Transcripts
1. Sketchbook Pages: 7 Colorful Watercolor Exercises : Hi and welcome to sketchbook pages, seven colorful watercolor exercises. In this class, you'll paint rainbow field sketchbook pages. This is a beginner's level up class focusing on honing core watercolor skills but doing so in the most vibrant, joyful way possible and using just basic art supplies. We'll be creating a series of eye-catching sketchbook spreads, taking a fresh look at classic watercolor techniques, getting to know the unique character and potential of watercolor. I'm Kate Willis Crowley. I also go by the pen name Inky Willis, and I'm a children's author and illustrator. I work professionally in both traditional and digital mediums. Keeping an ongoing physical sketchbook has always been a huge part of my working practice. Watercolor is such a versatile medium that if you're not splashing it on your sketchbook pages already, then you absolutely will be by the end of this class. What's more? The skills covered can be later applied to all manner of watercolor artwork, whether you want to try your hand at Old school watercolor painting at illustration, or perhaps even something more expressive and abstract. Let's get started creating some stunning watercolor pages.
2. About This Class: About this class. In this class, we'll be using the colors we have available to create some gorgeous sketchbook pages. Although your artwork is going to be colorful, this isn't strictly a color class. I'm deliberately avoiding getting into specific color names because that's not important for the purpose of these exercises, which are all about paint application. Color wise, what's actually more important is that we are understanding the difference between warm and cool colors. That's something I'll be covering early on and it's something I'll refer to throughout the classes. Over the seven exercises we'll be honing three key skills, or more specifically, three types of watercolor paint application. We'll be practicing wet on dry painting. In other words, painting over dry layers of paint, building layers of color. We'll look at wet on wet painting. This is where wet paint is applied directly onto already wet layers and we'll be experimenting with color bleeds. Bleeds occur where multiple areas of wet paint meet on the page and bleed into each other. In addition, there will be the option of adding some line work to your paintings in either a pencil or a pen where it feels appropriate. This can just be a really great way of adding extra detail and interest and it's a way to keep your work fresh and individual to you and your style. One last thing, I've chosen to break this class into seven short exercises so that you can do an exercise a day if that is what works for you, spreading them out over a week. I know lot of people find that way of working really useful to keep up momentum but equally, I totally appreciate that some people are going to prefer to just dip in and out and that's fine too. Just use these lessons as it suits you.
3. Cool and Warm Colors: Cool and warm colors. If you're familiar with identifying cool colors and warm colors, then feel free to jump ahead. If you're not, it's worth quickly getting acquainted with the warms and cools in your palette. Warm and cool are relative terms. I'm going to look at colors in pairs; two yellows, two blues, two reds, and two greens. Here are the pairs of colors in my paint set. I've split them into cools and warms. The key to identifying a cool or warm color is to ask yourself, what are the hints? If a color has hints of green or blue, then relatively speaking, it's a cool color. If a color has hints of red or yellow, then relatively speaking, it's a warm color. You can see that my cool yellow has hints of green, whereas my warm yellow has hints of red. My cool green has hints of blue, whereas my warm green has hints of yellow. My cool red has hints of blue, whereas my warm red has hints of yellow. Finally, my cool blue has hints of green, while my warm blue has hints of red. Take time to identify your cool and warm colors and then you're well on your way to painting some rainbow filled sketchbook pages.
