Transcripts
1. Introduction: [MUSIC] Welcome
to the watercolor frequently asked questions. My name is Alexandra
Gabor and I'm a professional art
teacher and artist. You can find me online by
the name The Artmother, and I'm the owner of amazing Facebook Group,
Watercolor for Beginners. Every Friday we have an
Ask Me Anything thread, where I try to answer
all the questions. If I don't know the answer, I do the research. There are several questions
that pop up regularly, so I thought I will create
this class to address them. In this class, I'm
going to answer the 10 most frequent questions every beginners or beginners
have with watercolors. At the bonus of this video, I will give a quick answer to 10 and more questions just to make sure I'm
covering everything. The class is ideal
for beginners who are at the very beginning of
their watercolor art journey. They don't know what paints
to buy, brushes to use, paper to use, and actually
how to start painting. The class can be useful
even for those who are just looking for a specific
answer to a question, just look at the list
of the videos you will see what questions
I'm going to answer, and you can just click on
that and get the answer. What kind of paints to use? Halfpans or tubes? What kind of brushes
do you recommend? What kind of paper to use? Do your predraw what
you're painting? What are the best
subjects to start with? How much water to use? What is masking fluid, and how to use it? Can I use a hairdryer? Copyright. Do I need
to give credit? How to finish a
watercolor painting? Plus 10 bonus questions. If you're ready, let's
get started. [MUSIC]
2. What Paints to Use?: [MUSIC] The first question, what paints should I get? Well, this is an ultimate
question because nobody agrees on how to start. There was a tribe saying that
you only need six paints. Meaning, you need a
warm and cool yellow, warm and cool red, warm and cool blue
so that you can mix all the colors from
the color wheel. Well, this is true. But as a professional
art teacher with more than 10
years of experience, I can tell that
beginners can get intimidated and overwhelmed
really quickly. Learning mixing even before
starting painting can be a thing that just scares
away a person from doing art. I'm going to be
honest with you guys, I think having just
six colors is boring. Me, as a craft hoarder, I am totally amazed when I
see a pallet full of paints. I think that the person who wants to create art
needs to get obsessed. If that starts with
the craft hoarding, then like that happened. [LAUGHTER] It happened to me. The next question is, if to start with a half-pan
set or tube paint. There are pros and
cons to every of them, but I would say start
with the half-pan set. I'm going to say
why. I have a hint. These are new two
half-pan sets here. I didn't start with this, but it comes with a plate. It has lots of colors, which I can explore. With the half pans, the paint can get
easily activated. You need only to job up little
water into the half pan, and you can start painting. While with two paints, you need to get the
right consistency, which can be again negative
factor for every beginner. From my experience,
beginners tend to either to overwet the two paints so they don't get enough
pigment on their brushes. They just end up
with dark colors, or they don't wet them enough. They create a thick layer
from one of the color, as if with gouache or
acrylics, which cracks. They're really not nice. It is a skill you need
to acquire by time, not when you're
just starting out. Now, the next question is, yes, if to start with
the student grade or the professional grade. Well, the real difference between them is just
the pigment quality. When you have student
grade paints, you might find colors
with the name hue in it, in their name, which means that the real pigment is replaced
with a synthetic pigment. That's just all. That's just the
professional detail. When you start out, you really don't need to put
that extra money into that. It will give you a
nice experience, yes. But if you can't afford it, I think you don't need
to invest a lot of money in something that
you haven't started yet. So returning to the
previous thought, I think you should start
out with the half-pan set, find the colors that you like. For example, for
me, it's indigo, turquoise, purple, mauve, sap green, phthalo blue. It's a good idea then to upgrade those colors into
professional tube paints. Then fill the empty half
pans from your pallet, or you can get from
Amazon empty pallets. You can add paint from
your tubes into them. Then you'll have a signature color pallet that you are using. That's just awesome, but that isn't the first step. I would love to give
few more examples on what does mixing all of your colors from
the primaries mean. If you have taken my
watercolor painting series, you will have seen in the
color theory that if you mix your secondary colors
from the same primaries, your artwork will
have color harmony. That is important, but there are several primary
colors that you can use. They're are not just
red, yellow, and blue, but there are rose
madder genuine, auerolin yellow, cobalt
blue, raw sienna, rose madder, manganese
blue, raw sienna, rose madder, cerulean blue, or permanent rose, new gamboge, French ultramarine, or permanent alizarine crimson, Winsor yellow, Winsor blue. As you can see, I just listed six possibilities
for primary colors, which means endless
possibilities of colors. All of these mixes have
slightly different results. This can be exciting and fun, but if you don't know what's
the difference between permanent rose and
alizarine crimson, or cerulean blue
and Winsor blue, which is also known
as phthalo blue, you will be missing out on
finding your own color pallet. This is the reason
I would say leave this next step to
exploring the pigments. That was the last sentence.
