Watercolor Hand Lettering in 10 min.

1. Intro: Hey, there. My name is Carella, and I will teach you the basics of watercolor hand lettering. In this class, you will learn to create beautiful compositions for any phrase or quotation you want. You will discover how to apply hierarchy with different form styles. Use dynamic shapes and watercolors to create staning gradients, thetic fading letters, and small decorations. Join me. 2. Watercolor Hand Lettering: Welcome back. This class is auditorial. So I invite you to work on your project while watching the following lessons. The materials you will need are a squared or dotted notebook, pencil, and eraser, compass, ruler, watercolor paper, a basic set of watercolors, brushes, and black pigment liner. You can review the quotes I have listed in the resources section. Or use any phrase or manitra you like. Let's begin by writing the text and selecting the main words. My phrase is, if you stumble, make it part of the dance. The main words are stumble, make it and dance. I am counting make it as one unit because they make more sense together. If you are a beginner, try using phrases with a maximum of four main words. This time, we will use portrait mode. Size A five, which is 14.8 centimetres for 21 centimeters, which is exactly half of an A four. I recommend sketching the composition in a squared or dotted notebook to help transfer the design later onto the paper. I have three main words in my composition. So let's talk about design in the shapes. The most basic shape is a rectangle, but remember that you can stretch it, skew it, or make it wavy. I like to combine different shapes and play with their positions until I find something I like. For example, I will make this rectangle wavy for the word stumble. This curve here could be followed by a circle. So let's play with it. It could also be a rhombus or even a hexagon. And this riven shape for the word danse could be fun. The secondary words should go in smaller shapes, and I usually leave space to add details with water colors later. I like to combine different funds and styles within the same composition. I'm providing the list of funds in the resources section, along with a few more so you can practice. Just a reminder to be open to free styling or adapting the funds if you feel inspired. In the same draft, we are going to sketch the words and fill the shapes. I am choosing a bold fund for the word stumble to give it a dramatic effect and to ensure there is plenty of space for watercolor. Now, I like to use this style to pure circles, triangles, or hexagons. Since I have two words make and it, I will add more size to the word make to create a balanced look. Finally, I will use this script style to dance and give a dynamic look. The secondary words can have your script style adorned with some swashes to fill the space, or you can use serif or sans serif as well. The next step is to transfer the design onto the watercolor paper. I am using a 250 gram hot press paper, which has minimal texture and helps the writing. Make sure to apply very light pressure with the pencil. You can use a compass and to ensure a good distribution of the text. I like to use my eraser to gently lighten the pencil marks at the end. Now, let's apply our watercolors. The type of brushes I am using are zero, zero, two, and three. I make my own watercolors from minerals I gather in nature. But you can use the ones you have in choosing colors, considered message and emotion you want to evoke with your piece, but don't overthink it. Sometimes it's okay to follow your intuition. For the secondary words, I'll use this dark purple and the thinnest brush. I want to paint the word stumble with this reddish brown color, because it reminds me of danger or fear. I will create a small gradient with some black as well. For this effect, we won't dilute the water color too much and paint only the borders of the letters. Then I will add water to start diluting the color inside and dilute the second color before adding it to the paper to create the gradient effect. For make it, I will paint a yellow and add a fading effect. Same process than before, but you can also play by accentuating the color in certain parts of the letters to create a sense of dimension. You can choose a different color for the rest of the secondary words. But in this case, I've decided to use the same color. For the word Danse, I want to use this sage green and add some sparkles of jello to create a connection with the word above. Decorations are part of the creative process, so feel free to use colors as you wish or adjust your initial ideas when adding the final details to your composition. Finally, I like to use my liner to add some shadows and extra touches to the composition. This is the final result. This type of art. It's great for hanging around your home or giving us a gift. If you're interested in learning how to make water colors. From mineral samples like dirt and rocks, please check out my Star pi class. Alchemy of color turning dirt and rocks into mineral pigments or sign up for one of my one on one sessions here on skosha. I'll be delighted to guide you through this beautiful process of color making. I'm offering 50% off to all my students until the end of October. Use the code, my watercolors at checkout to get your discount. If you enjoy this class, please remember to leave a review and post your artwork in the project section. I'm really excited to see your creations and the phrases you have chosen. Thank you so much for watching this class. See you next time. 3. Bonus Tutorial: For the second composition, I have chosen the phrase inside is a new outside. It has three main words, and the mode I am using for this design is landscape. I am sketching three shapes to fit the text, and this time, we are leaving more