and I'm doing all of these tiny strokes that forms the center of this flower. I can rinse my brush to create lighter petals. As you can see, I can paint just simple lines and it can be a petal. We will be having a different flower painting for this one. But I just wanted to show you guys what you can do just by combining all of these strokes that we have experimented on. Just try to paint different strokes in different angles and try to combine them and paint it into a simple flower. One of my favorite things to paint is a simple five-petal flower. Let's try to paint one petal first. We can create a petal using this stroke. We'll start at the top and just slowly press and just glide on the paper. We depress my brush so that it will fully spread and create a broad stroke. I can fill that in with another stroke on the right and just fill it in. But if I want a more expressive flower, I will do this style which I'm going to show you. I'm just going to press it also. I get this petal shape on the left and I'm just going to go back up and I'm going to fluff the other side and just create these wispy lines so that I can create a more expressive petal. This way it doesn't look as flat compared to this one and then leaving some white spaces. Let's just try to paint a simple flower using this technique. Let's paint some petals right here and then painting quickly because usually the loose florals, they look really nice when you paint it quickly and it just shows in your strokes. I also like keeping the brush quite wet so that when I'm painting, I can add some strokes to the petal just to fix the shape. Let's pretend that you just need three petals for now and I'm going to add just a stem right here. There you go. When you're painting expressive florals, just make sure that the center is really defined and that you can create some wispy strokes. I'm going to show you an example. This is a rose, I just created something like a crescent moon shape over here. You're just going to paint some C strokes and I'm painting it quite quick. I can now rinse my brush so that the color will be lighter and just fade away some of the strokes on the outer portion. I'm also leaving some white spaces. I'm holding the brush right here so that I can keep it loose. Now I can just change the angle of my brush. I'm just going around this rose. As you can see, because I have a very defined center, even if I keep the outer petals quite loose, it still looks good and it won't look like a blob. There you go. Now that we are done painting the brush strokes and all the drills, let's now move on to some of the class projects. 12. Fading Technique: [MUSIC] I'm going to introduce to you a technique called the fading technique. Let's start with a very concentrated mixture of permanent rose, but you can use other colors. I'm just going to paint a wispy stroke. This is a certain stroke that I also use for painting roses. I'm just going to rinse my brush and just tap the excess water and we're going to lightly touch this part. I'm going to touch just one side of that stroke. In order to do the fading technique, the stroke that we did earlier should still be wet. Now, we have one side that has a clean edge and another side that has faded look. This is actually a technique that I will be using in an intermediate class that I will release soon. But I just wanted you guys to try it as early as now. Let me do it one more time so you can observe it. I'm just painting a wispy stroke. Let's just rinse our brush. I'm going to lightly touch that edge. I'm just letting that paint flow into the water. We are done. 13. Leaves Part 1: In this exercise, we're going to paint some leaves. Here are the colors that we will mix and match. We are going to use sap green, indigo, sepia, burnt sienna, and permanent violet. We will be mixing these colors later, but for now let's just use sap green. I'm just mixing my sap green on the palette. For the first leaf, let's paint an ordinary leaf where and we will paint it in just one stroke. Let's start with a thin stem. I'm holding the brush lightly and start painting the first leaf. I am just going to start with a light pressure and slowly press it and then drag and lift. Let's try it on the other side. But you can also try to turn your paper so that it's easier to paint in this manner. I'm just going to flatten my brush again and just slowly lift and make that end pointy. Of course, you can always go back to fix the leaf. I'm just going to paint on top of this stem. I usually prefer that my brush has enough paint so that it can freely spread when I press it on the paper. Next up, we can also create a leaf with two strokes. Let's start painting the top portion. I'm painting in like a C curve motion. Then we are going to complete that by painting another C stroke at the bottom. We can also paint with an S stroke. We can do that two times if you want a leaf that is thicker. You just paint another S on top of the first S stroke that you made. I'm just going back and just fixing the shape. Don't be scared. That's okay if you want to fix the shape. Now let's try to paint an expressive leaf. I'm going to paint a thin stem and slowly press my brush and do a side stroke. Then just drag it and pull it down until we get that tip. It might be a little difficult for a first timer. Let's try it one more time. I'm just dragging it downwards to create that tail. Now let's try something a bit more tricky. Let's paint it on the other side using the same strokes. I'm just dragging it and now I just pushed it downwards. Just try to change the angle of your brush when painting leaves, you'll be able to create so many shapes that will be unique because you are using your own hand gestures to paint these strokes. Now let's move on to a fun exercise because we are going to paint a leafy wreath, that will serve as your practice as well. 14. Leaves Part 2 Leafy Wreath: [MUSIC] Instead of painting leaves one-by-one on the paper, I thought of putting it in a wreath so that after we finish learning about different types of leaves, you you end up with a very nice leafy wreath that can also be your final painting. You can also put some coats in the middle after you finish. To start, I just drew a round shape using pencil. Let's just grab some sap green and I'm just going to paint some stems first. Then let's start painting leaves using two strokes. Then right I am just going to paint in a downward motion in an S-shape. Then let's do that in two strokes as well to create a pretty big leaf. I'm just going to rinse my brush and then I'm going to paint a lighter shade of leaf. Then I just grab some paint in there and mix that with our sap green to create that earthy green color. Then we can do some smaller leaves. Right now I am just following the line that I drew a while ago. We're just going to do one layer of leaves first and then later on we will add a second layer of leaves. I'm just rinsing my brush again so that I can get a new color and I'm getting indigo. I'm going to mix that with sap green. This will create a deeper shade of green. Now let's try to create some expressive strokes. Lay your brush flat on the surface of the paper and just wiggle and then just drag it until you get a fine point. As you drag it, you're also supposed to lift at the end so that you get that pointy tip. I just added a little bit more indigo to my brush. Let's do some quick strokes and I'm just lightly touching the tip of the brush on the paper to create these strokes. It's like doing some check-marks. Then you can create some thin strokes as well and some wispy strokes. I'm just adding more strokes to make it as fluffy and more lush. I think we can add a bit of sap green just to change the color and make it look more interesting. With sap green in my brush, let's just paint some stems. I'm just going to mix my sap green with a little bit of indigo and then let's paint some eucalyptus by painting some oval shapes on top of the stem that we painted. When painting eucalyptus, I do love changing the shades of green. Sometimes I'll rinse my brush to create a lighter shade of green or I'll add some indigo to make it deeper. We're done and I'm going back to my regular sap green. Let's just paint some stems again. As you can see I always paint the stem first before the leaf because it gives me an idea of where the leaves should go. I've mixed a bit of indigo again to my sap green, and let's just paint some wispy lines that will serve as the stem. Right now I'm just painting some small leaves by stamping my brush on the paper. I'm just