Learn to Paint From Reference Images: Build Your Own Watercolour Style

1. Welcome to the Class!: One significant challenge we artist always face is the process of finding an ideal reference image and skillfully translating it into a captivating painting. Even though painting from real life is really exciting, there are times when you simply cannot paint the scene from real life. Maybe the lightest quickly fading, the weather's changing, is subject is moving and that is bad. Reference images can help. Using reference image. You can paint in your own data. Hello everyone. I'm geethu, a Skillshare teacher, Silverbrush educator, and an ambassador for White Nights. And see that I'm stationary in India. I've been teaching online for more than three years now and have conducted several in-person workshops and various cities. For almost all of my paintings, I have used reference images because they give me the inspiration to find the right composition Perspective and lead me to the final details in the painting. Welcome to this class on Learning to Paint from Reference Images and building your own watercolour style. After completing both my 100 Day Project classes in Skillshare, one thing that many of my students told me that they struggled with was to paint from reference images on their own. Although this class has cater to painting with watercolors, I'm sure that many of the concepts and principles can be translated to other mediums such as acrylics and gouache. In this class, you'll learn how and where to find reference images and how to choose a reference image. I will teach you how to decide the focal point, determine the composition, create the tonal and final sketches to analyse your composition in detail. Choose your colour palette, as well as tell you the secret to building your own style with watercolours, tips for great colour combinations, creating linear and aerial perspectives, and the odds of capturing the Focal Point in your paintings. By the end of this class, you'll have developed the skills and the confidence to embark on your own watercolor adventures using the thousands of images that you might have saved already, you'll possess the knowledge to find inspiration from those reference images. Compose captivating artwork, and bring your visions to life with vibrant colors and mesmerizing techniques, no matter your skill level, this class welcomes artists from all backgrounds who are eager to learn and embrace the Art of painting from reference images. If you are a beginner, then this class is gonna be super helpful for you because you learn all the aspects of breaking down a reference image with the example of a class project. If you are an intermediate or an advanced artist who just happened to drop by here, then I'm sure that you will find some interesting concepts in this class which will help you to improve your paintings. Let's embark on this exciting journey together and discover the beauty that awaits in your very own watercolor style. Enroll now and let your imagination soar 2. Class Project: Hey everyone, thank you for joining this class. I'm truly excited to have each and every one of you here before we delve into the gap to eating topics of this class, let me explain about the Class Project and how I've structured this class. Throughout this class, I will guide you through the process of how to use reference image and demonstrate the different approaches that we discussed in this class by following along, I'm sure that you'll be able to class the concepts quickly. Furthermore, I have Rabbet, step-by-step watercolor painting process using the same reference image that we using to discuss the concepts in this class. This was a, as a valuable demonstration showcasing how we can effectively apply the principles and techniques that we have discussed. Welcome to paint along with me, or if you prefer, there are seven copyright free images attached and the resources section from the esteemed sores Unsplash. These images will help you to explore and experiment putting into practice the principles that we have discussed in this class. Hi, I'm genuinely eager to see all of the paintings that you try out from using the references. So don't forget to upload your projects to the resources section here in Skillshare. Remember, this class is not just about learning, but about embracing your creativity, finding your own unique artistic voice, as well as sharing your beautiful creations with the community of fellow artist. So if you're ready to unlock your boundless potential, Let's move on to the concepts of this glass 3. Where to Find Reference Images: Now that you here ready to develop your skills on painting from a reference, we obviously need to know where we can find those reference images. If you are someone who does travel a lot and it's equipped with a good camera or smartphone. You can capture different scenes from various places and use them as a reference. But unfortunately, many of us may not be privileged enough to move around a lot. Hence, the search for reference images before we sit down to Paint, you may have heard of Pinterest, but while Pinterest is an ideal source of inspiration, the pictures available in Pinterest may not be copyright free as they could have been pinned by anyone from any website. If you're creating paintings for yourself and never intend to cellular Art or post to social media than it is completely alright to use the reference images from Pinterest for your practice sessions. I have used Pinterest reference images for my paintings only when I'm completely sure of the source of the same. And if I see that it mentions a source is not copyright free and I want to use it. I contacted the honor and seek permission to use the same. Whenever it comes to the topic of copyright free images and licensing, it seems very intimidating and scary, but there are plenty of resources in the Internet to help you with finding the right images. I'm not a copyright lawyer or a legal person. Before you decide on taking from a website, just be absolutely sure that you're free to use their images and content with or without credit. For most websites, you'll be able to find this information in their terms and conditions. The resources I'll be sharing here are the ones which I'm absolutely sure other websites that offer copyright free images, which means they are free to use and require no credit to be given to the other or the original photograph for most of the time when we're looking for photographs to Paint, we have some topic or keyword in mind, and this is enough to find some really cool images. Some of these websites include Unsplash, pixabay, and Pexels. Unsplash as my personal thing you read from these three and they have high-quality images for every keyword that I have literally search for from expert photograph as I mostly use the iOS app on my iPhone to scroll to the images and find the pictures I want. But the desktop version is really cool and hosts are more flexible way of searching through the thousands of images at ease. You can simply enter in a keyword or multiple keywords such as winter landscape, and instantly find all images that match those keywords that you ended. If you like a particular image and click through it. You will also find images that are related to the same as you scroll to the bottom of it. But the best part I like about Unsplash is the ability to save any images that individual private collections of my own, which means that I don't have to download each image straightaway to my phone and save it for later use. As you can see, over the years, I have created a huge list of collections of folders. Then I can easily refer to when I'm desperately in need for a big chunk related to a specific theme. This has also been my workflow for several months now where I collate images of different teams indented for my Instagram paintings are Skillshare classes and save them into individual collections during my free time. And get back to it when I'm ready to shoot a class. And being the same, all of the images from Unsplash are absolutely free to use except for the purpose of selling the image itself on your own platform or elsewhere. The other website I have started using recently, although I was aware of it from before, is Pixabay. It has millions and millions of images in different formats. Mobile interface of pixabay is not that great to use, which is probably why I haven't used it much before. But it is a great website to get the closest possible images to general Google search. I have individual collections of folders in Pixabay as well. The third great website is Pexels, which is another great source for copyright free images. You can obviously find more such websites by using a simple Google search. But make sure you always check the terms and conditions of the website before you use any images from that site to find. Another question I always get is whether the images in Google search can be used by there are images which are copyright free. All the search results may not be free, and hence it is not ideal to use for those from the search directly. However, there is an option to get free license photographs from Google. You can simply search for your desired keyword in Google Images. And then you can go to tools underneath the search bar and sought by usage rights and commercial and other licenses. These images have non Creative Commons licenses and can be either from sites that are free of charge, like Unsplash, pixabay, etc. or commercial sites that require a payment for accessing the images like I stock, Adobe Stock, etc. even then here you shouldn't be using the pictures directly because it could be from a paid websites such as I stock or Adobe Stock. The biggest advantage that I find with Google Images search through this way is to find images correlated over from Unsplash, Pixabay, Pexels, and all the other websites that I know a copyright free, which saves me time from individually searching in these websites. However, I still prefer to save images to my collections in Unsplash pixabay. Another option for you to get reference images to Paint and post in social media is to find images from photographs who have shared the same in their social media channels, such as Instagram or Facebook. But make sure you seek their permission to use the same and use it solely for