4. Brush Loading: Before we start painting, I'm quickly going to explain what I mean by the terms brush loading and also brush overloading. If you're a seasoned painter, then feel totally free to skip ahead to the next video. Brush loading is literally the process of loading up your brush with paint or water and I'm actually going to begin by looking at brush overloading because the first thing we do when using solid watercolor paints is generally to put some water in the mixing dish and to do this, we want to overload the brush with water by submerging all of the hairs into the water. Then lifting that brush and holding it horizontally, but just got to give it a gentle bob to lose any drips. Then if we keep holding the brush horizontally, we can move it over to the mixing tray before depositing the water by dragging those hairs against one of the ridges. Depending on how much paint you want to mix, you might want to repeat that a few times to get the right quantity of water. Remember to make sure that all the water is deposited from your brush into the mixing tray before you go for your pigment, otherwise, you'll risk flooding your paint set. If you're using tubes of watercolor, then this process is a little different. You'll be squeezing out a small amount of paint first into your mixing dish and then adding the water, still using that overloaded brush. Now let's look at brush loading. Once your paint is mixed, you'll want to load your brush with the right amount of paint for the task at hand and this will vary. For instance, if I'm painting fine detail then I don't want much paint on my brush at all. Whereas if I'm going to fill quite large area with color then I'm going to want much more paint. The best way to get familiar with how much paint you need is to practice painting often. These judgments will soon feel really instinctive. But for now, I'm going to talk about a standard brush load, basically, the optimum amount of paint my brush is able to hold easily without dripping. To load up my brush, I'm dipping the brush hairs approximately halfway into my pre-mixed paint. Then I'm gently wiping off the excess paint and because my brush isn't holding too much paint, I can now hold it diagonally in the same way I might hold a pencil. So remember for brush loading, half submerge your brush hairs, gently wipe, then hold diagonally. For brush overloading, fully submerge your brush hairs, bob to remove drips, then hold horizontally.
5. Exercise 1: Abstract Ovals: Exercise 1, Abstract Ovals. I'm going to kick out off with a really fun little watercolor bleed exercise. We're going to be painting ovals stacked one next to the other, following the colors of the rainbow and allowing those colors to bleed into each other. As I mentioned before, this is very similar to western wet painting, where wet paint is applied to an already wet surface. The difference in terms of application is that with a bleed, two areas of paint have been applied to a dry surface side-by-side, and it's where the edges meet that you'll find the paints merge, creating what's called a bloom. Color bleeds can be used in all sorts of painting contexts. For example, this landscape by John Dye has beautiful subtle color bleeds. Notably, the horizon line where the central landmass bleeds into the bleed sky above. For this exercise, you will need bare minimum supplies, your paints, medium round-headed brush, water, mixing dish, and some blotting paper. To begin with, I'm preparing my cool green in my mixing dish, making sure I've got enough ready to paint a fairly large oval. Then I'm holding my sketchbook at an angle using gravity to encourage the paint to well up at the bottom. I'm being a little fussy about the oval shape but you can keep this as loose as you like. The important thing is to make sure they're still a small well of paint at the base of the oval when you apply your next color. I'm working fast, I'm preparing my warm green and painting a second oval. This time I'm making sure the top of my oval meets with the base of the previous shape, so that the cool green now bleeds down into the new color. Now because my warm green has hints of yellow, I know my next color is the cool yellow. The one that has hints of green. Again, I'm just letting those edges meet, encouraging the green to bleed down. I'm going to try to paint different-sized ovals, so it doesn't look too uniform. Of course, you can tweak this however you like. Choose a totally different shape if you want to, just so long as those edges meet. Next is my warm yellow. The color bleed here is extremely subtle as the two yellows are so close and bright. The next color bleed is going to be much more obvious because now I'm adding some yellow ocher. Now for those of you who watched the lesson on identifying warm and cool colors, you'll notice I didn't include yellow ocher in my example, just so as not to over-complicate things. But as you can see, it's a very warm yellow. I'm going right over the middle of the sketchbook which is technically called the gutter, dragging my paint right across onto that new page. I've gone from warm yellow to very warm yellow, and now it's time for my warmest color of all, warm red. Already the ocher is bleeding beautifully into the red. Next, after my warm red, I'm preparing my cool red, the red with hints of blue. Again, look at how that well of warm red bleeds down into the new cooler color, and because I'm holding it at a slight diagonal, it's also bleeding at a diagonal. Next, I'm using the warm blue which has hints of red. Finally, my cool blue which has hints of green. If I were to keep on going, I'll be back to where I started with that cool green. Here's my finished example. I like the irregularities by fin size of the shapes and the results of the bleeds. If you'd like yours to be more uniform then you could prepare all your colors in advance, you could also prop up your sketchbook so that gravity is always moving your paint in exactly the same direction. My advice is just to keep everything as loose and relaxed as possible. Hesitantly, I like having the freedom to switch up the angles as I choose. When I'm holding my sketchbook, sometimes I want it to be quite sharp and sometimes quite shallow angle, but if you're working larger then physically shifting the angle might be a total pain. So do what works for you. That's all for our first exercise, I hope you really enjoyed it, I hope you got some cool results. Please share your work if you're happy with how things came out, I'd love to see. I'll see you in the next exercise, where we'll be pushing our color bleed skills up a notch. See you then.