creating these tiny leaves. Just gently press your brush on the paper. The shape of the brush is helpful in this technique since the shape is already triangular. That makes it very easy to just stamp some leaves on the paper. I'm just going to dip my brush in the water jar just to introduce my water in my brush and to lighten the shade of green because I want to mix different shades of green in this wreath. Let's try a different combination. This time this is sap green plus a little bit of permanent violet. Now let's try to paint some long and slender leaves. Just drag your brush. As you can see, I'm not really fully pressing my brush on the paper because I want just slender leaves. I just let the tip of the brush bend but I'm not pressing it fully. Let's do another one and this time I'm using just plain sap green and I'm going to paint some slender leaves again. As you paint these long and slender leaves, you can also try to curl some of the leaves. Just make like a wavy stroke just to make it look more interesting. Now let's try a smaller version of the slender leaves. Let's start with the stem, and this time I'm painting downward strokes that points towards the stem. I just mix sap green and indigo. Let's try to paint another set of eucalyptus. This time I painted the oval shapes first before I put the thin stem. Sometimes I like to experiment in this way, changing the way I paint certain leaves or fillers. Again, try to vary the shades of green that you will use. We're done with the first layer and actually you can stop right here if you're happy with this wreath. But if you want to add some extra volume, then just keep on watching we're going to add a second layer. Let me just start by mixing burnt sienna and sap green. Then we are going to paint some leaves that will overlap on the first layer, just like this. Make sure that the first layer is already dry before you do this technique. This is called layering. As you can see the second layer is quite transparent and you can still see the first layer underneath. This is an easy technique that you can apply to even florals and I had a class on Skillshare as well about layering. Then you can vary the shape of the leaves for the second layer. Some can be bigger, some can be smaller and it will look really pretty when you do that. Then you can also add some loose stems sticking out. It can be used as a filler. Let's grab some sap green and paint some markings. As you can see, I'm holding the brush at the end of the handle. Now I'm doing some check marks and then keeping it pretty loose by holding the brush at the end of the handle. Here comes one of the fun parts. Let's add some stem sticking out. It just makes the wreath look all organic. Again, I also use this as a filler. If there are some white gaps and you don't know what to add, you can actually just add some stems, just some thin, curvy strokes. You can also do some twisting with your stroke and create some fun loops like this. I'm mixing my sap green and burnt sienna to create some more leaves. Right here I'm just painting some small leaves. I'm painting on top of the first layer. We're actually almost done. I'm just adding a few more leaves for the second layer. As you can see I try to spread out some of the leaves just to make it look more balanced. Just don't forget to look at the wreath from a far just to check if it's already good or if you need to add some more leaves on some side and that's one of the techniques that I do. Sometimes I take a photo first or a video and then I check it on my phone because it helps me see it from a different perspective. Another way to make this wreath look full and with some definition is to add some veins to some of the leaves. Now, don't add veins to all of the leaves. You just want to add it to some of the leaves because it will make it look more interesting to your eyes. You can look for just some white gaps and add an extra leaf just to cover it up. We're are done. Congratulations on your leafy wreath. I'm very happy with this exercise because you are able to discover different strokes and make different shapes for the leaves and at the same time we were able to paint a beautiful wreath that you can definitely use. 15. Delphinium: [MUSIC] Let's paint a delphinium. I found some really pretty images on Google that I use as my reference photo. This will be a loose interpretation of the delphinium flower. Let's start with the color ultramarine. I'm just mixing this very rich mixture. I'm making sure that I'm coating my entire brush with this color. We are going to paint two stalks. I'm going to hold the brush right here in the middle. Let's drag our brush towards the center of the flower. Now I'm painting downwards and then slowly releasing the brush as I end the strokes so that you can get a pointy tip. Now, I just rinse my brush so that we can get a lighter color. Usually for these types of flowers that are in clusters, I like to mix the shades or the value of the colors so that it will look more interesting and it won't look flat. You'll notice that some of the blues are a bit darker, some are lighter. To make it interesting, I've added just a civilian blue color right over there. Right here we're just going to do three petals and not five because it is facing sideways. Not all the petals will face us. We won't see the other petals. We're just going to slowly fill in this stock. Some petals will look like they are just fillers. Right now I'm just mixing up some indigo, just adding a few more darker petals. Now let's add some indigo to this ultramarine color. Let's just paint some five petaled flowers again. If you notice, I always start from the middle of the flower or I end the stroke in the middle, but everything just points towards the middle. Now let's paint a side view flower. This one will have just three petals. Now let's add some sap green, and I'm just going to add some petals and also some buds. I'm leaving in some whites spaces, if you have noticed. That's because the top part of the delphinium flower has smaller flowers and most of them are also buds. That's why you will have some whites spaces of breathe air. Right now, I am just going to connect all of the spots and just add a stem. Let's now connect the stem to the flowers. I have here some sap green and just a tiny bit of indigo to deepen the color. Now we can extend this stem all the way down and I have curved it a little bit. We had a little bit of a blue bar over there. There was a small puddle that fell on the paper. What I did was that I just got a tissue paper and I just plotted it out. When this happens to you, make sure that you plot it right away, don't let it seep through the paper. Right now I have cerulean blue and they added a lot of water to this mixture because they wanted a light color to cerulean blue. Now I'm just adding a few more petals just to make some areas look fuller. We're done with the first stock. Let's move on to the next one. I have here a mixture of ultramarine color again and I'm painting this five petaled flower. We are just going to slowly add more flowers beside it. Of course, we need to change the shades of the blues in this flower to make it look more interesting. Just dip your brush in the water jar and tap the excess water and then try to paint on the paper and you will see that now you have a lighter shade of blue. Now of course, you don't need to really follow all the strokes that I'm doing. This is just a guide for you so that you can eventually create your own strokes and just try to feel your brush and practice with it a lot, so that you can create some really expressive strokes. As you can see, I'm holding my brush towards the end of the handle to keep it pretty loose. Now I'm adding a little bit of indigo to this ultramarine blue just to create a darker shade. I'm going to continue adding some petals. Make sure that your brush is well coated with paint so that it's easier for you to create these expressive strokes. Because when the brush is dry, it's very hard to move the brush because the bristles will not really fully expand. Right now I'm adding a few more light colored petals. In some areas, I'm letting it bleed with the other colors. Now it's time to grab some sap green because we're going to paint the buds. If you are more comfortable with painting the stem first before the buds, you can also do that. We are just going to paint maybe just five or six buds then you're all going to connect it. I'm just going to grab some sap green and I'm going to mix some little bit of indigo because they want the