Tiger Cub in Watercolor – Step by step Beginner Friendly

1. Intro: Hi, everyone, and welcome to this watercolor class. Today, we're going to paint a charming little loopard step by step from the very first underpainting layers to the final details. I'll guide you through the protest slowly so you can follow along at your own pace, whether you're a beginner or already experienced with watercolor. You will learn how to build up layers, capture the lopars beautiful spots, and bring your painting to life with texture and expression. I love painting animals and this little leopard has been one of my favorite to create. I can't wait to share the process with you, grab your paints, brushes, and paper and let's start painting. 2. Materials: Hi, what we will use during this class? First of all, you will need a watercolor paper and I will use a five size, and it's 100% of cotton. I usually use it during my classes and I'm very fond of. I recommend you buying similar, it doesn't matter what company you will use, but I suggest to 100% of cotton. The second thing, of course, paints, but you don't need the whole set of paints. During this class, we will use only five colors. You will need a Sienna light or similar color. I call it light brown, but it's a red ocher in my case. The second color, the first color is I call it dark brown. It could be any dark brown you have on your palette. But in my case, it's October 2023. I will use light gray and it's misty morning from Roman Schmal Aquarius. It's a granulating color, but still if you don't have it, you can use whatever light gray you have. And if you don't have light gray, still, you can dilute the paints gray with the water to achieve this light gray mixture. And the last color which we will use is, of course, paints gray just like I mentioned before. These five colors from water colors we will use during this class. As a last step, we will use guash, and I usually use Winson and Newton designers Guash Permanent white. But still, you don't have to buy if you don't have this squash, you don't have to buy it. If you have some other white quash, you can use it, of course, if you don't have white quash, you can use posca pen or Jelow white gel pen. It's still useful. And we will use mixing palette some brushes, mostly thin for the first layer, bigger brush because we will be painting wet on wet so we need a bigger brush to cover the whole area with water. Of course, paper towel and water. I have a dirty because I just finished recording this class. But at the beginning of this lesson, we will start with the fresh water. Just like on the other of my courses, you will find the sketch for Tiger in the project section, so you can download it and transfer it to the watercolor paper. Without further ado, let's start painting. 3. Underpainting on tigers head: Okay, so let's start painting our tiger. We will paint layer by layer. So the first layer which we are going to paint is the head. We need to mix our colors for the head, and we will mostly use these two colors. Sienna light, and I call it light brown, but it's red or her color. And we need to mix them with a lot of water. We need them to be translucent, these colors. This is my first color. I have my cuts for everywhere. This is first color, and this one is red ocher and perhaps I will add a little bit more of paint. Okay. And with the two colors, we will paint underlayer on our face of the tiger and we will paint wet on wet, but we will avoid painting the eyes around the eye we will leave white unpainted, and the rest we will paint with our two colors. We start with the water and I don't I don't paint water around the eye, so I simply leave it this way. I paint the whole nose and the mouth. Okay. Let's start with the Sienna light. Almost on the whole face, I use the Senate color. I forgot. I was too quick. But still, we can rescue this with the paper towel. We can make it dry. Once again, I will take my senate and place it on the face. Once again, I was too generous with strokes. Okay. Now I will switch to smaller brush because it will be easier, less accidents I will make. And with my brow, I will place it somewhere in here because the ears will be in shadow and somewhere in here, onto the cheeks and under the eye, and the second ear, the head under the other eye, still, this is the underlayer. I will probably be very light after it dries. We just for the beginning, we need the subtle colors and we leave it to dry. This is our first layer. 4. Eyes: First layer is still wet, but we will move on to the ice. This will dry in the meanwhile right now, we will make some colors for the ice. I will use one of my favorite colors. If you see my other courses, you know that I usually use the same colors over and over again. One of my favorite colors is misty morning from Roman Aquarius from an Schmal. This is a gray color. So I will mix it in 50 50 ratio here. If you don't have this gray color, still, you can use, for example, paints gray mixed with a lot of water to create this gray tone. Mistemonic is granulating colors, it creates this effect of two colors. It granulates on red um and bluish tones. I will use it for my eyes for my tiger's eyes. We don't need much of these colors, so I will mix it in here and we will kat pains gray. I don't mix paints gray on my palette because I want this paints gray to be very thick. I simply put a drop of water into my pan, mix it with