6. Exercise 2: Color Channels: Exercise 2, Color Channels. This next exercise is again going to look at color bleeds. But this time, our abstract shapes are getting a little bit more complex. We'll be making some free form ovals with overloaded brushes, meaning that there'll be an excess of paint welling at the base of those shapes. Then we'll be encouraging that excess paint to drip and bleed into neighboring oval shapes. If that sounds complicated, don't worry, I promise you'll soon get the hang of things. This is a great exercise for honing your timings, learning how long you can balance a well of paint before either drips or dries up. I'm going to be using just my basic painting supplies again with my medium round headed brush, and I'll also be using my smaller brush to help me draw a paint from one oval to the next. Then when I'm done, I'll be working in a bit of pencil drawing for added interest. Okay, so I'm going to launch straight into the demo so you can see what I've been describing. I've prepared two colors, yellow ocher and warm red. For yours, you can just choose any two which are close neighbors. I'm starting out by painting three very loose ovals with my overloaded medium brush. The first is a dense yellow ocher, the second is more watery, and this is simply for a bit of variation. The third color is my warm red. Notice those wells of paint just balancing there. Now, if I hold the sketchbook at a sharp angle, then those wells are going to drip, so I'm just being a little cautious. I'm using my small round headed brush to drag the excess paint from one shape to the next, making little channels of paint and encouraging the colors to bleed into each other. You can do this with your medium brush, if you prefer, it's just going to make those channels a little bit thicker. I'm creating a kind of a web of interconnected shapes, keeping them nice and irregular, so they look organic. I'm playing with gravity, tipping my sketchbook in different directions to encourage the paint to trickle and bleed. Next, I'm repeating that warm red. Then I'm painting my next shape in cool red. Again, working gradually down the rainbow. I'm going to stop talking for a while so you can concentrate on just observing the process, here it goes. All right. I now have a web of interconnected rainbow shapes all bleeding into each other. I'm just going to let that dry. If you want to stop there, then that's fine. All I'm doing now is drawing some curved lines radiating out of my shape to the edge of the page. I'm really just ad-libbing this. It's about adding some extra detail and have my paintings sit back into the page making use of the whole space. Going forward, this technique of encoating paint to drip and bleed has a ton of possibilities. You may want to scale up, creating some large format abstract work or you might want to consider incorporating these skills into figurative work. This is a little self-portrait I made, applying the same scales from this exercise, letting the paint drip, letting the colors merge, and bleed. The possibilities are really open, and hopefully, you're starting to spot some ideas about how you might take this further in your own work.
7. Exercise 3: Waves: Exercise 3. Waves. This is the last color bleeds exercise, is really simple, but really be useful I think. It's also really great way to get to know your paint brush and how it responds to varied pressure. You'd just be needing basic supplies for this one. Paper paints, water, mixing dish blotting paper, and your medium round head brush. We'll be painting a series of connected lines with varied widths, creating the impression of waves. You can use the whole rainbow of colors if you like. I'm just going to choose three colors which I'm preparing in my mixing dish. My cool green, my cool blue, and my cool red. Then taking some of my cool green, I'm dragging my brush slowly along the top of the page, varying the pressure so that my line is thick in parts and thin in others. Next, because I want the color changes to be quite gradual. I'm mixing in a bit of my cool blue with the green. Then I'm applying my second line of paint, again, varying the pressure, keeping it nice and irregular, but making sure that the two lines occasionally meet. Now, I'm adding even more blue to my green and I'm going again, and repeating the same process. Now, just topping up my cool blue, I'm painting a line of unmixed color, letting the green bleed down where the edges meet and again. Now, this time I'm adding a touch of cool red to the blue, concentrating on varying that line width. Then adding even more red to the blue, and again, until eventually, I'm just applying the cool red, allowing the other colors to spill through. Now, if like me, your page still has a little too much paint on it, you can literally just turn it in different directions, allowing gravity to spread the paint a little. It's easy to see how this method can be applied to all sorts of seascapes and water imagery, and of course, you can adapt the color combinations to suit your purposes. If you'd like to share your results, then I'd love to see them. Perhaps you used three totally different colors, or perhaps you went for the full rainbow effect. Whatever you chose, if you upload to the projects, then I'll drop by and take a look.