3. What Brushes to Use?: The second question is, what kind of brushes
do I recommend? When you are just starting out, the only recommendation
is to get round brushes because they are intended for watercolors because they hold up more water. But you can pick
individual fingers. So that's really not the point. You can think it's flat brushes, you can actually use a flat brush from
washes, that's better. There is a brush
called wash brush, which is a big flat brush for watercolors to wet the paper. So basically just get this
sort of round brushes. I'm a craft harder
with us as well. I have 200 brushes, but actually, I'm
using four from them. I have favorites. I have a middle-size
round brush. I have a small detail brush, which is round as well. I have a bigger
round brush and I'm using a bigger flood
brush for bigger washes. The question about the
synthetic and the real fur. I prefer the synthetic because they are cheap
and more durable. The cheap brushes with real
fur tend to lose hair, which is really
unpleasant and annoying. So I use up lots of brushes
because I'm painting a lot. So I just got simple nylon
brushes, which are round. Those brushes that
are good and not from real fur are expensive. But after you get
used to painting and use up at least a
set of nylon brushes, it is a good idea to upgrade and invest in a real fur brush, if you don't find it unethical. There are two best furs for
watercolor paint brushes, and that is sable and squirrel. Sable is a small
animal living in North Asia and has
really smooth fur. Here is a really
interesting fact. The Russians say 40 and above, starting with sorok, so sorok adin, sorok dva, which is very different from other Slavic
languages where they usually use the word they
have for fur for 40, like styri and styridsat. Four in Russian is
not sorok but cetire. The reason for that is that the Russians made sable coat, and to create one coat, they had to use 40 sables. Sable is sorok in Russian. Sad story but interesting. Anyways, you can find on the market brushes called kolinsky, and they are told
to be the best, but it has its price. So in summary, I
recommend to start with any brush you have at home, or just get a simple, cheap set of round nylon
brushes to start with. You will see in the next
video that I don't really recommend to invest
a lot of money into paints and brushes, but to save that to
invest in the paper.
4. What Paper to Use?: What kind of paper to use? Well that's a good question and that's the most
important question. If you watched the
previous two videos, you saw that I don't really recommend to invest
a lot of money into brushes and paints
but I do recommend to save your money for
a good quality paper. The minimum is the 300
gram in thickness, which is 140 pounds
because you need thick paper that can hold
up the water that you use for watercolor painting. Anything below the 300 grams will buckle a lot and give
you an unpleasant experience. Get 300 grams cold
pressed watercolor paper. The difference between
cold press and hot press is the texture. Hot press is smoother
really rather for illustrators and
more professionals who don't really needed
watercolor texture. Is easier to control the paint on cold pressed
watercolor paper. About the brands, they say the best brand is Arches if I'm
pronouncing it right. What I'm using is
Fabriano because again, I'm painting a lot. I need a lot of
watercolor paper. Fabriano is fairly cheap
and it's good quality. I'm buying them in pads because then you don't
need to stretch the paper. Just paint on the
pad and then remove the paper and you
will be good to go.
5. Do You Pre-Draw?: Do you pre-draw what
you are painting? If I don't have
experience and I'm not going for a loose painting, I pre-draw what I'm painting. What I use for this is I have this Cretacolor set of
watercolor pencils. What is good in
watercolor pencils is that you must have the
pencil marks on your paper. You don't need to erase
them or take care of them, simply you just blend the
outline into the painting. Of course, you can use simple graphite pencil
for pre-drawing, but I advise you to
minimize the pencil marks. Do lots of sketches of your
artwork before you approached the watercolor paper
so that you know what lines and shapes
you want to create, and to minimize pencil
marks with this process. You can just mark some
dots, for instance, where you want to place objects, or you can pre-draw
the whole outlines, but then you need to take
care of those lines. If you just use them as guidance and you don't paint
over them, that's fine. You can erase these
lines afterwards, but if your paint over them, you will not be able to get
rid of these pencil marks, but you can use, for example, ink or these markers to
embrace these lines. I sometimes use them to redraw the outlines and to embrace these pencil
marks and outlines, and that's just fine. [MUSIC] Yes, pre-drawing.