the purpose of painting and practice sessions or make them aware of your intentions with the painting that you do with that photograph. As long as you have the owner's approval, you are free to do anything with it. Some photographers may actually love the fact that you choose their picture to Paint and harness, lease odd-odd their permission and would agree to it being posted in your social media channels so that they get some exposure through you as well. Now that you know where to get reference images from, let us move to the next lesson where we will learn how to choose a reference image 4. Choosing a Reference Image: Let us see how we can choose one from the thousands of images available. While you may have a topic in mind, it is quite difficult to narrow one image down from the huge number of choices. But here are some pointers that you should look in a reference picture, some focal point of interest. The reference photo that you choose should have some objects of interest in it, and which tends to capture the attention of the viewer. If not, when you painted the painting will look wrong, just like the images. Good-quality photo or resolution. Whilst this is not an important criteria to choose your reference images, it is helpful to have a good-quality photograph from where you can deduce the tonal values and objects from within. It will help you in deciding the colours and the composition of the painting. And impressive tonal value structure. The tonal value is one of the most important factors in a painting. And as ultimately what catches the light and shadow in a painting, look for images that have an impressive or strong tonal value scale, a good color harmony. Ideally, we want to be looking at pictures with a stunning color harmony featuring a good contrast between colors are, for example, two complimentary colors together, or a gum sunset with analogous colors, the overall lighting of the image. It is better to avoid Images that has a lot of exposure and too bright or underexposed areas where the dark colors appear as black all around. A good tip is to look at the shadow areas and see if you can still see the details there, the arrangement of objects in the picture. Try to avoid images with a lot of objects or images that are cluttered with several things that might eventually take the attention away from your focal point in the painting. Obviously, there are exceptions to these criteria. As you as an artist might want to capture something specifically. And all of these do not apply to that reference teammates that you have chosen. Keep in mind that these are for general purposes only and should be considered as a guiding point in your search for a good reference image that will attract the viewer once you've painted it. But the Class Project of this class, after careful consideration, I have chosen this reference image. It is quite simple and does not involve a lot of elements which will make it easier for me to explain the process as we progress in the lessons forward, I'll show you the process of how to approach this reference image for painting in connection with the principles discussed. Now that we have the reference image, let us move on to the next lesson, where we will learn how to decide the focal point 5. Deciding the Focal Point: Alright, so we're going to talk about deciding the focal point in our painting. Focal point is the part of the painting that the viewers eye is drawn to instinctively or something that which creates the attention of everyone as they look at your painting, it is a key point in your painting. It could be a large tree in the corner or the sun's rays as it sets behind the mountains at the horizon. Sometimes it may even be the shadows in your painting. Thus, it is crucial to have a focal point in your painting. It has a huge impact on how the viewer appreciates your painting. Tells a lot about what you as an artist wanted to convey to them through that painting. Sometimes the reference themselves capture this focal point for you using the blurred background effect or what is known as the narrow depth of field. Usually these pictures are taken by the photographer with a focal point already set in place, and hence the rest of the background appears blurred out or out-of-focus as compared to the object that is the focal point. Here are some pictures where I have painted from references where the focal point was already chosen for me and was clearly evidenced in the reference photographs or other reference images tried to choose objects which are easier to capture the viewer's attention to in the painting, and also emotionally connects with you as an artist. I know that this sounds like a pro level or a professional way of painting. And you might find it difficult to even connect with the reference. And that is odd, right? Honestly speaking, I still got to get myself to attach myself to all the paintings that I do. And sometimes we paint only for practice, and it feels silly to be connected to every painting that we do. This is completely normal and you don't have to be stressed about it for good point. Objects in our painting can be something that is large enough for the viewer to notice quickly or instinctively without you asking them to look at that place, look for areas of interests in your reference image. There are some general things which our eyes are always attracted to, such as human figures in the painting, contrasting shapes and sizes, a mountain pathway, a crossroad junction exit door. All of these things demand a lot of attention, and hence we can easily pinpoint these from the reference image and choose it as our focal point. These are the elements that have a high visual weight than other subjects. As a beginner, you can start with one focal point, and then as you advance as an artist, you can add more focal points in them. Now to decide the focal point in this reference picture, let us have a closer look at this picture. You can see there are some trees towards the left, adrenal, somewhere in the middle, some towards the right, some subtle background, mountains, the sun in the middle, and lots of snow in the background. So I think that this tree makes a good focal point, especially because it's right in front of the sun and it's kind of gluing on one side and the other side has some shadows. And you can have a lot of objects around it such that it points towards that focal point. Obviously, we may have to move some things around to fix the composition, but that we will discuss in the next lesson. So here in this reference, I have chosen this tree as my focal point. You obviously can do something else as your focal point and changes according to your freewill. Remember there is no strict rule, all dependent upon your artistic perception. So feel free to choose anything you like and modify this reference as you like. I have this reference uploaded in the resources section here in Skillshare. Another best way to choose the focal point in your image is to find the objects that followed rules of composition and use that to attract the viewer's eyes. So determining the composition in our painting is what we will look at in the next lesson. 6. Determining the Composition: This lesson we will go through some essential Composition methods, tips and tricks for watercolor painting, which will enhance the flow and structure of your paintings. Even if we're painting from a reference or still-life composition, it is a first step to the B2C process. It involves the overall arrangement of all the elements in your painting. Aesthetically please the viewer when looking at your painting. Thus, it is very important for you to have the Focal Point objects in the right place in your paintings. So that you invite the viewers eyes to this focal point before it wanders around the rest of the painting. And at the same time, taking into consideration the balance, color, and contrast in your paintings, one simple method of fixing the composition in your painting is using the rule of Ted's. This method is a much simplified model of the golden ratio method, which I will skip discussing here because it's quite complicated to explain it briefly without going into the math of it. The rule of thirds say is that if you divide a composition into thirds, both horizontally and vertically. And then you use the intersection point of these four lines to place your focal point in the painting, then it becomes aseptically and visually pleasing for the viewer these areas, but particularly draws the attention of the viewer. However, it is generally recommended to not feel all of the foal focal points as it may look cluttered. Once you have identified the focal point in your painting, you can easily shifted position to the right or left and up or down to coincide with this intersection point of the line of Ted's. If you look at these paintings, you can see how I have changed the horizon line to be along the one by third position, so that the composition is more visually pleasing to the eyes. Here are some simple tips you can keep in mind while fixing your composition. You don't have to paint every element in the reference image. You can remove or add objects as you please. Do not think of the reference as something which you need to replicate exactly as it is. Use it as a source of inspiration or guidance, and then change things accordingly to your freewill. Remove objects from places that are overcrowded and add objects to places which look otherwise empty. If you feel that there are too many elements on one part of the reference, you can easily move that to the other side where it will look less cluttered. But at the same time, keeping your focal point and rule of thirds in mind, you can add points of detail. Additional figures are trees in your painting. Even if they're not there in the reference image, they just need to be placed there with a specific purpose. You can also use multiple reference images and combine objects from them together in one single painting. The only thing you have to keep in mind here is proportions. For example, if you're bringing in a tree from another image to a painting which already has a mountain. Then remember to give the proportions correctly and place the tree such that it does not look bigger than the mountain or place it in a position that makes a proportion correct in