deeper shade. You can see that really your rich green color and some petals are still wet. As I lay down the stem, It's actually bleeding with the blue petals. That's one of my favorite parts when painting with watercolor. I just love how it looks when two colors blend with each other. Right here I've just extended the stock and I'm painting some leaves at the bottom. I just grab whatever blue color there is on my palette and I added just a lot of water to create this nice baby blue color. I'm doing this just to add volume. Sometimes you even add a little bit of sap green so that it looks like a blue-green color and it's very pretty. I'm going back to the first stock that we painted because I felt like I just needed a little bit more volume. I think we are done. But I want you to add a little bit more character to this flower. But this is completely optional and you can go to escape this part if you don't like the splatters. Right now, I'm just grabbing some clean water and I'm painting it on the background of this, the finial flower. As you can see, some of the green buds at the top are fading away in the background and I just love that. I think it's really nice how it just blends together in the background. Right now I just have some cerulean blue. I filled up my brush with this color, and now I am just tapping to get those splatters and it makes it look more expressive in my opinion. I just love all those faded dots on the wet background. If you put splatters on dry paper, then it will also dry with hard edges Then let's go back now to painting some clean water on this background. I'm just going to splatter a little bit more blue on that area. You can also add a little bit of green. We can also try to spread it out if you're not that happy with the splatter, just to fade it out. This is the final painting. I just love the splatters in the background, but I understand that some of you might not want that. Of course this is completely optional. You can opt not to do the splatters in the background. 16. Dahlia: [MUSIC] In this video, we are going to paint a dahlia and I'm going to use this reference photo. I actually took this photo when I went to Singapore at the flower dome and we're going to paint this side view dahlia. I will also include this in the resources section so you can download it or print it. Let's just grab some permanent rose and I'm adding water and let's mix it with some permanent yellow light because I want a peachy pink color. I'm just going to put a dot right there and that is where the petal strokes will end or begin. I'm going to start with a top petal and I'm just going to slightly press my brush and just lift towards the end and just paint some lines and right there I just grab some permanent yellow light and let's do one more petal on the side and I'm creating petals with pointy tips. I always start with light pressure and just press my brush towards the middle portion of the stroke and just lift it again at the end. I'm just going to paint a small petal right there and I'm just rinsing my brush to create a lighter shade of pink and I'm going to paint that petal on the left side and let it bleed with the colors on the right side. I'm going to get some permanent yellow light and just mix a little bit of permanent rose to make it a little orangey and you will put this in the middle right there and just let it bleed with the petals. I want that area to be a little bit more concentrated because that is where the shadow is. I'm just going to pick up some peachy pink color and you're going to paint the side petals. This one will look like an elongated letter C. You can try to sway your brush to create this stroke and you can just try to flick our brush to create a pointy tip. Let's get some permanent rose and dilute it. I am going to just follow the shape of the petals and towards the end of the petal, it does look a little curve on the end, like it's curled and it looks like an S shape as well. I love following the shape of the petals because it looks so natural when you're painting it. I'm just grabbing some permanent rose and a little bit of the orange color that we mixed earlier. I'm just going to flick my brush and sway it back and forth to create some wispy strokes. This area looks like it has too much water. I'm just going to blot out the excess water using my brush and I'm going to let my brush absorb the excess paint. We are good to go. Let's continue painting and I'm just adding more strokes. Those strokes will look like the petals of the dahlia. The dahlia has a lot of petals and right now I just got a more concentrated permanent rose and I'm just adding those strokes that are more pigmented, and it looks very nice because there's a contrast and it looks more interesting. I'm just dropping in some orangey color again in the center to make it a bit darker. We can go back and just fix off the petals and I'm adding some small strokes and those small strokes really make a huge difference when it comes to painting expressive florals. I guess they just add more detail to your painting and right now I'm grabbing some sap green and let's just paint the stem. Let's just drag it in a curved motion so that it doesn't look too stiff and then let's just add some leaves. We're done with the first layer and you will just let this flower dry and we'll add more details. We are just going to add some wispy lines that will give more definition to this dahlia. I am using a more concentrated permanent rose and I also showed you this during the brushstroke drills. Aside from a very pigmented permanent rose, we can also use a permanent yellow light color and this technique just gives this flower more depth and I think it makes it look 100 times prettier and this is a very easy technique that you can also apply to other florals. Like what I said during the drills, when you're painting the strokes alone, it doesn't really make sense but when you are applying it on the flower, that's the time when it will make sense that that's the reason why you need to practice these strokes because it's not really easy to create some wispy strokes. It takes a lot of practice to paint a thin and thick portion in just one sweep, in just one stroke. With the wispy lines, some of them we are going to leave it as is and some of them we're just going to blur or fade one side to keep it a little bit soft. We want the center to have a deeper color and we are just going to add some burnt sienna and just spread it a little bit. Then we can add a few more details, some lines, and some small strokes. Just to add more definition to this dahlia. Let me just extend the petals at the bottom. We are done. That was super quick and I'm really excited to see what you can do with this technique. [NOISE] 17. Class Project: Bright Florals Part 1: [MUSIC] In this part of the class, you're going to paint this beautiful floral arrangement. We will paint this with expressive strokes, and I will guide you through painting all the flowers. This will be a step-by-step class and everything will be in real-time. I have my paper right here. This is the Saunders Waterford and we're also going to use the black velvet round size 6 just to assist us in some of the strokes. I'm just going to grab some permanent yellow light. This watercolor paper is nine by nine inches in size. Then you're going to start in the middle so I'm just painting some thin and short strokes in the middle. This will be the center of the flower. I just grabbed some permanent rose and I added a lot of water to create a dainty pink color, so making a very watery mixture. Let's start with that first petal at the top. I am touching the yellow strokes that we made so that they can blend in with the petal stroke. Let's proceed with a lighter shade. I just dip my brush in the water jar and tap the excess water to create an even lighter shade of pink. Let's keep our strokes very loose and I am just building the strokes one by one to create that petal. Let's grab some burnt sienna. Let's just mix this burnt sienna on the palette and I'm grabbing quite a thick amount of burnt sienna and I want it to be quite bold. Let's paint it on top of the yellow strokes that we made. Then let's just put the dot in the center. I love how the burnt sienna just mixes with the petals. Let's just grab some indigo and I'm going to drop it in the small dot that we painted. Doing this will provide more contrast to this flower. Let's rinse our brush to start with a new flower. Let's paint a peachy pink flower, and to achieve that, we need to mix permanent rose and