6. What Subjects to Start With?: What are the best
subjects to start with? Well, that's a good question. Again, it is totally obvious to start
with something easy. Galaxies, easy landscapes, objects that are not too detailed or demand
high jogging skills. There are five
places you can get inspiration and
resources for learning. First, you can go
on Pinterest and find easy projects
for beginners. Just write watercolor
beginner projects into Pinterest and you will
get tons of resources. Second, you can go to YouTube. There are some really
great creators who create tutorials
for beginners. I have created a blog post
with 10 youtubers to follow. You will see the link in the
resources of this class. You should check out my
watercolor painting series. I'm starting out with totally easy projects
for very beginners. I'm teaching color theory, and our theory within the dam is a great way
to start, I think. The fourth place
are blocks around, just search in Google. The fifth is, join the watercolor for
beginners Facebook group. There are tons of other
Facebook groups as well. You can join them, but join mine [LAUGHTER]
because we have an amazing tribe
of 17,000 members. We have them a big days
like inspiration Monday, ask me anything Friday
and very beginner Sunday, where we give an extra
support for very beginners. It is just totally
amazing community. People get inspired and motivate
each other and it's just amazing.[MUSIC] I would love to mention all the possibilities
that are not online. Because learning at home alone can be really
lonely by time. It is important to
look for communities. Make sure to localize
the nearest art school. Look at their programs. If they offer watercolor
workshops or courses, or go to watercolor retreats, which is a new thing. They are like a
camps as for kids, but for adults who
create together. Then you can meet a
fellow watercolorists or people with the
same interest. Go to galleries,
museums locally, or to cities which
are a bit far away, but it can be an
amazing experience. Then go to local art events. Join the local art
community because it is always great to
create together, to find your people
and your tribe. It will be more rewarding,
I promise. [MUSIC]
7. How Much Water to Use?: How much water to use? I would say it depends
on the subject. With every painting, you need to think in advance. Plan the whole process, keep in mind how many
layers you will have. If you are building
up a painting from the background with lots
of layers and the washes, you might need to stretch the paper which
means you need to wet the whole and let it dry and then you
can apply the washers. But if you are a beginner, I think you shouldn't start
with that complex projects. Just choose an easy subject and start to paint on the part. What are your paints? Well, find the right consistency
and it is really about the experience because
there are lots of discussions and questions
about how much water to use, my paper dries a lot faster etc. It is also about the humidity
you have in your room, how hot is in your room etc. You really need to experiment
what works for you, how much water you need.
8. Do You Use a Hairdryer?: Do you use a hairdryer? Well, personally, I
don't use a hairdryer. Watercolor painting
is about patients. You need to be patient, wait until your layers are dry. Beginners tend to be
really impatient. This causes lots of
mistakes in their artworks. You can use a hairdryer. They say, if you
use a hairdryer, your colors get dull. Well, I just partly true because only water
vaporizes from your paper. Pigment don't. Pigment can get damaged by heat so if you are patient
with hair trike as well, you will be good to go
so simply just don't put the hairdryer too
close to her painting. Don't put it into straight heat. Just be patient with this
drying thing as well. Or just put the painting
aside and do something else. Or what I'm doing is I paint paintings in lots of
details and small shapes and I don't use too much
water because I liked is vibrancy that's going on so what I do is I work on one
part of the painting and I follow the outer part and when I'm done
with the other part, the first part is dry, so I can return to that
at outside row so yes, you can use a hairdryer.
9. What is Masking Fluid?: What is masking fluid
and how to use it? Masking fluid, let
me just show you. Masking fluid is
actually gum arabic, which does exactly what
its name is, its masks. So when you are painting
with watercolors, you work from light to dark. You might want to keep the white of the paper as the
highlight of your subject, for example, because you can't paint white with watercolors, you can paint it with gouache or acrylics, which is opaque. But you might want
to use this thing, which is actually
really amazing. Just make sure you are using a brush which is
not your favorite. [LAUGHTER] This is
why it is good to have lots of brushes. So you just apply
it on the paper, let it dry and then
you can paint. When everything is dry, you remove it, this masking fluid and you will have the white of
the paper preserved.