your painting, with focus on the overall perspective of the same, you can try out different thumbnail sketches to determine the best composition for your painting from the reference image that you have chosen. I used to do this earlier for many of my paintings, but over time, I have gained the confidence to approach the picture directly and change the elements then and there from my head without using a sketch, thumbnail sketches can be thought of like a small plan for your painting. We use it and think of different ideas to approach your reference. For example, how to place your elements to change the reference from landscape to portrait format if it isn't the landscape mode and vice versa. This planning process can also help you to decide where you Focal Point elements are going to be to create the most impact. Here is how you can capture the focal point or emphasize it a bit more using the structure of your composition, use other elements, such as our road hedges are clouds to point D or Focal Point. Use leading lines that direct the viewer's eyes to the Focal Point. Make it bigger in structure compared to the other elements in the painting. We will discuss emphasizing the Focal Point more with your colors in a future lesson when we discuss about the color palette for your paintings. So let's decide the composition of the reference that we have chosen. I've made some boxes on a piece of paper here, and I've split it into the three-part for following the rule of thirds, of course. So along the vertical and along the horizontal line, just split it into three. Just a rough estimate would do You don't need to use a ruler and measure things out. Just do it with free hand. And sometimes the measurements may not be exactly equal or appropriate, but that's absolutely fine. It just needs a rough estimate, that's it. So here in this reference image you can see that the horizon line is somewhere closer to the halfway point and then goes down below, showing that there's a slope in that foreground. We can keep the slope, of course, because things doesn't have to be like perfectly oriented here in this case because we're depicting this loop. But if for example, your painting and ocean and you're having the further point, horizon point of the ocean. Don't make it such that the design is tilted. That needs to be straight for aesthetics, of course, here, the midway point is, of course here But let's not make it start at the midway point, but you can start somewhere below. And then let's take it towards the below point of the one-third line. This is because if it was a straight line that it's good to have it like straight along the one-third point. But here to depict the slope, it's better to have it like somewhat landed a bit. So starting there, maybe it can go to that point. So that slope is going to look better if it oriented that way. I have to keep reminding you that this is just my artistic perception. You are afraid to change anything the way you want it. Now, then we have lots of objects in the foreground, of course. But let's not focus on that. We decided that are Focal Point was going to be this tree. That tree in a reference images approximately somewhere here, which is closer to the middle space. But we don't want to put it in the middle of space because we wanted to follow the rules of composition. Not exactly follow, but to make it more pleasing to the viewers eyes and give that focal point of pushed. It is better to put it at a place closer to the one by three. So along the one method, this vertical position is right where I want to place that tree. So my tree is going to be there. So that's where the tree is going to be. I'm just not sketching properly. I'm just roughly marking the position. So I'm just when working out how the tree is going to be two there, that's where my tree is going to be. Now, let's decide how we can enhance this focal point. Obviously, enhancing the Focal Point means that making the focal point the center of attraction of your painting. When the viewer looks at your painting, they should be able to see the focal point first and all the objects that lead to it. More depth on how to enhance your focal point is discussed in a future lesson. So let's just try to decide the composition for now. And when you watch that lesson, all of this will make sense. Obviously first we have some background mountains there which we can leave as a day as you don't need to change that, but don't make it too high. So let's just capture some background mountains there. That's it, that's there in the background. Then we have some tree here on the left, which I'm going to reduce the size because I don't want it to be of the same height as my focal point. So considerably reducing the size of it. And that tree goes there. And we can have some trees on the right side as well. Which again, I'm going to be reducing the size of it that it doesn't match the height of my Foucault boundary. Okay? So there is another tree and another tree here as well. Okay, shouldn't. Maybe we can make this longer and there. So that's the simple sketch as it is. But obviously there are some foreground elements. But what can you do to make those foreground elements such that it makes the focal point, the focus. I know it sounds a bit confusing, but let me show it to you. So you see that there are some snowballs or snow what do you say? I think snowballs the right term isn't it? Snowballs in the foreground? And you can use those snowballs to point you focal point. Let's see how so for example, if I were to simply draw a line, this line is just an imaginary line. Okay, that's what I'm drawing it very likely it's not part of the Sketch. And you can place some snowballs on that one there so that its shadow. Oh, first of all, when we discussing the shadow, obviously you need to check where the light sources, so here the light source is kind of in the middle and that's fine because it's not the focal point or I think it's will get delivered in the middle. Another reason why I'm leaving it in the middle is because when you leave it in the middle, the shadows are all going to converge outward, which makes the painting interesting, of course, here, that the sun here, which will make the right side of our tree let left-side to be off darker shadows. So here we have our whole grand snowballs, which is going to cast a shadow like that. Following along this line, along towards the sun, which also makes it such that it's pointing towards the street. Can you see that? It just makes it interesting? That's all, but you don't have to do all of that. Don't make it too perfect. So we'll have some random ones along and try and please someone wants. So here we have a bigger one, which again is going to have a shadow like that. Then let's please along another one along this line. Again, we're just going to have I'll get this one. Shadow is gonna be slightly outward because that's by the sun is for this one. But then you can still see that when you make the whole of the painting, you'll see that the focus of attention goes to this tree because it appears as though these backgrounds elements are all pointing towards the street, as mentioned earlier, we'll discuss in a future lesson how you can make the Focal Point stand out a bit more. Let's just to finish off by adding lot more smaller rocks and elements. Okay. So did I say rocks? I mean snowballs. So just a lot more of them and that's it. Okay. So just make sure that all of them, not all of them, but most of them are pointing towards the tree, which makes it look better. Here, that is our rough pencil sketch for this reference image. I know that for such a simple reference image, we're going through a whole lot of process and trying to make it difficult. You might think that way, but this is kind of like the process that goes before you start a painting. And let me tell you when you do this process for a long, long time and do a lot of painting, all of these things are just going to come naturally to you in your head. And you can skip all of these processes like creating the initial scared, creating this Dolan studies, which we'll discuss in the next lesson of course. And all of this is going to be like embedded in your head as soon as you see the picture and you're just going to approach it straightaway now that you know the rule of thirds and the steps to get a better composition in your paintings. Let us have a look at the tonal studies for our reference image. 7. Creating the Tonal Sketch: Alright, at this point, you might be feeling overwhelmed with the fact that there is literally too many things to consider before approaching a reference image. But my intention here is to tell you the best practices and steps that you can go through for Learning to Paint from a reference with ease at the beginning stage of our painting journey. This might seem like a lot, but it's something that always becomes easier as you advanced as an artist. All the practice works that you do gives the experience for you to skip several of these steps as they become second nature to you during the tonal study before you approached the painting directly is a good practice to determine and understand the different color values associated with your subject in your painting, the tone of any object is a way of assessing the light and dark areas on it. Every object has a tonal value with a tree, mountain, or even the sky with some random clouds. In fact, this is something that I have been telling my students whenever I teach that the colors that you using your paintings are not important. As long as you get the tones correct for each element that you put in your painting. If we don't get the tonal structure in our painting, then it will never look good as it lacks clarity. The tones are the basic fundamental thing in any picture of painting. Depicts the light and shadow features on the object. Before you start with the painting, it is good practice to add some tonal values to the thumbnail sketch that you have decided from your composition studies. If, of course you have not made any thumbnail sketch for fixing your composition, then this is the point where you really need to make one to determine the tonal structure in your paintings. One simple and easy method that I used to determine the tones of different elements in my reference image is to use