Transcripts
1. Introduction: Have you ever wanted to skip the drawing and go
straight to painting? Or have you heard of direct
painting but getting started didn't feel very
direct to you at all? If so, I'm happy to
introduce beginners guide to watercolor direct painting: expressing value and
volume with competence. [MUSIC] I'm Jill Gustavis, a lifelong artist from
Western Massachusetts. I enjoy everything from large, intricate studio work to
quick sketchy planar pieces. While I can take my
time in the studio, working outside
requires me to paint more efficiently due
to time constraints. Recent change in light
and weather conditions prompts you to really streamline
your painting process, skip the sketching, and
trust your brushes. This leads to increasingly more competent and expressive marks bringing a dynamic energy
to your paintings. Brushwork is the foundation
of direct painting. Knowing where and how to move your brush takes a
mixture of exploration, experience, and a
little imagination. Painting from life
by directly painting shapes and value is like
sculpting on paper. As your perception
slowly shifts to break down your subject in
terms of space and volume, your brushwork will
become more tactile, modeling the scene
instead of outlining it. Each stroke is
either the addition of matter or the
carving of space. This intimate brushwork creates a direct connection
between how you perceive an object and how you translate this impression
with your brush. I find that even if my
execution is sketchy, the image still
feels more real so I include direct painting into
my practice whenever I can. Now, it may seem intimidating
to make that first stroke. But in this class,
you'll learn to paint directly with courage. This class is perfect
for beginners. We'll warm up with basic drills, loosening up your brushstrokes, and seeing how we can
push our brushes to make more informative marks
than just dots and lines. Then we'll use that
mark-making knowledge as a basis to start building forms and suggesting structure, challenging yourself to paint volume and not draw outlines. These exercises will give
you a chance to experiment, see what clicked for you, and offer you a base to create
your three final pieces. But figuring out how to
paint what you see is sometimes still the
hardest and most intimidating part
of the process. For that, we'll cover three strategies to get
started with direct painting. Whether you prefer diving in anywhere when choosing a focus, being pragmatic by
working big to little or harnessing the alluring
subtleties of depth by layering, these strategies will offer
variations that allow you to be flexible with
different subjects and environments
you may encounter. By the end of the class, you'll have a catalog
of techniques to confidently approach direct painting
situations in the future, as well as a small portfolio
of expressive paintings. If you're ready to dive
into direct painting, I'll see you in
the first lesson. [MUSIC]
2. Class Project: For the project for this class, we're actually going to be
breaking up into a series of mini drills and exercises. It's not going to be
all in one chunk, and you don't need to
do it all in one day. You can actually spread this class over a
longer period of time, say a couple of days
to a week or longer. Feel free to split up, when you're doing each
of the exercises. I will make a note of how long each exercise
may take you, so you can be more prepared
going into each of them. We're going to start with
some basic brush exercises, allowing you to play
with brushes you already have and see
what they could do. Then we'll use those
brushes to suggest form, creating objects by painting
their volume and value. Then we'll move on
to strategy lessons, including choose a focus, where we're starting
with whatever we find most interesting in the scene and moving
outwards, big to little. Join the largest object
in your composition and then moving on
to smaller elements, and then adding more layering. Letting layers dry in between applications to create
a nice sense of depth. We'll also go over
your experience at the end and feel free to use any of the worksheets
I've provided in the resources to help you along. As always, I highly
encourage you to share your work to
the gallery and I love to offer feedback and discuss maybe any new approaches you've
taken to this technique. If you're ready to get started, let's move on to the first
lesson and talk about, why direct painting?