8. Exercise 4: Fruit: Exercise for fruit. This wet and dry exercise is all about layering colors. We will be painting fruit shapes, allowing the paint to totally dry, then layering further shapes on top to create a simple, effective fruit design. Layering two colors can create a vibrance that is impossible to achieve by simply mixing those two colors together. This fruit exercise is a great way to work out how your different colors work together when layered so that you can later apply that knowledge to future work. Also keep in mind that simple paired anesthetics like this can be really effective in selfies design, in card design, in minimalist illustration, so the possibilities are just really open. For this exercise, you'll need basic paints applies, a round-headed brush along with some blotting paper. Also, you might want to add some line work to finish off. I'll be adding some very simple pencil drawing to my finished painting, but use whatever medium appeals for finishing touches. I've prepared some cool yellow and I'm painting a banana shape going across the page. Notice that I'm holding my sketchbook at an angle and I'm making use of gravity to create that little well of paint. That well is helping to prevent streaking. It's allowing for a nice even layer of paint. Now I'm adding another partial banana on the opposite page, same process, using that well of paint to prevent streaking. Next, I'm using my warm red and I'm painting some strawberry shapes. These are my daughter's favorite and luckily, we've managed to grow lots of these this year. I'm still working with those wells of paint, but this time because I'm painting multiple shapes in the same color, I can literally just treat the excess paint by licking little dipping ports, making use of the excess to paint a new shape. If you get to the bottom of your shape and you've now got a well of unwanted paint, you can just quickly dry your brush on the blotting paper, then luckily touch the bristles of your brush to the paint and that brush will suck up the excess. Next, I'm adding some cool green to my cool yellow with just a touch of warm brown to tone down the vividness. I'm painting the upper part of the pear shape. Then again painting a partial pear in the upper corner. Finally one more partial pear shape on the opposite page. Now with a clean brush, I'm mixing some cool red with warm blue to create a plumy purple. I'm painting a plum on the other page too. Then just use the drying tip of my brush to gently remove the excess paint. Now combining warm red and warm yellow and mixing a strong orange. This is my last element for this first layer. Now it's important to leave this to thoroughly dry. I recommend waiting a couple of hours. Now, I'm mixing some warm green and yellow ocher, watering it down so it's fairly thin to paint some white grapes. Funny that we call them white grapes, what's that about? Anyway, this time I'm making sure my new shapes overlap my dry shapes so that I can see the effects of the two layers together. Now, I'm mixing warm red with warm yellow and painting a partial orange in that top corner, overlapping the pair. Then a whole circle of orange on the opposite page. Always working with a well of paint to avoid streaking. Next, using some cool yellow, I'm painting a partial banana over the purple plum. These is really interesting things to the color below. If I simply mix the purple and the cool yellow together, the paint would have felt really murky, but when it's layered up, that layered color has a vibrancy to it. Now, adding another banana in cool yellow, layering that over the plum and the orange. Then using the cool red, I'm painting some small circles to represent cherries, dotting those loosely about the design. That's it, my two layers are complete. I've got loads of little interlapping areas of interest. I can use those layer combinations in future work with a good idea of the outcome. If you want, you can just set that aside and call it a job well done. If you want to add just a little extra detail to make your shapes feel really fruity, then make sure you leave it to dry first, then just a few simple lines can make a big difference. I'm using an HB pencil lead, but you could choose to use pen if you prefer that.