my colors to create this very thick color. So I have my palette somewhere near me because I will need my paints gray. Right now, I will switch to the smallest brush I had. This is a number three brush, and we will paint the iris of the eye. We will paint it with our gray color. We can even paint this middle part. Still, we can even paint on the whole of the eye because we will use squash to paint back the reflections on the eye. At that stage, it's easier for us to paint the whole iris, the whole eye. I will clean my brush, make it dry on paper towel, and let's wait a little for this paint to dry and I will take my paints gray. Check on the paper if it's thick enough because I want to paint a very thick lines with it. It also depends on the brush you take. But this is the smallest I have number three. I see that they are still wet, so we need to wait a minute. Perhaps we will start from this line in here because it doesn't touch anything, so it's safe to paint it. You need to be aware that if the iris is still wet, the plains gray could bleed into your iris and iris if your plains gray have a lot of water in it, it also could bleed. Let's do similar on the part. Oh, I have This is still wet. So let's try to fix that. I can place a little of my sandal light in here and perhaps I will dry my work with the hair dryer and go back to you when everything is dry. I have dried my eyes and the whole face of the tiger and let's go back to painting the iris with our paint scray. Let's go back in here. Okay. And the same with the second eye. Okay. So we have ice ready. In the next stage, we will move on to the shading of our tiger's face. 5. Shading: So for shading for this first part of shading goes we will place two additional layers of shading on our tiger's face. We need this brown color. I call it light brown, just like you perhaps remember, and I'll need more of this paint. I'll add water to it, and again, I will add some paint, and I don't need this very translucent shade. I call it 50 30% of faint. So it's like two shades darker than it was before. So we need to add more paint to it to achieve two shades darker color. And for that stage, we only need that one color. We need just one color, but I usually use two brushes, one smaller, one medium, and one smaller. Let's start with shading. So we need to make this area under the eye, perhaps smaller than this. We need the area under the eye even a bit darker. I will place my color in here. And only with the wet brush, I will blend it with the rest of the face. So we do similar on the other side. I will place my color in here and with the wet not very wet, but with the damp brush, I will blend the edges of my color. We need to define our nose. Still, the nose doesn't start in here at the beginning. Tigers usually have this white, lighter area in here, we will start from this little part away from it and I will place my color the line of the nose and I see that I have here something I don't like with the wet brush, I will blend it with the rest of the background and the same with the other side of my nose. I will place a line and blend it. And a little blend of the edges in here. I don't want the sharp lines, so I also blend the edges a little. We need this mouth under the mouth to be a little darker so I will just like before, place a line of my color and with the wet brush, I will blend it Okay. Ears in here and starts from the top in here, the ears are darker because they are like shade we play color and blend the edges. Almost all ears are darker, so I will there's a color on all of them blended. And the same on the other side. So let's play some color and to the top of the head blended a little and the rest of the ear to that point, let's blend it. I think we should also do similar stuff on the side of the cheek. Let's put some color and blend it I usually leave it to try and do the first layer of blending. See you in the next video. 6. Shading part 2: Okay, so my layer, my face of the tiger is dry now, so we will place a second layer of shading. This time we only need two colors. The first one will be once again. I call it medium brown, but this is my red color. I will mix it once again and I'll mix it in 50 50% ratio. I call it that way. So it's not very translucent and not very thick, not very solid. And the second color is my dark brown. In my case, it's October 2023, I need to add more pigment into this mixture because I spread some water in it so I diluted it by accident and the second color will be my dark brown, it's October 2023 from Roman Schmal Okay. When I have my two pints ready, I'm going to switch my palette to my work. Well, I will use two brushes, one smaller one because my number four I think my cat just took it and I don't know where exactly it is, so I don't have my favorite brush for now. So I will paint with my number six Da vinci, it's not so soft. This brush is not so soft as the Princeton one. That's why I will use to to brushes to paint this layer, and we will start layering and shading once again our tiger. Let's start with the easiest part and the details. Let's paint the nose. Here I will paint with smaller brush and this middle brown so red her goes in here. And leave it for now to dry because it's quite wet and I don't want this to bleed. That's why I will leave it to dry. Once again, I will with my smaller brush, I will take the dark prawn and let's define our nose. Once