10. Copyright - Do I Need to Give Credit?: Copyright issues. Do I need to give credit? Definitely. Giving
credit applies to the YouTube tutorials
that you are following. So for example, let's say
you choose a video and paint a painting and when you
are sharing your artwork, you should give credit to the creator of the
YouTube video, or at least say inspired
by this tutorial. You can of course use photos for reference from
stock photo sites, for example Unsplash,
Pixabay, Pexels, etc. But you need to keep in mind
that those photos are used by anyone else in the world. So I had an issue in the
Facebook group last week. There was a woman sharing an auto from
a reference photo, and there was another woman
telling that she copied her. Then we figured
out that they both use the same reference photo, but neither of them gave
credit to the photo. Even though you are using
royalty-free photo, you should say that
you painted that from a reference photo if you
are copying it exactly. This applies if you are copying
something in full extent. If you are just looking
at a reference photo to know where the shadows
are in a certain object, for example when I'm painting a doughnut in one
of my episodes, I'm looking at the
reference photo, but I'm not copying it, not the colors, not the shapes. I'm just looking where
are the shadows. You want to draw a bear. You don't know how his legs are. You are looking at a photo and you figure it out by that, and that's not copying. You don't need to create credit
to that reference photo. Also if you are inspired by
some artwork but you do that with your own signature style you don't really
need to give credit. This is a bit unclear, but just make sure you're
not copying anyone. Deep in your heart you always know that something
isn't your work. Just listen to that sound. Making art is great. If you're copying
someone, it's great. It's a good way to learn, and it is not a shame
if you give credit, it's just respecting the
original artist. [MUSIC]
11. How to Finish a Watercolor Painting?: How to finish a
watercolor painting. At first, let's talk about why would you want to
give it a finish. Well, after we are done painting and everything
is completely dry, you might want to display your artwork and this is why you want to give
it finishing touches. It might mean that
you need to start with making your painting flat, even if you have only
a little buckle in it. It might happen even if you stretch the paper
before painting. If the buckle is small, placing the painting below
weighty books might work. If not, you should take your artwork on a
clean surface with the painting facing down and sprayed back
of it with water. Then let it dry, maybe again, with the help of some weight. Pigments in your paint have different levels
of light fastness. It means that when
they are exposed to direct sunlight,
the colors fade. You might want to
preserve your artwork, you can use varnish to do this. There are products out
there called watercolor varnish with different
finishes like glossy, matte, or satin and they contain a UV filter which
protects your artwork. You can put your artwork
behind the glass as well, but make sure to use a border so that the painting doesn't
touch the glass itself and make sure you use conservation glass with
ultraviolet blocking properties. Even if you do these steps, it is still not recommended to hung your artwork to a place where it is exposed to
direct sunlight too much. The final way you can preserve your art is by digitizing it. This is what I personally do. I scan the artwork and keep the originals in a dark drawer, so I can make as many
prints from it as I want. If you're interested
in this process, checkout my Photoshop
for this course. Yes, I think these are the steps for finishing
a watercolor painting.
12. Bonus Video: Now we are at the bonus video. I'm going to answer
10 questions quickly. Do you paint the background before or after
the main subjects? It depends on the subject. Is it okay to mix the brands? Yes, you can mix
them all around. What are your
favorite color mixes? Tolerable and sap green
gives an amazing turquoise. Can you reuse dried paints? Of course. Just put water on
any old watercolor, it will get reactivated. Watercolor on Canvas? There are specific
ways to jess out the Canvas that you can paint
with watercolors on them. But there are Canvas specifically made for
watercolors as well. What are the best brands? I think it is a personal
preference where you live in the world or what
you can buy or afford. I would love to just
name the brands I hear the most in
the Facebook group, so far paints it is
Winsor and Newton, Winsor and Newton Cotman, which is a student grade, Holbein, Senellier, Schminke, and Daniel Smith. For paper, it is Arches,
Fabriano, Strathmore, Canon. For brushes, it as Van Gogh, Roubloff, and Silver
black velvet. Can I make money
from my paintings? Yes, there are several
ways to do that. You can sell your own artwork, you can do commissions, you can use print-on-demand sites or license your artwork. Just research these topics and you will find
lots of resources. I'm procrastinating,
is it normal? Yes, of course. It
happens to everyone. Just don't force yourself, just play around and you will reconnect with your
creative flow. Can you use acrylics
with a watercolor? Well, yes, but not exactly with mixing each
other, but separately. For example, when
adding highlights. How to take care of the brushes. Wash them well after you're
finished painting and don't let them stand in
the water holder too long. If they lose their shape, apply hair conditioner on
them for a few minutes.
13. Final Thoughts: I hope I've covered everything
you needed to know. If you have any questions, you can ask it in the
discussion in this class. You can join us in
the Facebook group, we really welcome you, come to the Ask Me
Anything Friday. If there will be some other
questions popping up, I will update this class
with answers to them. Make sure to follow me
on social media and Instagram and Facebook
and, of course, here is Skill Share
hit the follow button to see when I'm
creating new classes. Thank you very
much for watching. I hope it was
beneficial for you. I wish you a wonderful day. [MUSIC] As a project
please upload one of your watercolor paintings into the project gallery and write a detailed
description, what paper, what paints, what techniques you used
and anything that pops up to your mind that could be beneficial for other people.
The Artmother, Professional Art Teacher and Artist