permanent yellow light. Then let's add a lot of water and just dilute it so that you can get a dainty color. That's one of the secrets to making some peachy pink colors. You just mix a pink and yellow color and just make sure to dilute it. I'm going to go ahead and start again with the same center. I'm using my black velvet and I am painting some small strokes using the permanent yellow light. Now I'm grabbing the peachy pink color using my quill brush and I will just glide on the paper and just create that nice and loose, expressive petal. Then I'm adding some wispy strokes and I'm doing this very quickly. Don't be afraid when painting the petals. You can start with a small petal and just build it by adding more strokes to make it bigger. When you're practicing, you're also developing confidence in doing your brushstrokes, which is really important in painting expressive flowers. This is a very easy flower that you can follow, you just sway your brush and just paint some petals, and it will look like a very nice flower. In order to avoid painting a stiff-looking flower, just make sure that you sway your brush when you're painting the petals so that it will look curved rather than just a straight petal. Let's grab our burnt sienna and just drop it in those tiny yellow strokes that we made, and this will add more depth to the flower. I'm just going to grab some indigo and put it in the center and just let it spread a little bit just so that it will blend in with the burnt sienna. We can just try to fix some of the petals using just thin strokes. In this area, we are going to paint a yellow-orange flower. I have here permanent yellow light, and I'm going to add just a tiny bit of permanent rose just to warm up this color. But of course, if you have a different color in mind feel free to use it. Let's start with a strong downward stroke. As you can see, both ends are pointy and now I have shifted to holding my brush towards the end of the handle just to keep it quite loose. Let's move on to another petal and let's just press and glide, just go downwards. Then let's go up again and paint some thin strokes that will make it look expressive. Let me just rinse my brush and grab some permanent rose and add a little bit of that yellow because I want this stroke to be a bit on the orange side. Let's get ready to sway our brush and we can press our brush fully to create a nice big stroke and then combine it with just some thin, wispy strokes. I'm going to repeat another broad stroke right there. Another one on the left side. While it's wet, I can add an orange color to some of the petals just to make it look more interesting. Let's just fix some of the petals. As you can see, even just painting some thin strokes like that, it makes a lot of difference. As you may have noticed, we painted this flower using the petals first and then right now, I'm going to add the center using burnt sienna. We're just going to paint some short strokes and just a dot in the center. I just grab some indigo and put that in the center of this yellow-orange flower. I think that adding indigo in the center really makes a huge difference. Let's move on to the flower right here, and it looks like a rose, and let's get some crimson lake. Let's start with the center and you're going to paint these strokes that will look like a letter U from our perspective. In order to make this flower a successful painting, we need to make sure that the ends of the strokes are pointy. I am just going to paint a lighter shade of petals on the outer portion and we can just dip our brush in the water jar just to rinse off some of the excess crimson lake in our brush. I am just going to paint some C strokes, and it does look like a letter U from our perspective. I'm just going to go around the flower and I am making sure that there are white spaces in between my strokes, just to separate those petals. If you notice, I'm just flicking my brush just to create that expressive petal. We are done with this part and we are just going to add more details later when this is already dry. Now let's paint the flower over here. Let's grab some permanent yellow light and add a bit of permanent rose just to create an orangey color. I'm going to paint the center first, and it will look like a C stroke that also looks like a crescent moon. Let's paint some thin strokes around it. Let's just try to zoom it in so you can see it better. We're done with the center of this rose, and I'm just going to rinse my brush to create a lighter shade of yellow-orange. I will just try to feed some of the strokes in the center and let it blend it with the outer petals. Let's add a few more strokes and these will be very light because they will be on the outer part of the flower. Now let's grab some burnt sienna and I'm just going to paint this in the center. I will just overlap it on the first layer that we did and then we can just fix this area and just spread it a bit more. We can take a short break and then we'll proceed to Part 2 of this class project. 18. Class Project: Bright Florals Part 2: Let's continue painting. We can add some blue florals over there. I'm just going to grab some cerulean blue. I'm just going to lightly press my brush on the paper to create a petal. I'm going to also rinse my brush to create a lighter shade of blue. Now, let's add a little bit of ultramarine blue. Of course, you can use any blue color that you want or you can even use turquoise and that's all up to you. I'm just slowly building this flower. I'm continuously adding some strokes to make some of the petals look bigger. Now, let's grab some sap green and paint some buds at the top. Now, this feels like it needs a little bit more volume, so we are just going to grab some cerulean blue again. I'm just going to extend some of the petals that we painted earlier. This is really good because the petals that we painted earlier are still wet. It's very easy if I want to extend it or make it bigger. It will blend seamlessly. I am just mixing up the sap green and indigo just to create a deeper green color. I will be using this to paint the stem. As you can see, the stem is just blending in with the petals that we painted. You can also add a little bit of leaves on the sides. It's now time to add some leaves in between the flowers. I just have here my sap green with a tiny bit of indigo. I just painted the stem first before adding the leaf. You can make your leaves quite expressive just like what I did. Right here, I am just doing a side stroke and then pulling it down to create a pointy tip. You can just add some more stems in between the flowers as a filler. Try to observe that whenever you paint leaves in between the flowers, it just gives life to the floral arrangement. These green leaves just complements the color of the flowers in this floral arrangement. To make it look more interesting, you can change the shades of green. Right now I just added some indigo to my sap green again. Now, I am going to shade this flower using leaves. By doing this stroke, I am defining the petal of the yellow and the pink flower. Now, you can clearly see the edge of this flower. Let's do this one more time. Now, it's up close. I start by just lining the petals. I'm drawing some curvy lines using my brush and after painting those lines, I'm going to form a leaf. Now, I'm going to add a lighter shade of green. You can do some side strokes and just try to wiggle your brush to create that leaf shape. It doesn't have to look perfect. I feel like by wiggling your brush, it will actually look more organic and look more natural. You can also add some wispy lines that will look like small vines or smaller stems and it can be used as a filler. Let's put some more stems over there. I'm just going to add some permanent yellow light to the sap green because I want a yellow-green leaf for this portion. You're just going to paint some small leaves. Just lightly press your brush to create the small leaves. You can also paint on top of this flower. Now, let's add some leaves at the top portion. When painting this floral arrangement, you just start with the main flowers first and then you add some leaves and some fillers. We can just paint some stems sticking out, and we can put some small buds right there just to add some fillers. You can be creative in this portion. You can just tap the tip of your brush to create small dots and that can be a filler. Now, it's time for the details on the flowers. This is a mixture of permanent rose with a tiny bit of hookers green. I am just going to paint some strokes