again, similar just like before, let's paint a line, clean our brush, make it dry a little and blend the edges. I placed a lot of water in here, so I know that if I will paint this site right now, it will bleed in the way I don't want. That's why I leave it to dry for a moment and paint this area. I will place my darkest brown under the eye over here. Clean my brush, make it dry a little because I don't want much water on my brush and blend it in here to create a smooth transition. Similar goes to the side, I will place my color this dark brown. Make it clean in the water and dry a little in a paper towel and blend the edges Here you see that the left side of the nose is already dry so I can do similar thing on the right side. I have my line in my brush, make it dry a little, and perhaps it will be easier if I rotate the work and blend it. Blend the edges in here. Okay. For a moment, I palette back and let's pick a very dark brown, very thick dark brown straight from the palette. And let's paint this area. We should do the same in here, but this is still wet and I'm wondering if this will not bleed too much. Let's move on to the other side of the Tiger's head. Let's start with our ears. Just like before we will place dark brown in here, I was switching to a bigger brush to Princeton, so I will place my color in here in my brush, make it dry on paper towel and blend it. Perhaps I will rotate. Okay. This area is very dark, so I will place color in here and once again, blend it to the inside of the ear and I will pick my dark brown straight from the cube straight from the pen and I will add this brown in here. I know that it bleeds out there, but it doesn't matter. And I think we should also add some dark color over here and blend it. Perhaps we should even make this area a bit darker so it's still wet. I'll just add this color and it blends with the rest. But if it doesn't bleed, so I see that some part is dry now, then I will slightly with the tip of my brush, blend it with the rest. Okay. And we do the same on the other side. Let's start with our dark brown over here. That's why I like the softer brushes for this because easier to blend with them if they are softer. I will add more pigment in this area to darken this part. And just like before, And I will add once again color straight from my once again, I will add it in here and we'll do similar stuff on the side as we did on the right. If you see that somewhere just like in here is the paint creates not very beautiful, not very pretty texture, you can still blend it. With the dump brush, you can still do it. I switch to smaller brush and once again, pick my thick dark brown. I see that the center of my nose is already dry so I can paint the rest. I think I need to darken once again the nose a little. It's already dry. That's why I will pick once again my dark brown. I just layer on that part. Once again, one line and with the dump brush, I don't have much water in it. Blend this part. I want more contrast in these areas. Again, on the right part, we'll do the same align and let's blend it I think I will do similar stuff over here. Once again, I will put my paint and blend it oh I will take my lighter brown this medium brown, lighter from this too, and I will place a line in here and I will blend just a little the edges. I don't want them to flow very much down to the bottom of this area, but I want the area next to the mouth to be a little darker than it was. I see that here I have some not very pretty texture. So I just blend it a little and perhaps once again, let's add some over here and lend a little. The second part, so this part the same. When I did this workshop with my Polish people, they said to me, it's just like makeup blending on your face, it's just shading the makeup on your face. Yes, this is similar, we shade the face of the tiger just like we can shade our faces with the makeup tools. We need this layer leaf to dry. Because we only need to add some details with the pains in the next step, so we need this layer to be dry completely, see you in the next step. 7. Head details: So now we will move on with the details on our tigers face. We will use the same two colors as we did in the previous lesson. And I'm going to paint with the smaller brush. If you have, for example, rigor brush, it also will be fine because we need some very light andthin lines. So let's start with the medium brown, so it's red or her in my case. I will test if it's dark enough or light enough. I don't want this color to be very dark because I want to achieve this very delicate texture effect. Let's start with the ears. We will paint fur on our face. This is my smaller brush, it's number three. But if you have some smaller two or one, you can choose it. We will paint this just like in the birds class with the tip of our brush, very thin simulation of four. This time, this will be four. In the birds class, it was simulation of the feathers, simple lines, a little curved. With a tip of our brush. Let's start this. I will rotate my work with lighter color, I will paint some four in here and we can go beyond this outline. Over here, we will create rounded shapes because we want to show that this part of the face is rounded. We also will do in here, some four. We will do exactly the same on the other side. For example, if it's easier for you, you can rotate your work. And the same so Sometimes it's hard when you rotate