3. Why Direct Painting?: You're here to learn about direct painting. Now why you're here may be
different for everyone, whether you're planar practice
needs a little boost, or maybe you just
want to include more expressive work
in your portfolio. Direct painting definitely
has its benefits. One of the benefits
I enjoy most about direct painting is
that it saves time. One of the reasons I picked it up was because
painting planar, I would only have so much
time to be outside or the weather conditions or the lighting conditions
were changing quickly. I'd have to spend my hour that I had available
only painting. I could not spend any of
that time sketching if I wanted to get my piece and
before I needed to pack up. On the other hand,
I also like it to save time because
sometimes I only have an hour on a week night to paint and I just want
to get to painting, but that's the
part I enjoy most. Whereas I do sketch
in some of my work to add that structuring
element to a composition, it's not always necessary. Direct painting gives
you a way to dive in without spending some of
your time drawing first. The next reason is brushes
encourage suggestion. A suggestion definitely is more efficient if you have a
limited amount of time, not only will join a sketch, take up some of
that valuable time, but it may also feel like
you have to stick to your outlines versus
indirect painting, not only will it take less time, but you brushes
will also give you more expression in the
rendering of the object. Using interesting
painterly strokes is also a little more lively, although this is definitely
an aesthetic preference, not a category of
painting success. The third thing is more of a nerdy artistic
benefit in my mind, and that is, I think direct painting gets
me to focus faster. What it is I'm
painting and what is the most basic way that I can
represent what I'm seeing. I find it as a almost like an artist's challenge
in breaking down a scene and really getting my brushes to work hard for me. In return, they give you some really beautiful marks and let the watercolor do
what it's really meant to do. That's just mix and flow in
an interesting organic way, which definitely adds
to the beauty of a really quick impromptu sketch. Direct painting
also allows you to see your subject in a
little bit different way. I like to compare
it to sculpting or modeling in the way that
your strokes act like either chisels or
adding clay onto a sculpture in the way that
either your stroke is adding mass or it's putting down a value distinction that's creating a sense of space
or depth in your painting. Knowing how to control
value like that is helpful across all different
painting techniques. Direct painting
tends to increase your confidence in your
own artistic abilities more because you're learning to trust your intuition that your brush strokes
and your hand know what they're doing and
that it's going to put down the next right
stroke naturally. Now that you have a basic
understanding of what direct painting is and why
to use it in your practice, let's move on to the next lesson where I'll quickly go over
the materials you'll need for the class and
give you a couple of suggestions to keep
this really manageable.
4. Picking Your Brushes and Paint: I'm going to go over a few different
materials that you'll need to do the
class but keep things really simple because one
of the great benefits of direct painting is how quickly
you can get the sketching. We are going to keep
materials are really paired down for this class. The big three are going
to be your brushes, your paints and your paper. Your brushes, just pick out 2-3 different brush shapes that
you can experiment with. Brushes that are a little
bit different, I've a round, a one stroke or a flat
and a dagger brush. These are very
different brush head shapes that give me
different marks. It'll just give me a good basis for how mark-making
can be different. Paints are next, I kept it
very simple in this class. Either I used one color or I used a set of primaries
and so just choose a red, a yellow, and a blue, doesn't matter which
ones they are, just keep it really simple. You're not thinking about
what color to match, just play with them. Your emphasis is on
your mark making. Then their paper, you can use whatever
you have on hand. I do always recommend 100
percent cotton paper because the absorbency will
give you more bang for your buck in your mark-making. Feel free to use
other types of paper, whether that's loose sheets, blocks, or even the back
sides of paintings, you really didn't like
how they came out. Some accessories
I'll just quickly mention is your
standard water jar, rag and I have a paper towel
to blot out highlights. The only thing that I
have extra is I have a heat dryer just to expedite
the filming of the lessons. You do not necessarily
need one unless you want to get everything
done in one sitting but not necessary. Keep it simple,
couple of brushes, some paints and your paper. You'll be painting in no time. With these few basic materials, you'll be sketching in no time. Let's move on to the next
lesson where I just have a quick note on using value and basic watercolor techniques to make your direct painting
experience really great.