just to separate some of the petals. You want the strokes to be wispy and it's just like what we practice in the brushstroke drills. We want the stroke to have some thin and thick portions. Then we'll just fade away just one side of that stroke leaving the other side with a crisp edge. We do this by just dipping our brush in clean water and just tapping the excess water in the brush. This technique just helps us in giving more definition to the petals. For this yellow, orange flower, I'm just going to mix up some burnt sienna and orange. We're just going to define the petals again by using these wispy strokes. I usually do it quite fast. I'm just going to rinse my brush and tap the excess water out. I'm just going to fade one side of this stroke and leave the other side untouched. That will give me a hard edge on one side and a blurry edge on the other. For the peachy pink flower on the left side, I'm mixing permanent rose with a little bit of the orange color on my palette. As you can see, the strokes are not as pigmented compared to the first two flowers that we did. We can just play around with some wispy strokes just creating some checkmarks in some places. I'm also painting quickly to create an expressive stroke and just swinging my brush. I'm also fading some of the strokes that I made. Right now I have burnt sienna on my brush. I'm loosely painting the C strokes. We're just going to define this flower. Right now I'm just going to fade one side of the stroke that we made. My brush doesn't have any color at all. It just has water. I'm leaving one side of the stroke on touch, which means that it has a hard edge and the other side has a very faded and blurred look. For the paint rose at the bottom, I am mixing creams and liquid. Just a tiny bit of hookers green just to create a deeper shade of creams and liquid. Right now I'm just making these wispy strokes in a C curve. After I'm done with the center, I'm just going to rinse my brush and I'm going to fade the strokes. By fading the strokes, it will actually look like these are petals on the outer side of the rose. It will look like we are creating some transparent petals. When you're doing this style, make sure that the first layer is already dry. You can now see that the flowers have more definition because of the second layer of details that we did. We can add another layer to this blue flower. I just have some cerulean blue again in my brush. I made sure that the mixture isn't too thick because I still want that transparent layer. For some of the flowers, I think, we can add a bit more detail. I have here, just burnt sienna. I'm just painting these thin lines in the center. You'll immediately notice how it just gives more character to the flowers. It's all about just making a really defined center. That will carry the entire look of the flower. To make it look more interesting, let's mix creams and liquid, a little bit of sap green, and I'm just going to paint some leaves. Now, this is another tip when painting floral arrangements. You can add some green bits in between the flowers. You'll notice that there are still some white gaps. I'm just going to slowly fill them in. You'll immediately notice the big difference. When I add those green things in between the flowers, it will look like there are also leaves underneath. By doing this, the floral arrangement won't look too cramped. We are done. I hope that you enjoyed this class project. 19. Expressive Pink Florals Part 1: [MUSIC] We have here an artificial flower and you will be using this as our reference for today. I'm going to teach you how you can translate a reference into your painting. First up, let's paint this big flower in the middle. As you can see it has a cup right there. You have petals bending down from this area. Let's start with the cup first, and then you're going to paint the petals below that cup. To start, we need to grab some permanent rose. I'm just going to mix it here in my palette. I'm showing it to you up close so that you can see the mixture clearly. I do want a thick mixture, but not too thick that I won't be able to paint loosely. We need to just cut our brush with this paint. Now I am just going to put a dot just to serve as a guide, but you can also use a pencil if you want. Let's start with the first petal. I'm going to slowly press my brush and just end it with a curve and I'm going to also fix the shape. Then let's try to paint another one right beside it. The first petal is also touching the second petal. Then now you're going to go with the third one and I'm going to make this a little bit fuller. Then we are going to add some small strokes beside it. You're just going to fill out that area and it's just a term that I coined. It just means that we're going to add a lot of small strokes and that will represent the smaller petals. Fluffing also gives more volume to a flower. Now let's try to close this gap in the middle. I'm just going to paint some C strokes. I've just rinsed my brush so that the color in my brush will be lighter. Let's just add a few more strokes. I'm just going to rinse my brush again. This petal, I think we need to make it a little bit bigger. I'm just going to add a few more strokes to make it bigger. You can always make the petals bigger. I usually like starting with smaller petals so that eventually I can make it bigger and they won't overdo a flower. I think we need to add a few more strokes in the middle. Then we can start with the petals on the side. This is just a tip. Whenever I'm painting some petals, I usually put some strokes like that just as a guide instead of painting one big stroke so that it's not that overwhelming. Let's just lightly press our brush and let's build this petal. If it doesn't look good right now, don't worry, we can always fix it afterwards. Here we can create side side stroke and we are just swaying our brush until we can create a full petal. We can add some check mark strokes and make it wispy. As you can see the ends of the strokes are pointy. I'm just fixing the top area and filling in some gaps. If you notice, I just keep on adding. I usually start with some skeleton first before we add more petals. I'm just going to mix permanent rose and hookers green. I am going to paint a shadow. We just need a deeper shade of permanent rose. I think that's a good color. I'm just going to drop it right there where the petals are coming from. That is one of the darker areas in this flower. We can try to fix some areas if it doesn't look good as long as it is still wet. I just grabbed some permanent rose and I'm going to put it in the edges of the petal just to separate some of the petals. It looks a little bit messy, so I'm just going to rinse my brush and blot the excess water. I am just going to fix some areas in this flower. I'm letting my brush absorb some of the excess paint on this flower. We can go back to fix some of the areas again. Let's move on to the second flower over here. I have permanent rose on my brush. Let's paint some C curves. I'm going to paint one on the left, another one on the right, and one more at the top. I just painted some wispy strokes below that. Right here I just rinse my brush. I just extended the first two strokes that I made so that it will become a bigger petal. We're just going to close the gap at the top by painting some C strokes. As you can see, it's a combination of different strokes and really quick wispy strokes to create that expressive floral. The best part is that we all have our own unique ways of interpreting a flower. I'm pretty sure that you can also create your own version of this flower. I'm just dropping in a darker shade of permanent rose. It's the same mixture that we made earlier. We're done with the first two flowers and let's now move on to Part 2. 