a filter and change it to monochromatic mode so that I only see black, White, and grays. And it becomes easy to assess the tone of each subject. I often do this by editing the picture in my default iPhone photo editor and choosing the mono filter out of it, which then changes dot reference image into a monochromatic mode, which will easily show me where the darkest and lightest parts of my image are. So create a small tonal value study sketch for each of your references that you know the value of the color that you need to add when you start painting. Here are some things to keep in mind about tonal values. Tonal value is how light or dark something is on a scale of black and white. White is the lightest value and black is the darkest value. So any objects in your reference that appears black in the monochromatic mood needs to be painted with the darkest tone, while the lightest areas that appear white or light gray with lighter tone. Here's a tonal scale with values ranging from one to eat. Ages the darkest, while one is the lightest tone in the reference, you will notice that most of the tones are in-between these, but understanding the value of each color helps to identify the highlights, midtones, and shadows more correctly. It is really important to think of the values first before you approach with the colours. Because no matter what colors you use, the right tones, always mapped out. So let us go ahead and create the tonal sketch for this so that we know what the values are on different places. So here I have converted this image into the monochromatic scale, as you can see, which clearly shows us that blacks and whites and all the light and the darkest areas. This is the simplest method to use when you want to do the Donald studies. Just use a simple app in your phone and change it to the monochromatic and wood. And you can approach. So here I've made a little box here on the paper where we can go ahead and do the Tonal Sketch and find out where the lightest and the darkest areas are. Just as we've made the sketch. We can go ahead. That's the one my portfolio. And that's where my tree was. And there's a small tree here. And do small trees there. And frogs here. You don't have to do these sketches perfectly. It's just a rough estimate of how you want to do it. You can also totally skip this when you have the monochromatic reference right in front a few biggest the values are right there as you can see it. But it just helps out when you market with your pencil because it helps you to visualize it when you're painting. So here, as you can see, you've got so many the darkest areas are probably the shadows and the areas on the trees. So you can see that the areas on the trees are kind of the darkest, but even then in middle there are some lightest areas. Let me show that Duke loosely. So here, there are some midtones here, which is the snow on the trees. Mid tones here Alright, then of course, the background mountains here it is very dark, but we'll discuss in a future lesson how you can make the backgrounds in further away. You can skip the darker value for now, but it's still going to be in somewhat darker tone because it depicts them further off mountains. So here then obviously we have the students, but can you observe and see that it's in a different color tone altogether because the part where the sun's area is lighting onto the stone. And here it's somewhat has a highlight and then gets darker and darker eventually towards the right side getting the darkest. This is why I said, if you make it into the monochromatic scale, you can see all of these differences. For example, if you go back to the other big, the sudden change is not that evident here, but in a black and white skill, you can clearly see what is the darkest and what is the medulla and where are the highlights? Here? On the right side, it's going to be darker, getting lighter and lighter towards the front here. So that goes the same for all of the rocks. So I'm not going to market perfectly, but you can go ahead and sketch in. Another clear thing that you need to note is this is where the light ptosis acting on this rock here. So the light is hitting on the backside of the rock, which makes this whole side to be darker. Just the light source is going to be just a highlights is going to be rounded. Host of that snowball is going to be darker. I apologize if I've been synced to own for this, I know it's a snowball, but it just keeps coming out of my mouth. And then we've got some darker highlights here, but it's still not as dark as the shadow. So you can see that it's come what, in the scale of about maybe around six or seven, but not a nine or ten, which is what you can clearly see here. So we've got some colors here. And then along the shadows. Now the shadows, if you observe it's even more darker. So this darker areas that you've just done is probably like seven or 80, which makes this a five or six. You can see how you can study that's tonal value and see where your colour don't go in that tonal value range. Okay? So if I'm taking the shadow here, this needs to be even darker than the edge that I made. Can you see now that the darkest point? So you can keep repeating that here, That's the shadow up. And that goes and needs to be much, much, much darker. Alright? So we've got three here. I'm not completing the tree, just adding it random at the moment. Right? Didn't we see more rocks? Snowballs? Okay. All right. You can see now will obviously add in a lot more when we're doing the painting in real again. Then we had a lot of them here. All of those shadows needs to be darker. The shadow of the tree, which is again somewhat darker. But can you see now how you've made the tonal value range? Alright, even for the sky, it needs to have like a medium tone if you look and the lightest part is where the sun is right here and the sun's rays. So those areas are going to be lighter. The other areas are going to be somewhat darker. So this, if this is the lightest lighter value, the mountains need to be more darker, but then lighter than the tree. So this is how you can evaluate what the tonal value ranges. So study the picture in the monochromatic scale, which is the best, best method to approach a painting, even if the reference photographs have crisp edges for each object. There are several rules to keep in mind while approaching watercolor paintings and implementing tonal value structure. One of which is aerial perspective, which we will discuss in a future lesson 8. Making the Final Sketch: Now that you have finalized your Tonal Sketch, you can get ready to transfer the rough sketch or the placements of various objects onto the paper. You're going to be painting on. Different artists have different rules and preferences when it comes to making the sketch on the paper. Some prefer to sketch out everything in detail, every object, every contour, every line. Some also prefer to have lighter shading done for shadows on the final sketch. On the other hand, there are others would not sketch at all. They just approached the whole painting without a sketch on the paper directly. They might have already made the composition sketch and the tonal value studies and are confident enough to start painting on the beeper directly. Years of practice might also allow them to skip the composition sketch, tonal value study in who? I think I'm somewhere in-between. I prefer to do some sketches when it comes to objects that have a definite shapes such as a building, a house, or car. Whereas I skipped the non-important things like trees, Brushes are clouds. I also sometimes do a rough sketch on the paper to mark the position of the horizon line, a mountain, a stream or river, etc. but in general, I prefer to do most of my strokes with the paintbrush. You as an artist, need to find out what you're more comfortable with. Finding the answers to these questions might help you decide your approach to the sketching process. If you answer a yes for any of the question, that means you can skip that part of the sketch in your process, are you able to visualize the position of different elements in your paintings on the paper without a sketch, such as the horizon line, mountains, stream or river, are you comfortable in creating easy shapes like trees, bushes, background mountains, exedra directly with European brush. Can you paint the shadows of different objects directly onto the paper if there was no Sketch, are you comfortable to create objects with definite shape such as a building, house or car directly with Europeans. Apart from these, additionally, you might have to make a sketch if there is something that you need to mask out in your painting and use masking fluid. Even if you find out that you're a person that prefers know, Sketch adult, you might have to sketch the areas that you need to mask out. But then again, there are exceptions to these as well. For example, the slotted form in this painting, I used masking fluid but then sketch it out. So let us transfer the sketch that we made on to our final piece of paper. The paper that I'm using here is Saunders Waterford 300 GSM, hundred percent cotton cold press paper, which is what I normally use for my watercolor paintings. You're free to choose any kind of paper that you want or have. But make sure that it is 100% cotton cold press with minimum thickness of 300 GSM because that's what's ideal for watercolor paintings. Also, I have another video dedicated in this class for the Art supplies that I'm using right before the painting process, you can refer to that for more additional supplies that I'm using. So to transfer the sketch, let us have a look at the one by third position in our paper, which is this. And this. As I said, rough estimates are enough, okay? So those are the one by third position. So now we need to make sure that we marked the horizon line, which was kind of like halfway down, right below the middle point, towards below the one mark. So that's around starting there and going to go down sloping towards the right. Below the one by third mark, just like we sketched. So that's a horizon line. Now, one by third along the horizontal line at thing. That seems appropriate. Yes, it does. So that's one. And the other one was right there. So far where to market towards the bottom. Just proximately there. Now, our tree. Here