two seats. It's hard because you don't see exactly the whole the whole area, the whole work, how is it how it looks like. We have our first layer. Now we will do similar stuff, but with the darker colors. I will pick my dark brown. I will start with this part because it's already dry, so I will add this darker details and in here, I will add more shadow in my ear and this time, I won't blend the edges. I will simulate the fur in here. This darker color, I will not use everywhere. Only in the areas which are more in shade are to create more triedy effect of our face in here, not very much. We will do similar on the other side. Let's start with the center of our ear. Right now, I will remove my mixing palate and I will take my palate. Perhaps I will switch it this way because I need only the dark brown and I need it to be quite thick. So it's easier for me to take it straight from my pan. I will add some water to it to make it more to blend it a little with water. I just added a drop of water to blend it and to have this very dark brown color. On my scrap paper, I'll just check if I can paint lines with my color. If it doesn't bleed as much, I don't want this color to bleed with others, so I need it to be thick. With this color, we will add some details in here. We will paint the places from which the whiskers grow. Let's start with the left side. Some of them you have on your sketch, but you can paint some more if you like, if you feel that it will add something to your painting. We start painting our texture on the tiger. Some of these lines have textures you have on your sketch. But I didn't want the sketch to be very detailed one. That's why I didn't draw everything in here. So this is for you to be creative. To make your own tiger patterns over there. These spots are getting bigger while we paint to the top of the head so they can be bigger. I see that this area is still wet. That's why I for now will avoid painting on it and I will move on to the other part. I will paint this you can add some more over here. We can still darken this side, so we will draw once again the shade. Imitation of the four. This side is still wet. That's why I don't do that right now. The check I have my cheek is dry now, so I can safely paint in here. This area is a little bit wet and I know that if I paint something over here, it will bleed. That's why it's safer to just create some texture on this cheek. You just observe your work and make decision, which side is safer to paint for you for the effect you want to achieve. Paint in this area right now, I think it's quite safe. I think that's almost it because I see that I missed some texture over here. I think that's it. One more thing. Let's do one more thing. Let's make this in this part with a little darker with these two lines and I'm thinking while I'm cleaning my brush, I'm still thinking if I should blend it. With the very dry brush, I will try to blend these edges. One edge. I think I will leave the other ones. Let's leave that way. We already have finished our face. The only thing we need to paint in this space is white details with the guash, but we will add these details with the at almost at the end of our course because we will also add some white details on the rest of the body. From the next video, we will move on to the body of our cher. See you there. 8. Body first layer: Okay, so let's paint the first layer of the body. Just like before, we will use the same colors. So let's prepare them. So I will need for my tiger's body. Red ocher, so light brown. I call it light brown color. This is my red ochre. But I need more of this color. I will spray some water into it and we need 30% ratio more translucent than solid color. So let's check on paper. We will paint wet on wet techniques. Dilute the color will dilute with water. We need some sienna light color, and we prepare it in the same ratio. 30% ratio. I call it 30% because it's not very translucent and it's not medium value. So it's like 30% of paint and 70% of water. And the last color is my favorite one, so it's light gray. I call it pigeon gray color, but it's this misty morning from Aquarius Roman Schmal. It's very beautiful. So once again. For now, we will not do shading. Shading we will do in the second layer. For now, only we need the base colors for our tiger's body. Also, we will need some paints gray for the tail, and this color is not diluted with water much, it's 50% ratio. Okay. Let's start from this section under the bed in here. This is in shadow and I have simulation of darker fur in here. I'm picking the right brush right now because the bigger will be better, but this one is a stiff one and I don't like the stiff for painting with water. I want the soft. I need the soft brush. This one is soft and also this one is soft, but this one is too big for me for this area. That's why I will pick this number four for that stage and let's start with the water and only with this area where we will place the gray colors. Let's start with our gray color. I want it to flow in this area and I will leave it this way to dry a little. I will do the same on my tail. Without the layer of water, I simply place my gray as a base layer, clean my brush, dry it a little on paper towel, pick my paints gray, and I will add the spins gray in here and at the end of the tail. I want this pins gray to bleed with my gray. Also, I will do similar trick in here. I will