5. Quick Note on Washes and Value: Indirect painting, your brushstrokes
are the only way you are conveying information
to the viewer. So let's review just a
few basic watercolor tips to get you started. If you're already an
experienced watercolor Peter, feel free to skip this
lesson and move on to the first lesson about
mark making and brushes. Saturation and water control are going to become
more important. Knowing how to put paint down
onto a wet paper without it spreading means knowing how saturated your paint
is on your brush. On the other side, knowing if you put in
something that is not as saturated and more water-based into your already wet paper, it may create an imbalance in the water attention and
this creates blooms. Knowing how to control the water on your
brush is going to be very important to creating
a successful sketch. If you're interested
in seeing me go over more exercises practicing
water control, I do include a few more in my
previous Skillshare class, the value of monochrome. The saturation of the
paint you're applying also controls how
you're conveying value. Learn how to use a value
skill to train your eye and judge how your
value range is doing. Now, a value skill
is simply a group of boxes where each
proceeding box, you darken the saturation of
the color you are applying. You can see here, there's more pigment in each
one of these washes. Knowing the difference in the range of your paints
that you're using, and each paint is different, will give you a better
sense of having a balanced range of
values in your painting, and that balance of tones
will give you great contrast. You can see that everything
dried a little bit lighter, which is something to keep in
mind when you're painting. So if you don't know how light
something's going to dry, you may want to just
be prepared to put on some finishing touches, extra layers just
to get that depth. Having a little bit of
different ranges in your paint's value would give you that sense of contrast, and it will make your
sketch seem more lively and more energetic, which will complement your
more energetic brushstrokes coming from direct painting
versus following the sketch. Each paints going to be
a little bit different, so [inaudible] has a
nice deep valuation, get very dark, but you can
also make it very light. Each paint is going
to be different. So keep that in
mind. If you need more information about
this, you can reference, there is a longer
value skill lesson in the monochromatic class that I have here on Skillshare. Go check that out if you
are interested in this and need a bit more explanation. Always remember that
watercolor dries lighter, so factor that into when
you're judging the value that you are applying versus the value that you're
aiming to see. The other way to check the
value throughout your painting is to just simply take your phone and take
a picture of it, either with a black and
white filter on or to take a photo and then take all
the color out of the photo, and that will give you a chance
to see that value range, and if it's all mid-tones
or is it all too dark, is all too light. The easiest way is to
build from light to dark. So if you're on the lighter end or the
too many mid-tones, you still have room to
increase the contrast. Increasing that
balance, some light, some mid-tones, some darks. Take a photo and
judge it that way. Now we've covered a
few basic tips to make your direct painting
experience even better. Let's move on and
get our feet wet with mark-making in
the next lesson.
6. Strokes: One Brush, Many Marks: Direct painting relies so heavily on your
brush strokes. Let's explore a couple
of different types of brushes and see what
marks they each make. In this lesson,
we're going to be exploring three
different brush shapes. We're going to be exploring
a standard round brush. This is a number eight
Princeton Neptune. This is a synthetic squirrel. We're going to be exploring
a flat, or in this case, this is a one stroke, a 1/4
inch from Rosemary and Co, and then a dagger, which is also a 1/4 of an inch. Once again, the Princeton
Neptune series. We're going to explore these three different
brush shapes. I just have a sheet of nine
by 12 paper in front of me. This is a cold press 140 pound. The book is a Kilimanjaro
sketch or paint book. But I'm going to
split this page into thirds just really loosely. I'm just using a
sharpie marker here. It's just so I don't end up spending the whole page looking at one of them in particular. We have our thirds, and I'm going to start
with the round brush because most people are most familiar with this
particular type of brush. This is just a palette
of leftover paints from a different project, so I'm just going to use
these to use them up. You use any paint color. I have a fairly
well loaded brush, and I'm going to start with just exploring the
really basic strokes. With a round brush, you have your standard, the thinnest you
could probably do, you'd probably go
a little thinner. Then if you put down
all your pressure, you can get a wire line. Then going across, it's about the same for that. You get a wider stroke across, but it breaks up a bit depending
on your paper texture. Then the other strokes I like to explore is just