when you're sketching the tree, obviously you maybe you can mark most of the things with the brush itself. Like I said, I prefer to do when I'm sketching, I only mark the positions of the objects are other things that I'd like to do with, with my brush itself. So here what I'm gonna do is I'm going to just sketch out the important area of the tree, which is kind of the trunk in the middle and maybe just give some surface around. So I'm looking at the sketch when I'm trying to make It doesn't need to be perfect. It's just a rough thing for me to follow when I'm doing the painting process. You can do this, give this, and do this with your brush itself. So you can just draw the tree trunk and be done. That's it. Like I said, you'd decide what are the things that you need in your painting? Okay, that's it. That's how my tree is going to be, which is the focal point. Now to mark the position of the others. Not going to have a lot of height. Like I said, I'll make it right there. And then I don't think I'm going to sketch in a lot of detail for this. Again, just roughly marking the position then towards the right side as well. So again, this is a very tall tree. This these ones are not going to be that tall. Another one next to it. Okay. Don't want to create a lot of Sketch and ruin that thing. I think I'm just going to leave it with the trunk and just marking the position. So that's it. Now, if we look at the snowballs, didn't we say that we will try to place them on a line so fast. Let's go ahead and add the snowballs. They're all there are some background smaller trees which I just noticed, but that's okay. You don't you can just add it later on. You get closer. There. Some smaller ones. Now for the larger snowballs. Lot of in those regions. Now along here. So this is the imaginary line I proposed. So if I place one of my snowball there, another one there. And then let's see, we have another imaginary line along this line. And I'll make the biggest one there. Another one there, another one there. And of course some unknown smaller ones here. And there can have more towards the light, you know, like I mean, some lines towards the right and add more there. Okay. So I think we're good to go with the sketch. There you go. You can clearly see it. But like I said, again, it depends on how much you want to Sketch. You can totally approached this directly with your beans and without doing any sketch adult, but just by Jess reference to the Tonal Sketch that you made or even written the reference image that you've made. But obviously that's an advanced stage where you clearly know how you've been tick is going to be, which is what we're trying to learn in this class, isn't it? So here you go. Every part of the painting process gets better with practice and you will eventually learn the quickest and easiest ways to approach the painting. Now, let us move on to the fund. An interesting part of the painting process, choosing the colors for our painting 9. Choosing Your Colour Palette: Alright, now that you know the composition of the reference image tonal value studies, and it's ready with the pencil sketch. Let us get to the exciting part, which is choosing the colors. This is the part where most people get stuck. And the question I have always got from my students about how to choose the right colors. Do replicate the colours exactly as an reference. Should you change it to a whole new perspective where the factors, there is no rule for this. As I mentioned while explaining the tonal sketches, the colors you choose for the paintings do not matter as long as you get the tones right. Most of the times when you're painting, you are a the following a tutorial or following the instructions of a teacher highly influences your color choices as well. Because it has already chosen, already picked out by the teacher for you. And you may have a favorite Watercolour instructor or teacher whom you look up to. And hence you probably end up having most of the colors or shades Day suggested are used. And this is exactly what some of my students are often struggling with, but just something that I struggled with as well when I started as a beginner. This is mainly because the teacher can teach you the skills, the techniques, and the step-by-step process of painting something. But at the end of the day, when it comes to you actually sitting down to paint something on your own, your mind goes blank and you can decide the colors you want to use. This is very common, and I would say that it is highly because they were influenced by my color choices up until that point. For example, most of the brand of watercolors out there has paints gray, pigment composition of each of them as different. And some are more cool, some more grayish, some warm, and some more tending towards black. Just because I like paints gray from a sudden RAN, doesn't mean that it is the best one that suits your style. Hence, that wouldn't be the ideal pathway for you to Build Your Own Watercolour palette. However, I wouldn't go into too much detail about this topic as it is too broad for the scope of this glass. I do have a class on watercolor, pigment properties, color mixing, and setting up your own palette. And that class covers building your palette from scratch extensively. So you can refer to it if you would like to get an insight on this topic as well. Having said that, there's a lot of pressure on these days to be knowledgeable on watercolor pigments and color palettes. But I will definitely point out some of the important points regarding choosing Your Colour Palette here, it is always best to start with a minimal palette consisting of the primaries, so that you start mixing colors from them. And color mixing becomes second nature to you. You can have multiple versions of the primary colors. For example, warm and cool version or bag and transplant version. For example, a transparent yellow, which serves as warm and transparent yellow. Lemon yellow as a cool yellow. Cadmium yellow for an opaque yellow exedra. Once you have started using this palette, you will eventually figure out the colors that you want to keep and gravity towards. These are known as convenience colors. For example, you might always make a particular kind of green with Taylor blue and transparent yellow. Any observed that certain hookers green from a particular brand is almost similar to the shade that you keep mixing, then you can add it to your palette so that the mixing process becomes easy for you. You can also add other colors to your Palette which are difficult to mix otherwise. Just cobalt, turquoise tailored green, dioxazine, violet, etc. if you think you will need them in your paintings, gradually, you'll see your Palette buildup on its own. I'm going to be using this palette here in the class which I've set up after lots of experimentation over several weeks and months. But don't worry because I won't be using all of these colors. We just need a few colors to be in this painting. Of course, the colour palette is going to be very limited. I just mentioned that I'm going to be using this one which has all of the necessary colors that I mostly use. All the colors that are will be using for this painting will be mentioned right before the painting session starts. You can have a look at that to see what other colors that you will need. Alright, let us assume you have buildup your watercolor palette, or you already have one that you have been using for quite some time. And we have that sketch in front of us waiting to be painted. Most of the times we have this preconceived notion that you need to be in the reference using the exact same colors, or that you need to match the colors as in the reference picture. But let me tell you something. You as an artist is free to choose the colors that you want to use. You can actually totally change the color scheme off the reference and have your unique touch to it. Of course, I know it is easier said than done. It's hard to sit and decide the colors. This is why in the next lesson, I'll tell you the biggest secret to building your own style with watercolours. 10. How to Build Your Style With Watercolours: Alright, in this lesson, I'll tell you my little secret to building up your own watercolour style and how you can watch yourself naturally evolve as an artist with a unique style if your own, you might have seen a lot of professional artists with a unique style and the color choices that they make and admired them. Some artist may have a set number of colors which they gravitate towards and using every painting. While some artists might choose to experiment with hundreds of colors, you might even recognize the work of some artists just by looking at their color choices in the painting. And this may be something that you're looking to build in your own style. While this is totally doable, you need to remember the fact that each of those artists arrived at that particular style or uniqueness with a lot of practice. And possibly by trial and error sessions, it is highly unlikely that they chose a set of colors overnight and decided that this is going to be my palette and this is where I'll be using for all my paintings. But here is something that you can start with straightaway and will aid in building that unique style. If you take a reference picture and have a good look at it, I mean, good, really look at it. Keep in mind that the composition that you have decided from that particular reference image and observe the colours of each element. The sky, the trees, buildings, mountains, or whatever elements are there in your image. Once you think you have somehow analyzed the colour scheme of the reference, the next step would involve you are using some kind of app or editor on your phone to turn the reference image into monochromatic grayscale mode. If you have the edited version from the Donald studies saved, you could use that to now use this grayscale image to Paint. The good thing about this process is that in not influenced by the colours in the reference completely, the shade to use from your analysis of the image. But you won't be flexing your muscles to make that exact shade of colors as in the reference. Sometimes you will end up using totally different colors from the reference image as well. But you will find that it turned out for the good. Also. You will