add the spins gray under the head and in here where we have the shadow. Okay, let's place a water. Let's do the left part for now, but be aware that this black could bleed and it's not a big thing if it bleeds. With the water and let's start from this sienna light and add it to the pose my tiger and somewhere in here. While we're going up, we will take this red ochre color and make it blend with the rest. Let's do the same on the right side. We need to perhaps I will take the bigger brush for that. Let's place the water. Let's place water on the right side of the body. Once again, let's start with this light ocher, place it in here, make it flow. Take this light brown and add it in here. Also make it flow. And I see that I have some which I don't like, bleeds, which I don't like. I will take a smaller brush with brush with a dump brush. I will blend this bleeds which I don't like. I have the same bleed over here. It won't be visible after we place shadow layer, but still I don't like them on this very moment. That's why I'll simply blend them. And still I'm waiting a little this area to dry because it's too wet to add colors to add more color. I want to add in here, it's because I use this brush. It holds a lot of water. That's why I have a layer of water in here. I'm trying to pick some of this exit water from this area by touching a little my brush very gently. Right now, I will add more pigment because I want this area to be naturally darker than the rest. That's all for this stage. We need to dry this completely before we move on. 9. Body layer 2: Okay, let's paint some shadows right now. We will use the same mixture, the same colors just like before, but I will take a smaller brush for that. So let's start with this gray color and let's add more shadow under the head of the tiger. Sorry for my cat. Just like before, let's add a line with the color, clean our brush and with the damp brush, let's blend the edges of the color. We will do the same trick over here. I will place my gray in here, clean my brush, and let's blend this color. If you still have paints gray on your palette, you can add this paint gray over here to make it flow a little similar trick over here. And let them blend. I will switch to a larger brush. I will take my number four and with some red ochre, perhaps I will add more pigment to my paint. And let's add some details, I think it will be better with the smaller brush. Let's add some shading and for simulation. Or our tiger. Just like before, I will place a layer and blend the edges with my brush. That's why I like the softer brush. With the tip of my brush, I will also paint the simulation of the four. Perhaps that's why I took a smaller one because it's easier to paint this four with a smaller brush in here, I will try to simulate the stripes. Some details in here, simulation of the four and in here, let's simulate the four of our tiger. With the short strokes, here also with short and rounded strokes, we simulate the roundness of the poet's do the same on the right side. At the beginning, let's paint some shadow area, it's blend the edges. And let's paint these stripes. I need more paint, so I will make it quite fast. Again, I know that it flows, but I don't mind that it floats at that moment. I can even add more pigment in here because I want it to be the darkest These lines where we have the poll, I don't blend. They should be rather sharp. Let's add some more details. And let's move on to the tail. For that, we need our painscray and I will add a line of the color to the top of my tail and with a damp brush blended. A little with the rest and similar, we will do in here. I will place line and with the dump brush, you can rotate your work if it's easy for you and if you don't want by accident amuch everything you have over there, so you can rotate your work and blend this I think in here, it's too light. That's why I will add a touch of my gray to create a softer effect. That's all for this stage. In the next lesson, we will move on to the details on the body. 10. Body details: Okay, so it's time to add some details to the tiger's body. So to do that, we will need some colors, and this will be exactly the same colors as we used before. The first one is paints gray, and I will mix them in 50 50 ratio. So they are quite thick. The paints are quite thick. First one, we also need a red ochre. I call it light brown, but in my case, the exact color is red ochre. Is 115 from Aquarius Roman Schm and it looks like this Fir color will be dark brown. In my case, it's October 2023 from Aquarius, Roman Small pins. Okay. Let's take a smaller brush. I will take number three from Restor House. Let's start with the smaller brush. Let's start with the darkest area. I will take paints gray and with this paints gray, I will add some details on this area and on the tail. But we will be painting with the very tip of the brush and these very short strokes. Shirt and even curly. Don't paint the strokes to be very straight. Try to round them a little. They will look more natural if they are rounded a bit. So let's start with paints gray. And let's start with the tail because I will not smudge it when I move to this area. So we will paint try to remove it, and we will paint this simulation of the fur on the tail. We don't paint only in the center part where the background is the lightest. We only add this four to the area where the background