Watercolor Landscapes for Beginners | Chinese Style Painting

1. Welcome to this Class: Watercolor landscapes don't need to be overly complex. Once you know a couple of techniques and easy and relaxing style and prepare with warm-up exercises. You should be able to paint scenery like this. Hello fellow creatives. My name is Bianca lose track and aspiring watercolor artists from beta1, guess Philippines. I love painting florals and landscapes senior use with watercolors. But there are days when all I have are a few minutes for my craft. I still wanted to create the painting, but I'm not so sure if I can finish it in one sitting, let alone begin the work. That's why I'm so grateful to have discovered the Chinese Thai landscape paintings which aren't only easy on the eyes. They are also very simple and relaxing the grade. On days when life is very demanding, I was still able to complete an artwork and it felt so rewarding. In this class, I am happy to paint with you and discuss necessary techniques to create a minimalist atmospheric landscape compositions in Chinese style. With this projects, you'll have lots of opportunities to practice your brush stroke. Learn to let the medium do its work and let go and effectively use water as a painting medium. You'll also get over the fear of perfection and great simple compositions from scratch. This is designed as a beginner friendly short-course with hobbyists and experienced watercolor artists are welcome to join defined. By the end of this class, you will be the proud grade or of atmospheric Chinese style landscape paintings that you can give to families or friends are hanging on your wall. When you're ready. I'll see you in the next video and let's get started. 2. How this Class Works: Our goal for this class is to create the simple and minimalists Chinese style watercolor landscape illustration by highlighting or watercolor technique called wet on wet or dispersion. To get started, please prepare these materials. Watercolor paper. Student grade we'll do. The one I'm using is actually a very affordable one. The brand isn't that famous either. Watercolor paint. You will need four colors, light and dark blue for the mountains, a pink or red for a design, and some acids. And a dark one for the details. Watercolor brushes to round brushes, we'll do one big size, either 12.1, small size two or four. For the details. You can also use a pen or marker as an alternative. Water jars, one for rinsing your brush and another one where you can get clean water, paper, towel or a rag to remove excess water from your brush, and a masking tape if you want a clean border. I have provided a class guide PDF that you'll find in the Resources tab, which contains reference photos that you can use. A summary of what we'll learn in this class, a list of materials and recommended colors and painting examples that you can use as an inspiration shot. Please go ahead and download that if you haven't already. I want you to have the best experience for this class. So let us maximize Skillshare's different features. To the best of my abilities. I want to give you the premium support that you need. So if you have questions or suggestions related to this class, feel free to open a discussion via the discussion step. I'm happy to answer them as soon as I can. Review with also help other students to decide if this class is right for them or not. They ensured that I am creating high-quality classes. And of course, they say that learning is doing. So once you finish your artwork, I'll be waiting for them in the projects tab. And I'll be leaving a feedback soon as I can. Let's appreciate what our fellow art lovers graded do. This glass is divided in five main sections. Planning the painting, warm up exercises for watercolor techniques, and three projects with various compositions that you can use as an inspiration for your own artwork. I will end this with a handful of tips and how to avoid mistakes and painting with this style of landscape art work. Now that the Avanade, the underflow of this class, let's plan our composition and the next video 3. Planning Your Painting: It all starts with choosing the right reference image and creating a small study on how you're being thing will look. I suggest looking at the overall shape or the silhouette of an object. Focus on getting that right. When looking for a reference photo. For example, if you're searching for mountain images, these would work very well. The shapes are well-defined. They are simple and pretty straightforward. There are no complicated elements that will only confuse you. On the other hand, these are the ones that you need to avoid. This one is incomplete and you cannot see the mountain shape. This one's too busy with too many elements. This is too complicated. While this is a two symmetric or perfect shape. If needed, we can also look for references for the shape of a house, a boat, or a person. For our Chinese style landscape painting, the composition will be simple and has four major components. The mountains in the background, the sign, a small detail like a tree house. Both are first on a flock of birds flying in the direction of design. There are also lots of whitespaces in this painting style, which gives the AI space to rest. Now, let's use this reference photo and draw sample sketches that we can use as an inspiration later. I will only refer to this to draw the mountain shapes. I will place the sun over here. And usually they are going to lay across. That is where I'll place my focal point, let's say a bolt. And then use a flock of birds to lead the eye of the viewer to our subject. I will darken this, give it more emphasis. And we're done. Once you've gathered the reference images you need and have an overall idea of how your minimalist painting will look like. Let's practice the different watercolor techniques will mean for our projects. In the next video. 