20. Expressive Pink Floral Part 2: [MUSIC] We are done with the first two flowers and we're down to the last one right here. At this point you can put the stem, but I'm going to finish first, the last flower. I have permanent rose and my brush, and I will just press my brush to create a petal and going to fluff that area, add some thin strokes and also paint some on the top. Then let's try to close this one up. I'm going to put some finishing touches, some small strokes. This will look like a bud that is about to bloom. We can now grab some sap green. I'm just going to mix this and we can add a little bit of indigo for a deeper shade of green. I'm going to put the stem right here. As you can see, I'm painting it slowly and I'm not really painting just one straight line, I'm breaking up my strokes just to make it look a bit more natural. I'm also painting it in various pressure so that I get thin and thick lines. Let's attach another one to this second flower. I personally like painting the stem a little bit crooked because it just feels more natural and let's add the stem to this last flower. Again, I'm just painting it in short strokes. Let's make the stem a little bit thicker. I'm going to grab some indigo, and this is one of my favorite techniques. I'm just going to drop in some indigo on the stem and I'm doing this while the stem is still wet so that it will just blend in with the sap green color. This one just creates a shadow and it makes the stem look more natural. Let's make sap green and indigo again. I'm just going to paint some stems, some expressive ones. I'm just dragging my brush and letting the tip touch the paper. Now we're ready to paint the leaves. I'm going to paint this downwards and just lift to create that pointy tip. Let's paint another one in a different direction, and I'm just making the tips pointy so that it looks quite expressive. Let's paint another one from bottom to the left. When you're painting that, think of it as painting a hill, but in varying pressure. We can paint some leaves in two strokes like this and you can also change the shade of the green, so I just rinse my brush to create a lighter green color. Let's make sap green and indigo again and I'm going to paint another expressive leaf. The trick is to paint it fast so that you can get those curves. Let's add some more fillers. Just painting some lines, and then you can add some leaves, and right here I'm pressing my brush on the paper to create a full leaf. As I'm pressing the brush, I'm also trying to wiggle it to create those curves. Don't forget to end with a pointy tip and if you've noticed, I keep changing the angle of my brush so that I can create some unique leaves. Let's add some filler stems, and right now I'm using a lighter shade with screen. Let's proceed to adding more details to the flowers. I just grabbed some permanent rose and I'm going to add just a tiny bit of Hooker's Green. So as you can see, the color change immediately and it became a little bit deeper. I'm just going to paint some strokes in the middle. I'm almost following the same strokes that I did on the first layer. We are just going to create some wispy lines and some C strokes, making sure that all the ends of the strokes are pointy. I'm also creating a separation of petals just to make it look more defined and now I'm going to rinse my brush and it's time to fade some of the strokes. We're just fading to define the petals so that it's not too harsh when you look at it. I'm just blurring one side and take note that the first layer was already dry before we put the details in the second layer. Let's do this again. In the second flower, I'm just going to paint a deeper shade of permanent rose and then painting some C strokes. That will look like the ruffles in the center of the flower. I'm going to fade the stroke because it looks too harsh. That looks good. For this small bud, I'm just going to put in just a few strokes. At this point, we are already done. But I just wanted to show you how you can add more character to your painting, but this is completely optional. You can skip this part if you don't want to do this. I'm just going to grab some clean water and I'm going to paint in the background of this painting. I'm just painting outside the flower. In some areas, the flower might bleed into the wet background and that's okay. It will actually look nice. Here's the fun part. I'm going to pick up some permanent rose and just splatter it all over the background. Because the background is wet, it will fade away. But you can still see the dot. If you splatter on gray paper, it will dry up with harder edges and it will look more defined. You can also use your brush to spread some of the splatters that you are not happy with. Right here I got a more pigmented permanent rose and I'm doing more splatters. I'm just tapping my brush. When you're doing this technique, make sure to also cover your table, because you don't want some splatters on your table. You just want the splatters to go into your painting. I'm just spreading some of the color and I'm adding more splatters. This is completely up to you if you want to add a lot of splatter, or if you want just a few. I'm just grabbing some permanent violet and I'm going to add that to my background. Just have fun with those splatters. You can add different colors that you like. Right here I'm adding a more concentrated color so that it will look like the bud is just fading away. We are done and don't forget to sign on your painting. 21. Bonus Video Flowers in a Vase: [MUSIC] Welcome to the bonus video. In this video, we are going to paint a vase with some expressive florals. I've already drawn the shape of the vase using a pencil and of course, you can paint a different shape for the vase. Right now I'm just grab me some clean water and I'm painting on the inside of the vase. Let's grab some cerulean blue and I'm just going to drop this on the inside of the vase so I'm going to start with the outline of the vase. The vase is still wet so as you can see, as soon as we dropped in the paint, it just bleeds out and it has soft edges. I'm just going to rinse my brush and I'm going to take out the excess water and I will just try to blend in this cerulean blue on the inside of the vase. I'd like to add some sap green because I love how it just mixes with the cerulean blue. I'm just spreading the colors and I don't really have that much water in the brush, I don't want to add any more water on this wet surface. I'm going to grab some clean water and I'm going to just spread it in some spots, and it will just be random. I'm going to paint some flowers over there. The reason why I'm doing this randomly is because I want some of the flowers to have soft edges, I want some to have clean and sharp edges. I'm going to show you what I'm going to do. Let's grab permanent violet, and let's start painting the flowers. I'm just going to stamp the brush. As you can see, some areas have touch the wet part that we painted a while ago, and you can see that it has bled out. It's blooming and it's very soft. But some parts of the flower are quite sharp and it's not really that soft looking so I wanted to mix those two textures for this flower. I just rinse my brush and I'm just going to add some more petals, but I wanted a lighter shade of permanent violet. Right here I'm adding more petals and stamping and trying to sway my brush to create more expressive petals. Also, I wanted to create different shapes. Let's start mixing sap green and indigo. I'm going to paint those very thin stems. As you can see, I am painting in broken strokes. Now let's paint some leaves and I'm holding the brush towards the end of the handle just to keep it really loose, and I'm painting quite fast. This one was painted in real-time. That's my tip, when you want to paint something quite expressive, do that very quickly, paint very fast. I've added lighter shades of green. Let's just grab some more sap green, and going to paint the leaf right there. Let's just extend the stem, I'm painting some broken strokes and we can paint some expressive leaves. Let's just paint a long stem, and then we'll add some more leaves. I've just rinse my brush to create a lighter shade of green. That's sepia with bit of indigo so I wanted a dark leaf right there. I am just gliding my brush and doing a side stroke and just pulling it down so that I can create a pointy tip. Now I have sap green in my brush, I'm going to do a side stroke again. Think I can just paint one more leaf over there. I'm going to rinse my brush and going to paint some water on the vase to keep it wet again. I'm going to grab some sap green and I will just paint the stems right there so we have the illusion that this vase is a glass and you can see the stem inside. I'm going to rinse my brush again and I'm going to dab the excess water, and we are just going to clean some of the stems. I'm going to take out some of the areas that doesn't look that nice. This is just cerulean blue with a little bit of indigo, and I am going to paint the outline of this vase. Then I'm going to rinse the brush and take out the excess water, and I will just try to soften the edges right there. Let's just grab a more pigmented permanent violet, and we are going to paint more details on this violet flower. I'm just lightly stamping the