when you start getting into stamping and looking at the shapes that the brush
head makes organically. You can go upwards and see if that gives
you a different stroke. Sometimes letting off pressures gives you some interesting,
more organic edges. Just play around, see if
combining your stroke, so that's a bunch of these
strokes really close together. If that gives you a really
interesting texture or shape, that maybe if you had
tried to paint each of those intentionally would not have looked quite so natural. So you can see if
doing these strokes in a weird grouping would
be really interesting. That looks like waves if I had done it at
a different angle. That's the other thing,
is play with your angles. That would be really interesting texture
there for whether it's a man-made pattern
or a natural patterns, fish scales or
something like that. You'll be surprised
what you can pick up by just turning the brush. Just play around and see
what textures you get. Flicking different speeds. We're going to practice this with the two other
brushes as well. Now I'm going to move on to my second
of three brushes, and this is the one stroke, which is technically
just a longer flat. You can see, I don't
get as much of a brush stroke variation
due to pressure. You can see that it does
tend to break up a bit more. It's not quite as consistent unless you're
doing that downward stroke. It has a few different
applications. You can use the corner,
you can use the flat side, or the skinny side. This brush really, you could see a difference
with being able to rotate it. You're going to get different
strokes as you rotate it. Using that with repetition, you get a nice unpredictable
series of strokes. There using that skinny side, you get more of a
horizontal stroke, which looks like waves. Then moving on to
the dagger brush, this one has the most range
in different stroke widths. You could see it does create quite a few very
different strokes, whether its size, its shape, depending on how you're
putting down repetition. You do give up a little bit of control
in that balance there, because that is
how you're getting so many different shape strokes. You can see just
smooshing it around, you would get more
nebulous shapes. Using that tip, you
get more detail there, and letting the brush break up that stroke gives you
some really nice texture. You could see some
grasses there. Now you see, after having done the
three of them that you get some more fun strokes
as you start to get into the less predictable
brush shapes. You see this is our round. This was the flat or one stroke, depending on what you have. This the same brush top. The difference
between a one stroke is it's a little longer. Then we have our dagger. Doing some of the
same exercises, you can see how some of them become a
little bit more expressive, some are a little
more controlled, and then some of the shapes just start
to make themselves. You can start to see
things like grasses. Not even with just
what you would think would produce
a grass shape, but also with some of them
more when you're twisting the brush and it flicks
off to the side, it gives you a more wild
look to your strokes. Now that we're
more familiar with what type of marks
our brushes make, let's move on to the
next lesson and see how we can use those marks
to suggest form.
7. Suggesting Shape & Form: In this lesson, we're going to use
the knowledge of the different types of
strokes our brushes can make to suggest the
form of real-life subjects. You can see here,
I've split my paper up for this exercise
into three sections. You can also do the same
if it helps you also keep your different
paintings separate as well. I have some primaries and the same brushes from
the last exercise. What I'm going to
do is, I'm going to paint three objects, practicing drawing the volume of these objects and not drawing the outline and
filling in that void. Try and pick stuff that
either you have in front of you or that you can see
from where you are. Remember not to
draw your subject, and even with your
brush, try not to draw it with your brush. Here, with this round brush
is a great way to start, and I'm using it to slowly basically, paint the
surface of this apple, and I'm moving more according to value than
particular colors. I started with the
red is like a middle, and then add the big yellow
with the highlighters, and slowly lifting
extra highlights out, and then the blue gives
me that shadow and still keeps that contrast that gives this apple a sense of form. The last stroke, is this worked
together very quickly, is just going to be to ground
this apple on a surface. You can see I pulled
out some paint and added in a
little extra shadow. My next brush I'm going
to do is this one stroke, or you can use a flower or whichever brush you're
experimenting with. One of my favorite
things to suggest with this brush is loose
clumps of foliage. As you see here, I'm
letting the brush hit the paper at
different angles using different pressures and letting different rotations of the
brush create various marks. I'm also switching up maybe
the hue a little bit to create some more interest
in this section, in this wash, remembering that you can use the brush