notice that your brain seems to be working more clearly this way. Because if you were looking at the reference image, you will probably sit there wondering what shade of pink to use for that subtle being barred in the sky, or which orange or yellow to use for the sunset areas. When you just have different gray tones for the entire sky, you will see yourselves approaching the image more clearly with more freedom and choosing colors from your ballot in a manner that you would like to see the sky turn out to be once you're done with the painting, compare your painting with the reference and see how it has done out. If you're unhappy with the result, you can read all this process again, but this time, you will know clearly what colors to avoid or what are the mistakes that you did with the first going one step ahead on this process would be to not do the colour analysis on the reference image at all. And to approach the same directly from the monochromatic mode, you will notice that you get a lot more freedom and you start to experiment with more color schemes and combinations. And you slowly develop a pattern or a set of colors that you keep using for sudden elements. You obviously will have a general idea about the time of the day, the colours of the main elements or the color scheme and the actual image. Because unless you got a monochromatic image from somewhere, you must have used this first image to edit it into a grayscale. And although you can try hard not to look at it, your brain will be looking at every minute detail in that few seconds. Because it knows you're not going to give a time later. But even then, this process is something that will go a long way and helped to identify that Colour style unique to you. So this is it. This is how you can easily develop your style from scratch. 11. Tips for Great Colour Combination: In this lesson, I will tell you some general tips and things that you can keep in mind while approaching a painting feed from a grayscale reference which we discussed in the previous lesson, or a colored image so that you can create more aesthetically pleasing paintings. Remember, do not put a lot of pressure on yourselves trying to implement every single one of these steps are thinking of these checkbox of things that you need to be looking at. These are just some simplified ideas and tricks that will add some additional visual aesthetics DO painting. However, the whole process of painting should be more lean towards the experimentation and having FUN side, rather than you being worried about the outcome of it, try not to mix more than three colors together. Chances are that each of the colors you mix as composed of multiple individual pigments. And you may actually be mixing five or six colors in the process, he might create muddy or jockey mixtures, although it is very much enjoyable to experiment with choosing colors of your own based on individual preferences. There awesome color schemes which you can adapt known as harmonious color schemes, based on using two or more colors, depending on the position and distance of the colors on the color wheel, you could go for one of the color schemes discussed to get a more pleasing appearance. Do painting. Analogous color scheme uses three or more colors that sit next to each other on the color wheel. For example, using reds, oranges, and yellows for us answer painting would be an analogous color scheme as these are three colours are each other on the color wheel, monochromatic color scheme is probably the easiest way. You use just one color and its range of different tones to paint the whole painting. This is probably easiest for us to do once we have the Tonal Sketch done. This is also one of the best way to learn a subject thoroughly, as well as to learn values as you don't have to worry about colors and their relationships between each other. Adult, complimentary color scheme uses colors that are opposite to each other in the color wheel. I feel that among all the other color schemes, this one is more visually pleasing as it creates the right balance of colors and you're beating every color on the color wheel, be it warm or cool, will have its complimentary color on the opposite side and opposite bias. For example, red on the warmer side has the complimentary color green on the cooler side. Blue on the cooler side has complimentary color orange on the warmer side. This creates the right harmony and balance in your painting, and thus is my ideal choice. Triadic color scheme uses three colors that are evenly spaced around the color wheel. There will be one dominant color followed by two more colors, which are colors evenly spaced from the dominant one in the color wheel. These to serve as mild accents in the painting. Triadic colors literally stand out on a painting and make a vibrant and lively colour palette. Just because it has evenly spaced on the color wheel, irrespective of which colors that you'd used. When you look at this reference image, you're going to be confused a lot as to what the colors that you need to choose Art, mainly because you can see there's a lot of colors and so many colors blended together and your brain is going to be confused as to how you can match those exact shades. Which is why I said this is the best option. Because now you're limited to a black and white image and your brain is free to choose the colors that you want. So here you can see that there are some subtle blues and yellows. So just remember these sheets. You don't need to use those exact shade or match it. But obviously if your intention is to paint exactly as in the reference image and replicate the same, then you're welcome to go ahead and try that out. But for me, like I said, as an artist, I like to create that uniqueness to my painting. That is to make sure that I used the colors that I have in my color palette and make this painting more attractive in a, in a geethu kind of way. So you need to figure out your way on your own. For the painting session, I'll be showing you how I use my colors to paint this painting. You're welcome to do the same as mine, but it would be ideal if you can decide the colors on your own and James some things Your Own which will make it unique to your own. So moving on to this monochromatic scale and love the way that I've got some darker shades in the sky and some subtle lighter tones here. So obviously towards the dub, I think I'll go with the blue tones itself, but it won't be the zigzag blue that we have in this guy here. Then towards the sun region, obviously I want some highlights here. That is the lightest part in this case, we'll, we'll keep it as white of the paper. I'd like to add some yellow tones in the background. And then for the mountains, I think I'll go with subtle dark brown or orange-ish kind, which makes it closer to the warmer scale here, because towards the bottom, I'm going to be using a lot of cooler tones then for the tree, probably go with some subtle darker tones, but also tried to put in some olive green tones in there, just give it a little hint of greenish tones. And for the foreground, I'm going to be using the colours that is opposite to my highlights area. For the highlights, it will do. I'm going to be using some subtle yellow tones, which means that the opposite color, that is the shadow colors here, are going to be wireless. Here for me mostly it's going to be bluish violet tones, which is what is going to go into the shadows and the snowy regions. Here, I'm using a complimentary color scheme. You can also go for other color schemes, of course, but I believe that for this painting, the complementary color scheme matches the best because it balances out the warm and the cooler tones 12. Creating Perspective - Linear: Creating visual perspective in our paintings is of utmost importance because otherwise are a paintings would be flat and lacked the three-dimensional look. Adding Perspective gives a deeper look that is depth to your painting. Even though you're painting it on a flat surface. Hi, know that for some people, Perspective sounds complicated or boring, but it is actually quite simple once you get your head around it, it is a matter of visualizing every element in perspective before you paint it. There are two types of Perspective, linear and aerial. I covered this in very detail in my cityscapes class, but I'll run up the basics here. The three main components of Linear Perspective or the parallel lines, horizon line, and the vanishing point. By using just these three elements, it is possible for us to arrange the elements in the painting in such a way that it resembles the way the human eyes see the scene in real. The guiding principle for this technique is that objects that are closer to the viewer appear to be larger, whereas objects that are further away appear to be smaller. To accomplish this, we can place a horizontal line across the surface of the picture, which is known as the horizon line. Vanishing point is the point on the horizon line where the parallel lines, also known as orthogonals, converge as they recede and meet. One-point perspective contains one managing point along the horizon line. This type of perspective can easily be used to portray things such as railroads, hallways, or room interiors. Two-point perspective, also referred to as angular perspective, than they install vanishing points on the horizon line. This is often used to show something like the corner of a building on a street. One side of the building will vanish towards the left, while the other side will vanish towards the right, creating two separate vanishing points. Have a look at these images and see how the horizon line vanishing points and parallel lines are arranged. We just have to remember to capture these in our paintings to give the illusion of depth to the viewer. Perspective comes into play in every bending the digging, imagine there will always be something that is related to Perspective, which you have to capture it in your paintings. For example, here you might think that there is nothing. It is just a simple image, but something here on this painting that follows the Perspective. That is the shadows here on these snowballs. The sun here is right in the middle, which we kept the same. So don't bother about the tree and everything dried. Now we're going to look at the shadows. The sudden here is here, and every object you see is actually following the Linear Perspective. Their shadows are going to be such that it's converging away from the sun or diverging towards the sun. If you look at the shadows, they are such that they're following the rules of perspective and going towards the sun. Do you see that? Okay, now, let me explain another thing. If you look at the shadow of this one, this is slightly bend towards that side and you're thinking, why does it fall towards that side? Because if you draw straight lines coming towards this side, That's because if you look at this, there is a surface change. The surface change means that it's got a step down. So the Perspective line has changed, which created a bend in that shadow. Okay, let's not get into too much detail there. That's just for advanced Perspective class someday. But just understand that it's because of the step change there. But as you can see here, what you need to note is that most of the things here are in perspective, that is linear perspective. The other type of perspective is aerial or atmospheric perspective, which we will discuss in the next lesson. 