brush and also trying to sway the brush to create some marks. You can also try to just flick the brush to create more expressive stroke. Right here, I think we can add some more flowers. We are just creating the illusion that these strokes are flowers and they just look very expressive. I'm going to grab some sap green and a little bit of indigo and let's just paint on top of some of the leaves that we painted awhile ago. I just want some of the leaves to have a deeper shade. Then you can also put some veins on some of the leaves. Just try to spread out the leaves with veins so that it looks just more balanced and doesn't look too crowded. Let's just grab some indigo and I'm going to paint a stroke underneath the vase. Then let's rinse our brush and I will just create a shadow, we'll try to fade the stroke that we made. I'm going to touch the bottom and let it bleed into the clear water. Make sure that you're using clean water. We can also drop in some cerulean blue, and you can just spread this. I usually like adding the color of the flower onto the shadow, just so it looks more harmonious. You can also put some green spots right there to create the illusion that maybe some of the leaves have fallen. We are done. I hope that you enjoyed this bonus video and I am excited to see your version of this vase. 22. Final Thoughts: [MUSIC] Hey, guys. This is the end of the class. I know that this is quite a long class, so thank you so much for watching. I hope that you've learned a lot today. In my opinion, using a good brush really makes a difference in painting flowers, especially the loose and expressive ones, because we're not really sketching the flower. We're not just filling in the color. We are actually painting strokes and forming them into a flower. It's really important to use a good brush that can follow your hand gestures. If you're not yet ready to buy a quill brush, you can use a round brush. I suggest you using the Black Velvet brand because it's quite close to a quill brush, in my opinion. You can also buy some artificial flowers like this so that you can use it as your reference and just paint the flowers in your own way. Of course, don't forget to practice. Every time you practice, you are one step closer to your goal. Don't forget to follow me on Skillshare so that you'll be notified every time I have a new class. Also, don't forget to upload your class project in the project gallery of this class. If you're going to upload it on Instagram, you can use this hashtag right here so that I can see your paintings. If you have any questions, you can also message me on Instagram and I would be happy to help you out. That's it. Thank you again and see you in my next class. 23. Bonus Video: Yellow Floral Bouquet Part 1: [MUSIC] Welcome to a bonus video. So a lot of you commented that you don't have a quill brush so I decided to use round brushes just like this. I find that Silver Brush black velvet is the closest one to using a quill brush. All right. So let's start. In this video, we are going to paint a simple and loose floral bouquet. So I plan to use this for Mother's day, but you can also use this for any other occasion. I'm going to show you my reference photo from Pinterest. I just decided to get a yellow themed bouquet just because it just feels warm and really perfect for Mother's Day. I'm going to show you my quick sketch of this painting just to show you how I translate a reference photo into a painting. When using a reference photo, just choose the main flowers first, so right here I chose those three main flowers in this photo. Then later on, I'm just going to add those small fillers that will complete the whole look of this bouquet. When choosing the main flower, just look for the flowers that speak to you the most. All right. So to start, I'm going to use a pencil. I'm going to draw three circles that will represent the main flowers. So this will just serve as a guide for me so that I know where the flowers will go in this bouquet. To start, I'm going to get some permanent yellow deep. We want this mixture to be a little bit thick and just more concentrated. I'm using my size 8 round brush and we're just going to slightly tap our brush and create some tiny strokes and this will be the center of the flower. As you paint these small strokes, make sure that there are spaces in between leaf strokes. With a size 6 round brush, I'm going to just fade away these strokes. So this size 6 round brush has just clean water. I'm just going to pull away from the center, going outward, and we're going to spread that color from the center. Now if you want a little bit of color, you can also add a little bit of permanent yellow light, just like what I did here. If you don't have any permanent yellow deep in your set, just use any yellow color that you have in your palette. Right here I'm just swaying my brush and just moving that color. As you can also see, my brush is also a little bit wet. It's easier to spread that stroke if your brush is wet. While the petals are still wet, we can try to fix the shape of this flower and extend some parts. We can also add some small strokes to give the illusion that it's a petal. We can also go back in with some permanent yellow deep and drop in some more concentrated color in the center just to give it that pop of color. Again, don't forget to leave the white spaces in between the strokes. Now we're okay with the first flower and we'll now move on to the second flower on the right. I'm going to grab some permanent yellow deep again, and I'm using my size 8 round brush. Let's use the tip of our brush and create the center. We're going to paint a rose, and I'm going to paint a C stroke, that will be the center of the rose after which I'm going to paint some small strokes around it, just hugging that center. I'm also making sure that they are wide spaces in between those tiny strokes. Then now let's rinse our brush. I'm going to move on to painting some larger petals and it's still a C-shaped stroke. Just move your brush all around. Now I'm going to add some more water in my brush and I'm going to paint a larger stroke. The more water that you have in your brush, the easier it is to actually paint loose petals. You can also go over the first few petals that we did and make it a little bit bigger as well. Sometimes I try to vary the shape of the strokes. As you can see, some strokes are just lines. Some are big, fat C-shaped strokes so that way, it will make the rose look more organic. All right. Now let's add some punch of color in the center. I'm going to grab some burnt sienna and mix it to my permanent yellow deep. While the flower is still wet, we're going to drop in that color in the center and just let it bleed. If it looks messy, you can try to spread that out using a clean damp brush. Make sure that your brush isn't too wet so that you're not adding some more water into the rose. So that was pretty quick and now let's move on to painting a small rose bud. I'm going to grab some permanent yellow light and just add a little bit of permanent yellow deep, sometimes I just like mixing the colors. It is, of course, your choice. So I just started with the main C strokes for the center of this bud then I'm adding some smaller strokes around it. So what we're going to do is we're going to paint the outline of this rose spot that's about to bloom. You can see a letter U-shape over here. Now let's rinse our brush. I'm going to fade away this part and just spread that color. Now, let's close a gap on top, just like this, and we're going to add a few more strokes just to fix the shape of this rose. We can use just the tip of your brush to create some more thin strokes and just build this flower. It's usually nice to paint some small strokes first so that it's not overwhelming. Now let's move on to painting some small fillers I have here, some cerulean blue, and I'm going to dilute it with a lot of water. We can also add a little bit of sap green so that we can get that bluish-green color, and it will look very pretty. All right. So now let's paint some small flowers. These are small five-petal flowers but doesn't have to look perfect. Just keep it pretty loose and just sway your brush to create some small petals. The number of flowers that you put here, it really just depends on how lush you want this filler to look like. As you can see, I'm just pressing my brush onto the paper to create these tiny strokes that will look like petals. For the center, we can add some sap green. Make sure that your brush isn't too wet because we don't