in many different ways. You could use, the edges, the corners, the flat
side of the brush, whatever you need to get a variation in
your brush stroke, then remembering to charge
in and create that contrast. As you see here, more detail
and then even less detail with a wide brush stroke
across using the side of it. Then this last one here, I'm using the dagger brush
to suggest a cloudscape, and this is great for this brush because
it is very loose, and what I'm doing is
wiggling it around, but making sure that
it doesn't look like squiggles by connecting all these areas that I want
to be part of the sky. You don't want to have too many loose islands because
then it looks disjointed. Another way to tie it in here, is using clean water to pull in the wash and get rid of
half of that outline, and then accentuating the
part of the outline I do want to keep by
charging in more paint. This creates this high contrast that really makes
these clouds pop. Remember to also when charging, think about your
brushstrokes here too, by keeping it loose, the paint, doesn't look like you
put it down in a stroke. Using also dagger brush, which is great for cloudscapes. You see here, I have three
objects I chose to paint, and that the level of
suggestion increased with each object due to both
the brush and the subject, I chose to embrace each
brush's level of control. I ended up with this cloudscape
done with a dagger brush, which created some
effortless clouds. Now, you can feel
free to explore whatever level of brush control and suggestion you'd like. Now that we've implemented
our mark making knowledge into creating
some real-life subjects, let's move on to
the next lesson, where I'm going to give you guys a couple of tips
on how to prepare yourself to use direct
painting and paint from life.
8. Prep: Painting From Life: Now that we've started to get familiar
with our brushstrokes, let's quickly overview
how to set up for success with both direct
painting and painting from life. There are many advantages
to painting from life. It's one of the reasons so many art classes encourage
students to paint for real still lifes to paint from a live model or to paint plain air in front
of your landscape. You're going to be seeing
a wider value range with your eye than if you were looking at a photo
of your subject. You're just plain starting with more information
and it gives you more information to interpret
into your final painting. Another reason is
a great benefit to painting from life
is that you can move around and see like in 3D how your object is interacting
with its environment. This gives you also
more information as is it really circular round, is it oblong round, and all of that comes to a more realistic rendering
of your subject. The last reason is, is just fun. There is something
intrinsically creative and inspiring about
painting the object that is in front of you. It's just a lot of fun. I highly encourage,
especially beginners to start with a subject that
matches your current skill set. Learn unless complex
subjects and add complexity as you progress. When in doubt, I always
think that fruit and veggies are a great
place to start. Even if you're
painting from life, I do still encourage you
to take a reference photo. This will serve the purpose
of it'll help you restage your photo if you have to
cut your session short or if you can't access
that subject again, it'll at least give the
opportunity to finish your sketch with
information you do have. I encourage you to keep
your setup simple. The faster you can set up, the quicker you will
get to painting. The easier it is to set up, the more often you may
find yourself painting. Painting more often is the key to practicing and improving. Always be sure to gauge
your environment as well. This is especially important if you're painting
outside in plain air, but it does also apply to
indoor environments as well. If you're painting
somewhere that's wet and humid and maybe warm or cold, depending on your paper, it may dry slower or faster, limiting your techniques that
you can do successfully. If it's more humid and your paper is not
drying very fast, you may not be
able to squeeze in as many layers if you
want to use that method or you may have to
spend more time working around the
page before you can come back to an area
and add details. If it's drier, you
may not be able to do washes or to do them very carefully if they are larger because it'll
dry unevenly and faster means blotchy
colors, separation. It can be used interestingly, but always know what
you're getting into. Take a moment and thoroughly observe your object before
starting to paint it. You're painting from life, so if you're allowed, go up to your object, check it out from different
angles by understanding what's really going on
and what that subject is, and how it's sitting
in its environment. You'll better understand what you're looking at from
your painting perspective. This is also a great time to start thinking about how you want to approach
painting it. We'll cover a few options
over the next three lessons. Now that we've overviewed how to set up to paint from life, let's move on to our
1st painting lesson, which is the approach of
starting with just one focus.