is darkest. I forgot to curve a little on my hair so you see how it looks and still, once again, if you have this gray color which you used before, you can use it. My gray is a mixture of red and blue. That's why when it dries, it looks like red, but it's granulate in color. I will add with my gray a bit in here. I want to clean my brush and once again, take the paints gray. I have four my cats four everywhere. So sorry for that. And we it is very short strokes. I don't mind. Well, there is unpainted areas like this. So in here in the shadow. I think we will have somewhere over here. Some of the spots you have already sketched on a sketch on the sketch. But still, you can add your own. Okay. Let's clean our brush, and let's switch to this darker brown. Let's start with this left side of the tiger and let's do similar things. Here, I will connect this brown with this black. Let's define here the pulse and second layer of four in here and in here. Details in here and just like before, let's define And let's do the same on the other side. So again. To add more interest, we will use this light brown, its red or her color, and we will add more simulation in here. I'll paint with that color between. My left side is already dry, so nothing will bleed at that stage. So I can add everywhere where I see that more details is needed. And the same in here. But first, I want this part to be darker. That's why I will place what's left on my palette with my dark color in here. And blend a little. Perhaps I will do the same with the very rest of what I have with my dark brown and pains gray because I don't have dark brown. I just used the rest, which I had, I used Pains gray because this area is in shadow. This should be darker. Let's do the same with the light brown, the same what we did on the left side. Let's add more details with the slight brown. It won't be visible much, but still it will create this texture on the four. In the same pose here. That's all for that stage. In the next stage, we will add details with white gwash, and this will be the final stage. 11. White gwash: At that stage, we will add details with the gwash. Just like you see in the material sections, I will use designer gwash permanent white. I have squeeze it in here and let it dry. Right now, I will only add water and mix it to create this very thick paint effect. On this piece of paper. I will test if I can paint thin and solid line with my tip of the brush. If I can, then I will go back to my work and I will add the details. Let's start with the eyes and let's paint this dot on the iris. Just like you see, even when we add only these two dots on the iris, the tiger looks much better. If your white in here lost, you can paint it with the white. We will do the same on the right eye. These two dots on iris, around the eye mid our. But this is my first attempt to paint this tiger from Mid Journeys reference photo. In my reference photo, the tiger had the white area over here. So we will do similar. We will do with simple strokes. Simulation of this lighter fork over here and with the tip of my brush, I will paint the whiskers. Let's do the same on the other side. Perhaps it will be easier for me if I rotate the work and I see that I have a blob on the end of my brush so and the whiskers. And while we on that area of Tiger's face, we will add some details over here. On the ears, something over here, not much. Still this texture gives us interesting point to look at and the same on the other side. I will rotate my work. Sometimes it is just easier to rotate. I have a thicker paint on my brush right now. It creates thicker line. I see that these are too thin in comparison to this one. That's why I will make them thicker. Let's move on to the whiskers over here to the main whiskers. I trying to round them. And on the other side. Still, if you don't have white gwash, but you have white jalpin, you can do the same. Let's add some more. I see that my guash is too dry because it creates this texture I don't want. So I just add some water to it. Okay. Let's add some simulation of the fork in here. So whatever tip of our brush, Well, I hope you like it because I like this I like how it looks. And the rest the very last thing, I guess, will be to add some details on this for here. And we can still add some simple single strokes. Oh, let's leave it that way. Okay, so this is so this is it. We have finished our tiger. I hope you like the effect which you have achieved. It could be a bit different than mine because just like you see, I painted it three times and every time it looks a bit different. Don't worry if it's not exactly how mine is. But still, I believe that your work is beautiful. See you in a wrap up video. 12. Outro: Thank you so much for joining me in this class and painting your own little loopard. I hope you enjoy the process and learn some new watercolor techniques along the way. I love to see your finish work, so please upload it to the project section so I can take a look and leave you a feedback. Seeing your interpretation is always the most rewarding part for me. If you enjoy this class, it would mean a lot if you could leave a review. It helps other students discover it and join in the fun. If you're ready for more watercolor adventures, check out my other classes. You will find plenty of animal and botanical projects to keep you inspired. Happy painting and see you in the next class.