want the sap green to spread all over the place, we want to control that color so we want the paintbrush to be a little bit on the dry side. So as you can see, there's a small white gap over here that I'm going to just fill in with some stamps. I'm going to grab some sap green and add the stem onto that bud. Right now, don't worry too much about what this will look like, just go with the flow. I am going to paint some thin strokes over here. Now let's create a filler. I'm using just greenish yellow. We're going to put some small dots that will look like small flowers. We can also rinse our brush to create a lighter value and it will just make this filler look more interesting. Looking at this composition, we can add one more flower just to keep it balanced. I'm going to grab some greenish yellow. We're going to paint a bigger five-petal flower. We can also add a little bit of cerulean blue. As you can see, the colors are very diluted because I don't want it to look so strong. I'm going to keep the center open. Then now let's grab some indigo, and you want it to be quite thick and concentrated, and just drop it in the center. So this technique will give it that punch of color. After painting the five-petal flower, let's move on to adding some more fillers. I have here some sap green. What I do is I just add these thin stems first just so I know how it will look like if I will add more fillers. Because we're pretty happy with this, I'm going to add some hands and attach it to the stems. We can also rinse our brush to create a lighter value to make it look more interesting. Now let's grab some cerulean blue, and I'm going to put some small dots. These will look like small flowers. You can just try to dab your brush in the tissue paper if you feel like there's too much water in your brush. I'm going to continue dabbing my brush. So when you're choosing fillers, try to choose colors that will complement the main flowers, so that's a way to make the main flowers pop up some more. So I also added a little bit of green to these fillers. Let's look at this painting again from afar. I feel like we can add some filler on the left using permanent yellow deep, I'm going to add some small dots again. You're going to paint the filler that looks like a ball. We can also rinse our brush to create a lighter value and add some more dots, or we can also add some permanent yellow light. You can use two colors. You can also add some yellow orange color if you want or maybe a little bit of red. Now let's just add a stem to attach to the main bouquet. Right beside it I'm going to add some leaves. I just painted the main stem first. Then I'm going to grab some greenish yellow, and we're going to dab our brush to create these small leaves. So just try to have fun when it comes to painting leaves. It's so nice to paint leaves because there's just no pressure, and it's just so relaxing to paint leaves. All right. Now let's move on to part 2 of this project. [MUSIC] 24. Bonus Video: Yellow Floral Bouquet Part 2: Welcome to Part 2 of this project. Right now we are going to add more fillers. I'm just going to copy the blue flowers over here on the right side and using seen just diluted cerulean blue. When you're adding fillers to your bouquet, don't be afraid that you're copying the same fillers into another spot. That's definitely okay. After adding the small flowers, don't forget to add the stems. Using a more concentrated mixture of sap green, I'm going to add some more leaves. Try to vary the color of the leaves in a bouquet so that it doesn't look boring and doesn't look flat. Right here, I just mix sap green and some indigo to get a deeper shade of green. They also made sure to vary the shape of the leaves. Some of the leaves that I'm going to paint are going to look more slender or longer. Some are fatter leaves. Just change the way that the leaves look by changing the pressure that you put into each stroke. Right here at the bottom, I'm just going to add one more filler, and I'm just going to copy the filler right here. To give it more depth, I'm going to add more concentrated green on the steps right here and it just gives that 3D effect. I'm adding leaves in between the fillers and the main flowers. Let's change up the angle of the camera so you can see how I paint the wispy leaves. I usually just use the tip of my brush and I try to drag it very quickly so I get that pointy tip. [MUSIC] Whenever you're painting light-colored flowers, make sure to add a dark leaf around it. By doing this, it makes a flower pop up and you'll see that we are giving definition to the edges of this flower. Right here you can see that there's a white gap, and I'm just going to put some leaves to fill up this white space. [MUSIC] It's now time to add the main stem of this bouquet. I'm just going to grab some sap green and you're going to paint some straight lines in different directions. After which I'm going to rinse my brush and I'm going to grab some clean water and we're going to drag away some of those colors. That will make it look more impressionistic. You can also add some indigo to our sap green just to give it more contrast. I'm going to leave this area first and you can go back to this stem in a while. I'm just going to add a few more leaves and fillers [MUSIC] Try to stop and look at your painting from afar just to see where you want to add some more fillers or leaves. At the top right, I'm going to add one more filler. I'm just letting my eyes bounce from one side to another and just see if it feels balance. [MUSIC] Right now I think we can add some yellow on the top part, just near the blue fillers. Let's paint some small flowers. I'm just going to press my brush and create some loose petals. It doesn't really have to always look like a five-petal flower, sometimes just adding some loose petals will make a big difference in your entire bouquet. Now I'm using just a darker shade of sap green. I'm going to add some small stems in between the flowers, just to separate the flowers. Then you can add some more dots on this filler to give it more depth. I'm adding the small dots when the first layer is already dry. Now let's add some definition to the small flowers. I'm going to put some small dots in the center using sap green. You can also use indigo. Let's play around with some of the leaves and make it look really expressive. You can also hold the brush in a different area than your usual spot so that you can create some expressive leaves. Some of the first layer leaves are already dry. What you can do is you can paint on top of them. We are layering some leaves. Layering really makes a bouquet or a wreath look more lush. Speaking of adding a second layer, we can now add the second layer to our flowers. I have here burnt sienna mixed with some permanent yellow deep. Using the tip of my brush, I'm just going to try and wiggle some strokes in the center of this flower. If it looks too bold, then you can grab a clean brush and just fade away some of the strokes to make it look softer. This brush has just clean water on it. I'm using my size 6 round brush and I'm grabbing that burnt sienna mixture again. Let's paint on top of this rose. I'm pretty much painting the same strokes as the first layer. But just this time I wanted it to be darker. Then let's rinse our brush to get rid of that dark color. I'm just going to grab some permanent yellow deep and this is more diluted. I'm going to add the second layer. You can see it's quite translucent. You can still see the layer underneath and make sure that you can see the first layer as well. Let's move on to the small bud. Again, I'm adding the C stroke in the center and just some tiny strokes around it. Then let's rinse our brush and fade away the other strokes. You're done with the details on the flowers. Now, let's look at it from afar again. I feel like the stems look too thin and I'm going to add a few more stems and also a few more leaves. [MUSIC] This part right here looks a little awkward, so I'm going to add some leaves to cover up my mistake. That's one tip for you guys. Use leaves or fillers to cover up some tough mistakes. Let's add some blue fillers on the left because it doesn't feel balanced. We want some blue on the left as well. That's it. Congratulations for finishing this bouquet. You can add some more leaves if you want, or some more fillers to make this bouquet bigger. Or you can also add a small bow right here, just like what I did in my first sketch. Thank you for watching this bonus video. I look forward to your project. [MUSIC]