9. Strategy One: Choose a Focus: In the first of our
painting lessons, I'm going to be
starting with one of my favorite approaches
to direct painting, and that's starting
with your focus. Starting with ever
you find the most interesting in your scene or just wherever
you want to start. Now saying choose your focus
may sound really vague, but it's relatable benefits
make a starting easier. There's less analyzing, so
you get started faster. Your favorite subject
is what you start with, so it's given the
most attention. There's an extra
spontaneous energy that's added when
you just start. How to use the choose
your focus method, you simply identify what you're most excited
to start with, and then work outwards using
your brush to build shapes. Then you move around the
page as areas need to dry, and circle back to strengthen value and add details
as time allows. I went with choosing a focus for this plain air
watercolor painting because I needed to start fast, take advantage of
changing light and simplify a lot
that was going on. I started with a waterfall
and expanded outwards using my brush energetically
to create shape and texture. I then added layers preserving my highlights and this essential
sparkles on the water, and strengthened my values
and add a details later on. For this still life, I'm painting my
cat's favorite toys, and I'm starting
with my [inaudible], which is this blue and
orange one in the front. Just like that, I'm
also starting with the object of it that
is most in front, so that's the ears, which is using my
brush to draw in the shapes as they
relate to each other, and then moving
to the next area, and then charging in
some extra value. Now this next section, you really get to get
into the fun part about direct painting and
that's using my brush and crazy rotations and forms secrete an interesting texture, and I'm not trying to create the exact placement of all of these little hairs that
are exist on this toy. I am simply creating
the suggestion of the texture that
makes this toy fun. Then here, dropping
in or charging some extra paint to give this
toy a bit more dimension. Always looking for
ways you can add and increase in
strengthen that value. Moving on to the next toy over is this little
sparkly fish, and here using my
brush in that texture, we explore it a little
to create some scale. Just stamping with it, changing my color as
I move along to give the dimension of that
iridescent sparkle that goes around the fish. Always using your brush
to fill in the shapes, so create the shape
with the brush. You're not drawing the outline and then filling in a void, you always want to keep pushing that shape until it encompasses the shape of
what you're painting. Then moving on to the third of other objects in the still life, and using my brush once
again to create the shape, I'm not drawing an outline
of filling a void, just pushing the outlines until it is the shape that
it needs to be. Then here, following the
shape of this object, you can get a sense already
for the dimension of it just by looking at those
directional strokes. Remember to use your
brush to create texture by just
staggering your strokes. Onto our last object is this white ball
with green stripes. Just adding in some shadow, and then using the brush, the width of the brush, what it's pulled along the direction like the
actual shape of this ball, it's just automatically going to create these strokes,
these stripes. Last section of the fish
that I skipped over until the avocado was
then is putting in that feather tails wet and wet. You can see just
flicking the brush around and letting it create the sensation of feathers .We're adding value. Anything where it overlaps
or any shadows to create that dimension that
these objects exists on a table in 3D space. Then finally getting into some of the funner
little bits and pieces, so adding in these
darker details. This you can come back and do once
your areas are dry, and then moving onto times altogether with a little
bit of extra value. Here putting in some darker
value and then using clean water to blend it out. You see dark value, clean water to blend it out. Now that we've
learned one approach to direct painting
which is starting with whatever you find
most interesting in the scene and moving
out from there, let's move on to the next
lesson and learn another.