4. Warm Up Exercises: Now that we have selected a reference photo, let's prepare our materials and lose some warm-up exercises. There are two main ways of preparing your watercolor paints. This is for absolute beginners, by the way. So feel free to skip. If you're already unexperienced watercolor artists. You can use paint directly from the tube and squeeze it on your palette. This way, you'll have fresh beans and can get the thickest mixture possible. In my experience, it took awhile to estimate how much paint I needed to squeeze out for a specific art project. I also use these individuals ceramic bowls, one for each color, but you can use whatever pallet you already have, or you can squeeze your paint on the palette and let it dry overnight. This also works for water color paints. You will then need to reactivate the paint by writing them with clean water. The beauty of this option is that you can arrange your palate with your most used pigments. Once reactivated, keep dipping your brush to and from the paint, do the palette and get as much pigment as you think you need. A spray bottle is also a handy tool in reactivating dried up watercolor paints. And with this, you won't need to constantly rinse your brush just to reactivate different colors. As a practice, I sprained my veins a few minutes before starting my artwork to give the water some time to reactivate the drive of pigments. There are, however, some pigments that take longer to reactivate. For example, this deep ultramarine blue gets so hard when it's dry that it takes so much time just to load my brush with enough paint that I need. So for this type of pigments, it's better if you get them straight from the tube to your palate. Hematite genuine is another example of pigments that are hard during grants. For our exercises and projects. Please prepare for colors. Blue shades of blue, a pink, or a red, and a dark color. And we're all set time to practice the watercolor techniques that we'll need for our projects. This is just an exercise, so feel free to use a scrap watercolor paper or even the backside of your watercolor pad. Let's try ovals first. For comparison. I will paint a plain wash with deal. This is a direct application of watercolor paint or what they call wet. On dry, or simply direct painting. Your brushes wet and the paper is dry. On the second, overall, the process is simple. We'll paint the shape with clean water first. You can build your paper to check how shiny it is and therefore how wet it is. Load your brush with the color of your choice and drop it on the web shape. Let the colors bleed and observe how they spread. This technique is called wet on wet or others referred to it as dispersion. The brushes wet, the paper is wet as well. Try it again with a different color and observe carefully. With the third one I painted, the color spread faster and farther. This is thoroughly and blue. I recommend trying this method with the colors that you're planning to use and take note how each pigment reacts. If painting the shape with clean water is challenging for your eyes. You can also begin with a lightly colored water mixture as your base shape and then drop the thicker colors. Like what I'm doing here. This way, it is easier to see what shape you've already painted compared to using just clean water. At the start. Let's try it again, but we deal blue. This time, instead of just leaving the oval alone after dropping some colors, I will use fresh, thicker paint. You'll notice that the less water and more paint that you drop, the less movement of the discretion to. This is useful when you want to add darker shades of color while the paper is still wet. Do this warm-up exercise as many times as you need it. And in the next video, let's practice how to paint the sign 5. Painting the Sun: We learned how to prepare paint and use the technique called wet on wet or discretion may painting in perfect ovals. We can then move on to Siri calls as a practice for painting this sign to avoid frustration. Don't get too concerned in painting a perfect circle. Imperfections are welcome. Again. Just like what we did with the ovals. I started with direct painting of the shape with a pink plus a bit of red for comparison. Moving on to the next one, I'll use clean water as a base and then drop the warm colors. I live. This is an incomplete circle and only paint the upper part, living the pigments to interact and bleed with the water. This style creates a mysterious vibe and I like how it looks compared to the flat wash on the left side. The first one that we did. I will do the same for the next circle. But after dropping the colors, I'm going to rinse my brush and remove the excess water by tapping it on the tissue paper or a rag and then soften the edges of the red pigments. It looks different than the previous one. And I think each has its own charm. Again, this is an incomplete Seroquel, and I think I will use this farther project leader as it looks visually appealing. Retouch if needed. But don't get too hung up on perfecting this area. Go. Okay. For the next shape, I'll start with a light pink mixture, then grab red paint and drop it on random parts. This looks like a moon rather than a sign. But we're free to interpret our painting, our old way. So nothing is wrong if you bake your son, looking like a moon with different textures. And for the last circle, I'll use pink instead of red. Now, once you get the hang of this, you can then test other looks like starting with a dark strong blue color and then rinsing the brush and lifting up some color for texture. Or do the same, but with red or pink. You can also try using two colors like this one with two different shades of blue. The last one with the pink base and blue layer. Now, you have different options on how you can beat the sign for our class project. Keep this practice sheet near you. And let's continue with our warm-up exercises in the next video. 6. Painting the Mountains: We worked on a flat surface earlier. But for this exercise, let's paint at an angle and use masking tape or any other object you have to tilt your paper. This way, we can easily predict where the pigments will go. And that is downwards. Of course, the higher the NGO you work on, the faster the paint will flow from top to bottom. So grab any item you can use and choose an angle that you are comfortable working with. And then we'll continue with our exercises. Also a books that is a great alternative when working at an angle. This is also a good practice if you want to avoid back and neck pain when painting for a long period of time. Okay. We're dotted ovals and circles. Now let's move onto rectangles and triangles. As a preparation for painting the mountains. I'll begin by painting a rectangle with clean water. The node may rush for the color of choice and paint the top part, only, letting the pigments dispersed. Compared to the previous exercise, the pigments will most likely spread downwards and not outwards. Okay, let's try it again. But on a triangle and with a different color. You can retouch the top part. We adding more pigment and making it darker. This way, we get a misdemeanor looking mountain. Now we can proceed to a mountain shape. We're working at an angle and only painting the top part and loving the rest of the pigments disperse downwards. We will be able to achieve an atmospheric look, which will give