9. Exercise 5: Arches: Exercise 5. Wet on dry arches. This is another wet on dry lesson, we'll be painting overlapping arches of color, painting freely and expressively with varying line width. Just like with the waves exercise, this is a great way to get into the versatility of your round-headed brush. Also crucially to understand how different color layers work together so that you can make informed future choices. I'll be finishing off with some simple line work in fine tips colored pen, this is of course totally optional but the combination of line and paint can be really effective. If a little drawing appeals to you then go for it. For this lesson, you will need paper, paints, mixing dish, water, medium round-headed brush, and some blotting paper. You may also need a small round-headed brush and if you'd like to add some drawing, you need some coloring pencils or pens. To begin, I'm preparing some cool blue. Using my medium round-headed brush, I'm painting my first arch, varying the line weight. I find it's easiest to begin at the top of the arch and draw the paint downwards, making use of gravity. This also helps me to avoid splaying the hairs on the brush, it gives me more control over what I'm doing. I'm just going to continue with this cool blue across my double-page spread, adding arches wherever I feel. Now I've got a selection of cool blue arches across my double-page spread, I'm going to introduce some of my cool red. Again, varying the line width, varying the positions and the angles. I'm now leaving this first layer to dry, the thicker paint, the longer you need to leave it. I've left mine for an hour, and that seems to be plenty but if you have thicker paint then I would advise at least two hours. Now for some yellow ocher. I love how yellow ocher really makes these colors underneath come through, it brings much warmth to that cool red in particular. I'm making sure that as I apply these new arches they're always overlapping with the first layer of paint. Now, I've combined my warm blue with my cool red to make a strong violet and I'm using my small round-headed brush to draw thin arches over those thicker arches below. Now, I'm returning to the original cool blue but applying this more thickly this time, as I now want, need to be layering on top of it a second time. I'm keeping these arches really thin, using my small-headed brush and setting as many of the arches below as possible. Now, I'm repeating this with my cool red so that I've got a series [inaudible] overlapping arches across my double-page spread. Once those arches have had time to dry, I can introduce some line work. This is using a very fine tip Tombow Twin Tone pen and I'm just going to show you a close-up here, it's quite difficult to show you the level of detail in the video so close-up. I'm repeatedly adding quite organic arches, there's no regularity to it. The only thing I'm trying to keep roughly the same is the thickness of those white spaces between the lines so that my line drawings are evenly spaced out. I'm using magenta, which is fairly close to my cool red and I'm using a cyan and yellow ocher, which is quite close to my yellow ocher paint. I just want these line details to echo the painted arches, giving an extra layer of interest. Now, when you come to do this activity, you can copy this arch pattern or you might want to try something totally different, whatever works for you. In terms of future work and next steps, these layerings skills apply to a vast array of other watercolor exercises, whether you are a fine artist, an illustrator, or whether you work figuratively or abstractly. Understanding color layers is going to open up a ton of painting possibilities.
10. Exercise 6: Rainbows: Exercise 6, wet-on-wet rainbow. You will need paper, paints including a mixing dish, water, brash, and blotting paper. You may also need a pencil. To begin with, I'm roughly lightly sketching space for too long bars across my sketchbook. These are just too long rectangles. You can skip this if you like. Personally, I just like having a rough guide as to where to apply my paint. Then I'm using my cool and warm color knowledge to start painting my rainbow. I'm beginning with a cool blue. I'm holding my sketchbook again at an angle allowing the paint to lightly flow down, giving me a small well at the bottom, which keeps my paper damp and it avoids streaking. Then I'm preparing my warm blue and I'm painting this overlapping some of the cool blue. Then I'm continuing to paint down my rectangle. Next I'm adding some cool red to my warm blue. Again, when I apply this new color I'm overlapping my previous color, allowing the paint to combine and spread, giving that wet-on-wet effect and just adding a little cool red to extend that color down to the central gutter of my page. The wet gutter is just another way of describing that central fold line. Now I've made sure again that I have a small well of paints, keeping that painted layer nice and wet, stopping streaking on the page, which does occur when the paint dries too fast before you've had a chance to work with it. Now I'm adding some warm red. Again, I'm applying this on top of my previous layer of color, letting those colors combine and react to each other. Next, I'm mixing some red and some warm yellow to create orange. Again, I'm applying this overlapping my painted layer letting those colors combine. Now adding more warm yellow and again applying this onto the paint. Then when I finish, I can choose a totally new color to start again. This time my cool green, and I can begin my second rainbow. There we have two wet-on-wet rainbow bars. This graduated color blending is such a useful skill to have with applications in calligraphy and all areas of voice painting. Just as an example, I've painted a couple of little quirky creatures. Here, I've slightly exaggerated the silhouette of a hair and I've applied my first layer of paint using the graduated wet-on-wet method then I've applied some abstract designs on the second layer. Next I've drawn a little rooster in black fine liner. Then again, I've painted graduated color using the wet-on-wet method. I've also used this approach to paint some rainbow lettering down the side of my bed. If you enjoy painting your wet and wet rainbow bars, why not have a go applying the technique to a painted objects or animal. I'll see you in the next session.