open space for outer ornaments. As you can see, having a dotted notebook is a great help since I can easily sketch the shapes without measurements. Let's begin by designing the fonts. The first word is inside, and I want to evoke a mysterious but smooth feeling. So I am sketching asymmetric letters and adding a few extra elements, such as dots to give it a mystic touch. The second shape will contain the words is new. The idea is to make it look like the core of what's inside. So I will choose a different style for the word new to make it stand out. The last word is outside, and I would love to add inner ornaments to it, so I'm making it bold. In this case, I'm adjusting the size of the last letters to create more balance in the text. If I had chosen to make the letter E extra large to fit the shape, it wouldn't look aesthetic. So instead, I added three dots on top to fill the gap. Now, I would like to show you an easy way to transfer the design in no time. Flip the paper, take a piece of charcoal and paint the surface where the design is. Then using a pair of clips, attach the sheet to the watercolor paper you're going to use. This way, you will prevent the paper from moving around and make unnecessary stains. Then all you need to do is go over the lines of your design. I'm using a pointed tool made of wood, but you can use a pencil as well. As you can see, the result is very clean and can be erased very easily to lighten the marks. Now it's time to apply our watercolors. When choosing your color palette, I suggest making a little test on the paper where you have done your first sketch until you find a group of colors that match well together. Make sure to choose light, met, and dark values. You can also review some color theory principles if you're having trouble choosing your palette. I began by painting the design in the middle. I've chosen a dark tone because my intention is to apply white color to the text. The idea is to make this look like the center of a flower that simulates a deeper meaning. I'm also applying a first layer of white to the word new and also setting the space for the small words. For the word inside, I started with a layer of dark orange. The style of this word, it's very simple. So I added the color without a specific technique. For outside, I've decided to paint a sage green. As you can see, this first layer is not covering the area that gives volume to the letters. I'm just painting the front shape. Meanwhile, as these words are drying, I'm painting the petals of the flower and adding the first touches to the background. I'm choosing a yellow color since it's a mid tone that fits well with the orange and green values I have. This step is totally open to creativity, and I often let myself flow with the process and not get attached to a specific design. You are welcome to add outer elements right now, depending on the design you have, or wait until you have finished with the inner ornaments of the letters to decide on the extra elements you would like to add. Now, I'm ready to apply volume to the word outside. In this case, the light is coming from the left, so I'm carefully adapting the shade in that direction. I am making a correction here with a letter O, and all I need to do is add a bit of water to fade the unwanted area and paint again. Next, I'm adding a second layer of green to the word outside to create contrast with the white inner ornaments I'll add later. Notice that I'm leaving space for the highlights as well. While this is drying, I will move to the word inside to apply a layer of shading and add small details around the letters. I'm also adding an extra layer of orange to accentuate the color. I'm adjusting the darker tones around the word new. Oh next, I am using white to add highlights inside the letters of the word outside. Using a 00 brush, I am painting small dots, lines and curves on top of the darker tones. I noticed the highlights were not leaving space for the details I wanted to add, so I had to apply another layer of green on certain letters to tone down the highlights I have painted before and make space for the inner ornaments. Mm I also wanted to add more details inside the petals of the flower. So I decided to paint some lines and add a fading effect by diluting the color with some water. I repeated this step for the rest of the petals. The word outside has dried, and I'm ready to finish adding the rest of the highlights and inner ornaments. I wanted to keep it simple, so I painted some dots and switch to curves so it doesn't look too repetitive. H. Then I added some highlights to the word inside. Now it's time to add outer ornaments. I invite you to play with curvy lines. And depending on the theme of your composition, you can integrate small elements along the curves. Here, I'm adding lines on the corners to help create a frame for my composition and to fill the empty spaces. The outer ornaments can also complement your design with color and a contrast to your artwork. But be careful not to add too many colors, as that can detract attention from the main words and make your design look chaotic. I like to create ornaments that look like draps, but you can also experiment with circles or any other pattern that matches your design. The final step of the painting process consists of adjusting the color in certain areas, adding a few extra touches, or as I'm doing here, applying an extra layer of allo to accentuate the color in the petals. At last, I'm using a brush or black pigment liner to outline the letters and correct the areas that need black shading. You can thoroughly skip this step, if you would like to keep your design solely with watercolors. I didn't outline every single border of the letters signs that would overshadow the color. I am adding the final details, and this is the result.