13. Creating Perspective - Aerial: Now that you have learned what is linear perspective, let us have a look at atmospheric perspective in a painting. Or if you're painting from a picture, the horizon line is the furthest point from the viewer. Going further away from the horizon line, be towards the top or towards the bottom. You're getting closer to the viewers eyes. Keep this in mind when trying to implement aerial perspective, like Linear Perspective, at most, free Perspective or aerial perspective also creates the illusion of depth on a two-dimensional surface. But instead of using horizon lines and managing points, at most three Perspective primarily uses color and details. There are three ways to capture this. The first one is to use blurred and sharp edges. The colors become weaker in proportion to their distance from the person who is looking at them. In other words, objects that are further away have blurry edges and appear lighter in color. The objects dot closer to the viewer are more sharp and detailed with clear contour lines. Secondly, tonal value can be portrayed in such a way as to create atmospheric perspective. Objects further away can be painted with a more lighter tone and those that are closer to the viewer in a darker tone. This comes from the fact that the viewer can see the objects closer to them with more clarity and vibrancy. Where does the objects further away are foggy and muted to the naked eye? The third method is to use a combination of warm and cool colors to depict the signal. In general, cool colors recede in the painting while warm colors appear to come forward. Using this rule, the objects further away, it could be painted using a cooler sheets and that in the foreground with warmer shades. Exceptions to this, for example, a sunset scene by the sun and the sky are at the horizon, which would be in bright yellow tones, which then makes the foreground to have cooler shades as shadows come into play. You don't have to incorporate all these three methods into one painting to do big the atmospheric perspective. Sometimes it has even impossible to have all these three methods to be put together. For example, the sunset scene, you could apply the tonal value and blurry edges principle. But it would be much better for the painting if the colours are the horizon where vibrant and saturated, unlike muted, lighter for creating the Aerial effect. Now to capture the aerial perspective, you can use some of the suggestions I have mentioned using your colors. Most of which is better to be in some of these objects in wet on wet and make the foreground stand out and the background recede away. But keep in mind that our focal point is the tree which is kind of towards the horizon, not exactly to what the horizon in detail in the background as you can see it, because the background here is the mountains, which you can use wet-on-wet method. And all of these are the foreground with the Focal Point being the tree. Now that you know how to effectively depict Perspective in a painting, let us see how we can capture the Focal Point 14. Capturing the Focal Point: I have been painting from reference images as it is for a long time. And slowly I realized the importance of focal point in my paintings. Focal point and the main thing is that area of the picture that attracts the viewer's eyes. It plays with the viewer's curiosity and mental concentration. Every painting ideally needs to have a focal point which commands the viewer's attention and makes them want to know more about the artists thoughts on it. When I was a beginner, I used to paint all of the scene as it is from the reference without any focus. But eventually, I learned that I need to direct the viewer's eyes to one part of the painting. Especially when painting landscapes, cityscapes. Creating a focal point in your painting is one of the best ways to create a composition that will keep them interested about your subject. For example, if you're painting a landscape with a mountain road leading to a house on the left and some trees to the right. You need to decide which is your focal point. Is it the mountain, the trees, or the house? There are several ways to create focal point in your painting. Here are some of them. Use lines to lead the viewer to the focal point. Make the focal point the darkest and lightest part of the painting. Make the focal area lighter than its surroundings, if possible. Since the eye is attracted to light. Alternatively, if the scene is mostly bright, make the focal point much darker than the rest of the areas. For example, if you're painting the ocean or the sea and the waves in the ocean or your focal point. You don't on the sky so that it does not detract the viewer's attention from the ocean. On the other hand, if the sky is your focus, then tone down the ocean area. Use highly saturated color in contrast to a neutral background. Adding one or two points of saturated color again, make your focal point pop out from the rest of the painting. For example, you can paint monochromatic scene with a neutral gray, but then add the focal point with a bright saturated color, which will immediately pull the attention of the viewer to the scene. Try to paint the warmest and coolest colors together. Having a high contrast between the warm and cool colors will bring attention towards that area of the painting. Lastly, you can use light contrast to highlight the focal point. Human eyes are drawn to bright things. Placing the focal point in the brighter zones is a great way to ensure your viewer will see it as the most important part of the scene. You can use strong light contrast to emphasize your focus point and hide distracting elements by hiding them in the darkest areas of your painting. Of course, it is not possible to use all of these methods together, but you can choose the best out of these methods to create an emphasis on your focal point in the painting. 15. How to Build Your Style With Techniques: Now that you're equipped with everything you need to know to paint using a reference image and creating your own composition out of it. Let me tell you some interesting tips to create your own style with watercolours techniques. Several artists prefer several methods to paint with watercolors. You can instantly see it reflect on their artwork. Here are some common techniques or methods that you can experiment with to find your own line and wash technique. This technique is mostly used by urban sketches, where they make the most of the sketch with a pencil or a pen, and then add drops of washed beans or Colour desert areas to enhance the painting. Wet on wet single layer approach. The approach that I usually love. How I usually paint the whole background in a single wet on wet layer. And then add the foreground elements where the wet on dry method, wet on wet multiple layers. This method achieves more realism in your paintings as each layer you add rings in more color and detail to your paintings. Wet on dry approach. This approach is where you do paint every objects on its own separately and the objects in the painting are disconnected from each other. This method is also mostly used by artists when they are painting in sketchbooks, are doing quick urban sketches. Mixed approach. This involves mixture of both the wet on wet and wet on dry techniques, and mostly involves color bleeding into different areas, creating a unique look to the paintings. There are several types of mixed approach and discussing all of them is definitely outside the scope of this class. You could experiment with all the different techniques and adapt one which you feel more comfortable with and attracted to. Practice with that technique until you naturally find more interesting shortcuts and approaches that suit your liking. 