10. Strategy Two: Big to Little: [MUSIC] In the second of our
painting approaches, I'm going to show you
another method that I've picked up in my direct
painting practice, and that's starting
with whatever is the largest or most simplest
piece of the subject, and then moving to smaller, more intricate areas
as you progress. Painting big to little
is good to look very similar to
choosing a focus. The main difference is when I choose to use this approach, I'm always starting with the largest or most
simplest object that is in my composition. The benefit to this
is that this will help you gauge where things need to be positioned on
your paper in order to fit everything you want to
be in your composition. Now, using the still
life objects here of my mannequin pushing
the small pie pumpkin, the small pie pumpkin
is actually going to be the largest element
in my composition. I'm going to start by
blocking in that shape. I'm going to start with
blocking in this larger shape, which is my pumpkin. You can see I started with
actually clean water. I'm making sure to keep an eye on my values as
I'm even putting in this first wash. You
can see I'm working around the shapes that
I know are going to have to go there for
the mannequin's hands. Then, just continuing
to move my brush, add value, or push the shape
and add more volume to it. You see making it a little bit flushed out
there at the bottom. Now, lifting some paint to
make way for this stem, which is the next logical choice in stepping down in
size and logistics. Then, starting on the mannequin, you can see I'm using the
one-stroke brush here. The width of the brush is the width of each
of these limbs. I'm just creating and modeling
each of these sections. I'm using that first
large shape, the pumpkin, to gauge where my
now smaller shapes need to be in relation
to that on my page. [MUSIC] You see using the brush to go along the
direction of the objects. Adding in some value
here at this stage. [MUSIC] Then grounding that pumpkin with that same adding value
in and then clean water. Here you can see I've
paused it just to show you I added
a bit more value. We're going to be
starting with adding in these background colors,
accenting color. I'm using the one stroke
with enough paint to put down a good washing
near the objects, but then it breaks up
really texturally, really nicely as I get farther away and the brush starts
to run out of paint. You can see just letting
loose, being very gestural, creating a nice
textural background. [MUSIC] Then, adding more value and
you see overlapping objects, tying it all together because
this will make it seem physically grounded on the plane that I'm not actually drawing. Then, you just add
in shadows that overlap the objects between the mannequin and the pumpkin. Then, using the brush
here to let it skip over the paper and create those textured shadows
on the pumpkin. Using the corner of the brush, add in the crispest of details [MUSIC] and darkening
those values one last time to make that
really pop off the surface. [MUSIC] Now that we've learned
how to move big to little or most simple
to more intricate, let's move on to our
final painting lesson. [MUSIC]
11. Strategy Three: Layering: In the final of our three painting
approach lessons, I'm going to be going over somewhat of a more
traditional approach. That's using some layering to approach your
sketch structure. This is the most probably
intensive of the three, which is why I've
saved it for last and it is somewhat dependent on your either environment
or on your time frame. Layering will allow you to slowly add steps of
depth to a scene. By letting paint dry
in between layers, you will need less of the white space to
buffer any sharp edges, creating a more
seamless painting. However, more time
is needed to dry each layer or you can use a heat dryer to
speed things up. This method is often used to depict atmospheric
perspective and landscapes, like my reference here, but can also be
used to accentuate a range of focus in any subject. Start your first layer by painting the subject
that's farthest away or lightest in value. Here you can see I'm
using the dagger brush to create some great
jaggedy cloud edges. Then different to how I
added clean water to fill in the clouds during our structure
and suggestion lesson, I'm adding a purple
tone that will create some value contrast between the shadow and light
areas of the clouds. Accentuate darker values
while preserving your lights. Here I'm layer in more blue
to accentuate the cloud edges and then amping up those
cloud shadows with added layers of value. Move forward, adding
the next object closer to you or the
next darkest layer. Here I'm using the
brush loosely to create a nice jagged mountain bridge in the distance and then blending
out towards the bottom, to soften where I may want
some next players to go. Keep adding layers of
closer or darker objects. Here I'm adding the almost
silhouetted treeline. Keeping things loose and lighter in value
until I know where I like or I've put things and then charging in a
little extra value, to make them really stand out against the lighter background. To create the suggestion of the bows of these
closer pine trees, I'm letting the brush
do a mixture of hit the paper and spray out a bit
and letting it jump around. Once I get to these
farther away pine trees, I'm just letting the
brush jump around and slowly creating these
conical pine tree shapes. Feel free to add your next layer while the previous is
still wet to blend more. Here I'm adding the grasses and keeping them
from getting too detailed by using flackery
strokes and sideways motions. Since I didn't let the previous tree line layer dry before I started this layer, they blend nicely
into that tree paint. Because these two objects are similarly distanced from me, I don't mind that they're not given a distinct separation. Now we've finished the third of our three painting
approach lessons, in the next lesson
we're going to evaluate our experience and
how you can see what you think you'll be most
likely to take into your future practice to
continue direct painting.