11. Exercise 7: Landscape: Exercise 7, wet-on-wet landscape. For this lesson, we'll be painting little landscape paintings using paper, paints, mixing dishwater, brush, and blotting paper, just these basic supplies. You may also want to use a pencil. I'm beginning by just drawing a rectangle on my page. It's not entirely necessary. You can paint directly onto your sketchbook page if you wish. But I just like to frame my work with that outer edge. I just like the effect. I'm using my warm and cool color knowledge yet again, and I'm keeping in mind that things in the distance would appear cooler than objects in the foreground. With that in mind, I'm going to be getting gradually warmer as I work down my page. I'm starting with a cool blue and I'm very loosely painting in that sky, making sure I've always got a slight well to work with so my paint doesn't streak. Next, I'm mixing some cool green and warm green. Now the reason I haven't gone just for that cool green is because I want my landscape to have a fairly natural feel and that warmer green just feels a little bit more organic. It helps tone down the cool green. I'm just dotting it into my original layer of paint and letting that paint bloom and spread. Again, holding my sketchbook at an angle. Adding more warm green now. Again, just dabbing and dotting that on and letting that well drew itself down the page. Now I'm combining warm green with some warm yellow and just before, I'm dabbing on that paint and those dab marks can actually form the idea of clumps or fishes of leaves depending on how thick the paint is. Then for my final warm-ish color, I'm just going to go for some of that warm yellow, letting that come down to the base. Now this could work as a landscape in its own right. These skills can certainly be applied to all manner of landscape paintings. You can build up your layers at buildings, mountains, wherever you're wanting to paint. However, I just want to introduce you quickly to something that I like to do with these wet-on-wet backgrounds, which is to photograph them on my iPad and then work into them digitally. This is a great way to combine digital illustrations with something more handmade and organic and charming. If you happen to have these tools at your disposal, then you might like to have a go with this too. If you're happy with your results, then I'd love to see your work in the project section. There's so much room for variation with these wet-on-wet landscapes and for interpretation. So I'd love to see what different painters produce.
12. Final Thoughts: Final thoughts. Thank you for watching this SkillShare class. I hope that was current exercises have been a fun way to hone your skills to increase your painting confidence, and also to add a bit of rainbow joy to your sketchbook. If any of the exercises sparked ideas for future work, then be sure to jot down those thoughts so that you can attend them when you're ready. If you're still not sure about where to go next with these skills, then why not try some abstract watercolor bingo? You could set yourself a simple challenge of including all these four elements in your work. Wet on wet painting, wet on dry painting, color bleeds and line work. Why not give it a go and see if you can come up with some great abstract artwork. Or you could take any of the seven exercises and go bigger using a large round-headed brush and some large-scale watercolor paper. Whatever your next steps, I'd love to see what you come up with. If you share anything social media, then feel free to tag me and I'll come over and have a look and say hi. Likewise, if you feel like sharing any of the work from the exercises, then please do upload them into the projects. I'd love to see. It's so motivating for others taking the class to see what going up. If you're looking for more sketchbook ideas, then you might like to check out another of my classes. It's called the Fearless Sketchbook, 14 days to Creative Confidence. It's a drawing based class aimed at overcoming creative anxiety and maintaining a daily drawing habits. Also, I have a short words color class you might like to try called Illustrating Quirky Birds in watercolor and pen. I think that's everything. But if you have any questions, you can start the discussion thread and I'll do my best to answer. Again, thank you so much for watching and I hope you've had a lots of fun creating your colorful watercolor pages.