16. Painting Process Part I: Alright, now that we know all the principles of how to approach painting from a reference image. Let us go ahead and paint this. So I've already mentioned all the colors that I'll be using for this painting at the beginning of this lesson. And I'll be following my go-to style of painting which is wet on wet mostly. So I have this board and the paper where I will be applying water to both sides of the paper so that I can paint wet on wet easily. Free to choose your own style of painting. Go ahead and experiment with different techniques and different methods to find out your unique style that suits you the most. You can go ahead and use the taping method where you Dave the paper onto your board or surface. I love to paint the hair, there is no edges. And also I use this method because I apply water to both sides of my paper, which eliminates the need for any masking tape while I'm painting. Now, I'm going to do the painting Process. I've kept the video in real time so that you can follow along if you are going to be using my same style of painting. So feel free to paint along with me. Or if you're using your own technique, you can use this as a reference on how to approach certain elements and then painted in your own way. So I'll be applying water to the backside of my paper first so that I can stick it firmly onto this board. I lose my large flat brush for this purpose and apply water to the backside of the paper. Once I have applied water to the backside now I'll flip it along the other side and use that water to stick this paper onto the board that I'm using. So this is An acrylic surface which makes it easier for it to stick on. If it was a wooden surface, then it would absorb the water and the whole thing would dry out quickly, which is why I use an actual except just use any plastic board or known absorbance surface. That's it. And then I'm applying water along the front side and then pressing along the edges so that the water makes the paper to stick onto the board. See that it's now stuck on a wall I have to do is met the front side as well, which will make my be bursty wet longer for the wet on wet application. Like I said, you're free to choose any style of painting so you can go ahead and date the edges and just use the normal watering method that is normal Upload abrogation of water for your paintings 17. Painting Process Part II: Now let's go ahead and paint our focal point. It's very important, isn't it? So I'm going to be starting with a nice brown and gold color. We're going to be using a nice lot of colors. So let's start with a nice golden color. So I'm going to use this color that we used for the mountains here and mix it along with the Indian gold. I'm going to start with that. That's speaking, is this region here is kind of like raw and exiting, dry it next to the sun region, we will make it darker. But let's go with this first. Then I'll pick up the dark paint. I think the dark beans going to go over the dog as well because that's the blue region. But as you approached the words, the sunny side, you do need to capture the colours. Oh, no. Let's go with a nice greenish brown color that we already have here. Start adding. I'm just following along the simple pencil sketch that I had added. So that'll give me the shape of the tree that I want to achieve. But then I painted like a whole blob here, like I've done with my sketch. I'll just try and make little shapes of the leaves and everything. Okay? And it's completely random with my brush just using the tip of my brush. I'm trying to do like ease of strokes, digging back. Nice. Now, as we approach to the sunny side, here is, as you can see, we're going to work the sun, so we need to bring in brighter colors. For that, I go back to my golden mixture. I'm going to be in that With Gold. See, it gets golden on that side, right thing. We can put some subtle golden sheets on that side as well. So we're going to be using a blend of these two colors here. That is the green brown mixture and the golden color there. If you don't want to keep switching between your brush, you can go ahead and paint on the left side first, then find the right side. So I think I'm gonna be doing that. I've been told the left side first, which makes it easier for me. I've completely avoided the midst in my painting because I don't want to get into it. I chose not to include it. You're free to include it if you want. Of course Okay, Then my dad died. Now let me get to the other side. Of course, getting to the other side means I have to keep adding yellow for the Indian gold sheet, of course. Alright, the trees looking still incomplete because we haven't added the golden shade that needs to go. What's the right side? I think that's good enough. Just want to pick up this darker color. I love the way it's done out, but I need to know, bring in some lighter areas and basically the snow. So what I'm taking right now is a little bit of olive green. For a little touch of green. I'm working more on this because this is my focal point. But the olive green is for the purpose of some highlights towards the left side, which is kind of like why the sun is reflecting at backside. So let me explain that. I know you might be thinking that this is on the left sides of why. It's because the sun is kind of reflecting on the backside of the tree. It's not really on the right side. The whole sun is shining, so you need to have some branches of the trees are the leaves which has highlights on that side, but it just like kind of behind. You only see some parts of it, which is fine. I'm putting berries or dilemma around of those green, of the olive green on that side. Now, let's go with further darker shadows. Here. I pick up my Payne's gray in that green mixture. And just going to put it at random, please. Alright, now let's get to adding the no. Just some large blobs of snow. But make sure to wash your brush each time because I'm picking a green back, which we do not want, right? Alright, I loved the way it's turned out. Now, remember about the shining part that I talked about. So you can add some subtle once to the edges of the left side. So this is the one where it's shining from behind. Okay? Alright, that's it. So we've made the focal point and as you can see, it's really in focus, right, compared to this one which is now less bright when we add these trees as well in less focus to ban all, it'll make more sense. Okay, so let's go ahead and mix that green brown color again. Alright, making a watery mixture of that. Oh, go ahead and been that right side. So this tray is kind of like a very dry kind of tree, but make it still subtle and lighter. So it has to go behind the snowball. Now for the other one on the right side So we can blend a lot together at the bottom because it's quite dense. Are there. Now. Add in some darker shades. Alright, let me pick up some Indian gold now because I need to add some towards the left side for the sun. Just a little amongst towards the left side. Okay. I think that should speed it. Now let's get back to adding snow for the right one. When we my lavender. I think that should be it. I'll what I'll do in order to make the squared lighter is I'm going to use my glute. You can use a cloth or a tissue or whatever and go ahead and absorb some of that pigment from what you've kept on and absorb it. So that area becomes lighter and this becomes the focus and the darker region. Just make sure it doesn't have your glute or whatever you're using doesn't have any texture like in mind of God, that texture on mine. Like this texture. Okay. Yeah. I like it now. It's very light and this is like kind of darker. Let's go ahead and add in those smaller ones that we talked about. And another one right there. Alright, I think we're done with that. Let's finish off by painting the snowballs. So that's gonna be quite easy. We're going to be using our wireless and maintain on them. I think I'll start with the one on the left side. But remember the direction. So I've painted the whole of it at the bottom part is not completely dry, which makes it easy for us to do any wet on wet or wet on dry on its own area. Here, made that side darker. And it needs to be darker towards that side and the bottom. Okay. Now remember this one. What I said, it should is to be as dark as that, that should be the shadow. But obviously, you can go ahead and lighten up You can see how it looks. Use the don't need to be closer to the background. Let me lighten that up even more. Now that you've added the snowballs, Let's go ahead and add in the shadows. So for that, I pick up the darkest violet. But I think I'm going to mix in a little bit of cobalt blue just to make it not that too much violet. Okay. Then let's see the shadows of this one. P is going to be in this direction. Remember, the darkest. So the shadows. Now, let's add in the shadow of our main tree. We just go to be somewhere along here. And I'm just going to soften out the inches effect. Okay? Because it's such a large object. So I wonder shadow to be going disconnected again thing. Go ahead and add some shadow elements there as well. Then soften it out. Alright, I'm gonna finish off with some subtle White dunes. So here I take my white and I'm just gonna go head on some of my stones and give some highlights. I will spread that out in a moment. I believe that it's absolutely essential that we capture some highlight. And then a bit at the bottom for the reflected shadow. Now let's blend it all up. Land. Highlight. There. Now you can see how the effect of the Sun is here. If you want, you can have some subtle lavender mixed doors. Lavender and white. Don't on the foreground on our Focal Point tree. Just to bring it out, but remember to mix lavender into the white, okay. So that'll brighten up the lavender if it's kind of faded and dying of gifts like a well don't structure to your snowy regions. We don't need to work on the other areas, of course, because that's not the focus. So we have finally completed the painting. And can you know, when you look at it, clearly see that the focus in your painting is this tree, because the other parts are faded. The snowballs are all kind of like pointing towards this tree right here. So that's it. See, that's how you can create a really good focal point in your painting. I hope you enjoyed this painting session if you were following along and all the steps that we discussed in-between 18. Thank You!: A huge thank you to everyone who has joined this class. I hope you enjoyed the painting session if you've painted along or all the concepts discussed in this class. And I hope that you were able to translate it into your own painting from whichever reference that you have chosen. So this was the reference that we painted in this class from the reference image, which if you've followed along, you know, obviously. And I showed you how we capture the Focal Point and how we made all the elements Point to the Focal Point, as well as the different color choices and everything that is there to translate reference into a painting. I would be most grateful if you can upload your Class Projects that is whichever reference you chose and the painting that you did along with it, do the Project section here in Skillshare. It would also be better if you can capture the Tonal Sketch, the Final Sketch, and your composition sketch and upload that as well because it will help other artists to visualize and see what was your thought process when you were trying to approach that reference or don't feel pressurized, it's absolutely fine if you just wanted to capture the reference and just the painting into the Project section here. Once again, thank you for joining this class, and I'll see you in my next class. Bye bye.