12. Evaluation: [MUSIC] Now that we've finished
all the class exercises before we wrap up, let's use this
lesson to evaluate your experience and
really not only take note of what worked for you
and didn't work but really understand what you enjoyed
about this process. When you are evaluating
your painting, what I'm talking about is not only just the
technical stuff, so what worked,
what didn't work, which approach best
suited your subject? Those are important, but sometimes the more
important thing to evaluate is how much enjoyment
you got out of using one of these techniques. Whether it was which subject
no matter you are painting, which approach you were using, whether it was the
start with your focus, big to little or layering, or perhaps you tried
a mix of the three. The more fun you
have with something, the more likely you
are to do it again. If any of these areas were
more challenging than fun, try the following tips out
to see if you can increase your success with them and maybe find them a little bit more fun. [MUSIC] Try using
the same subject over again or if
it's not available, use your reference photo of
it to repeat the scene again. By using repetition with a
little bit of experimentation, you'll find ways that you yourself would work
out troubling areas. [MUSIC] Take notes, whether you
write them directly next to your sketch or log them
somewhere else in art journal, break down any colors, brushes, or thoughts that
you don't want to forget. Building off of
retained knowledge will help you learn faster. To learn more about how I
use this in my own practice, check out my first
Skillshare class, problem-solving in
your sketchbook. [MUSIC] The approaches that I've just covered
are by no means the only ways to approach
direct painting, merely the favorites that
I've learned along the way. I transitioned between them, weighing their strengths and weaknesses against the subject
that I'm trying to convey. [MUSIC] If one of the skills challenged
you, ask yourself why? And either see if you can practice that
skill specifically or try another approach
and see if that works better for the subject
you're trying to paint. [MUSIC] Most importantly, please give yourself
some space to grow. You may not pick up on all of these techniques overnight, you may need to try things a
few times before they click. Feel free to add
any questions to the discussion forum below
if you're getting stuck. I'm happy to help
you out and pick up these techniques
more thoroughly. Be sure to continue what you do have fun with though because that's really what makes everything so much
more enjoyable. [MUSIC] Now that we've taken a second to review your experience using direct painting and maybe what approaches resonate
the most with you. It is time to wrap up our
time here in this class. I'll see you in the last lesson.
13. Conclusion: As we wrap up our time here with
direct painting, I really hope you find this energetic
watercolor technique to be as enjoyable as I do. In the class, we started with
the basics of mark-making, and then use that to build
up to create a form. Then use those knowledge
base techniques to learn three different
direct painting approaches. Starting with choosing a focus, and then working big to small, and then ending with
learning how to use layering in your direct painting to create a deeper sense of scene. At the end, we definitely took a moment to evaluate all of these new techniques and connect with what resonated with us and maybe what didn't. Make sure you take
a moment to share your exercises in
the project gallery. I'd love to see how you've taken on direct
painting and maybe what interesting techniques or tweaks you've made to make
it work for you. As always, thank you
for taking the class, and if you are interested in when I release new material, or if you want to check
out my past classes, make sure to follow me here on Skillshare where you'll get an update when I
release new classes. In the meantime, if you want to find out
what I'm working on, you can follow me on
Instagram @JULLGUSTAVISART, or join my studio inside
our mailing list, which is available on my
website, jullgustavis.com. As always, it was been a pleasure teaching you
here on Skillshare, and I will see you
in the next class.
Jill Gustavis, Everyday, illuminated