our pain things and interesting look. Keep retouching the top part is needed. Or if you want to adjust how the shape looks. You can also soften the bottom most part of the mountain and say, that's a field of grass or a body of water. Now, let's try another style where both the top and the bottom parts of the mountains have soft edges. In the previous exercise, we define the top parts of the mountains only. But let's see how it looks. When both the top and bottom parts have soft edges. Do this a huge area with clean water. Load your brush with paint and draw the shape of the mountain in the middle. You can also assist the flow of the pigments by tilting your paper slightly. Since we've painted on an already wet area, this creates an impression that this mountain is far from us, far in the background. This style is best used if you want a great depth in your painting by using it on the farthest mountain. Again and try another color until you're satisfied. Notice how this cerulean blue pigment spreads fast. So I will need to tilt it at an angle and encourage the pigments to flow downwards instead. That's the importance of warm-up exercises. You get to know your materials more. Now you have two options and how you want your mountains to look. Let's practice painting details. In the next video. 7. Painting the Details: Let's talk about painting details, which are usually the last ones to be added. For this exercise, you can use a round brush with a pointed tip and practice painting thin lines with your darkest color. Using light pressure. Start by drawing short parallel lines. Then move on to elements like birds with different pulses. This is a bit tricky for beginners, but this is an opportunity to get to know your brush on what it can and cannot do. Another option is to use a smaller brush. The only disadvantage with this one is that you have to repeatedly reload your brush more compared to using a brush with a bigger belly. Again, practice painting thin lines and small details like a boat, house or a tree. Depending on the overall composition of your painting. Whether you are in drawing a meadow or a body of water under the mountains. Take this time to figure out how, debate the small details that would fit your design. You can even paint a small person facing the mountains and looking at the direction of the sun, which I'll do later in the last class project. Or even banker pet, a silhouette of a dog, a cat, a horse. This is your paintings. So I want you to own this and add elements that you think would best fit your painting. These simple elements, when added to an art, Greg completes the composition and makes it more interesting. If you want to paint trees, simply dab the tip of your brush repeatedly, or this is what they call scumbling. But after practicing and you think you won't be able to pull this off using a brush and fear that the details might mess up your paintings. Then you can pick up a pen or marker and do the exercise. Please use whichever material is comfortable for him. We're done with the warm up exercises. If you've followed in practice along, the next videos will be more familiar and you will be confident to work on the class projects 8. Project 1 | Traveling: Okay, it's time to work on the projects. This is one of your options on how you want your flow meat, chinese, Thai landscape to look like. For this project, I have prepared for colors with two shades of blue, a pink, and the darkest one for the details. Or you can just use a pen. I use masking tape or a neat mortar. And I will like me sketch where the mountains, the sign and the boat would be. I know it is barely visible since I want to hide the pencil marks. But it also helps in positioning the different elements of the landscape painting. You may do the same oranges directly and spontaneously. Tilt your paper at an angle that you're comfortable working with. Of course, the higher it goes, the faster the water and pigments will flow down. Then, Let's begin with the biggest shape first, the mountains. I will load my brush with a light blue color. Paint the top of the mountains so you can see it. Easier. Rinse my brush and extended downwards and sideways. Make sure to cover the bottom part where the C will be. For the waves to have soft edges. I also painted the small hill on the left with clean water only. Now, as practiced. For an atmospheric look, I will only paint the upper parts dark and let gravity do its work. This process is so relaxing for me and I hope you're feeling the same. You'll notice that I start to change how the mountains look compared to the reference photos I showed earlier. And to me that is a good thing. We have an artistic freedom to change how we want to represent a scenery, an object, or even the person. I'm working on the hill at the left. And I made sure to vary my colors from one shade of blue, another because it would look too flat or boring. If I only stick to one color, the same blue color, I will likely paint the sea and some waves. But making sure to leave lots of whitespaces for that characteristic is distinct to a Chinese style painting. While the mountains are drying, let's paint the sign. You can now remove the masking tape and let's work on a flat surface. Since we will no longer need to let the pigments flow downwards. For the next steps. Now, for our design, I decided to color in the circle completely and use the lifting method to add texture. If you'll remember, we have to do is rinse your brush, remove the excess water, may padding it dry on a paper towel or a rag and lift some pigments. You can also choose other styles that you want for design. Please refer back to the class guide for your reference. Since this is a smaller shape and compare it to our practice pieces earlier, it will be safe the switch to a smaller brush. Keep retouching as you see fit. Now, the mountains are still wet. So I'll paint some birds for now. Again, for a smaller details, it's your choice whether you want to challenge yourself and use brush with a light pressure only, or switch to a pen or a marker and go for a mixed media loop. As discussed earlier, the birds will be painted diagonally, pointing from design to the focal point, which is about the bottom-right part. This style of composition suggests movement. So no matter how simple this is, we are following some basic principles. This piece will still look interesting. Leave this to dry before painting the rest of the birds and the boat. Okay? Once the paper is dry to the touch and not cool anymore, we can continue painting some more birds and our focal point or main subject, which is the boat. Notice also that I am varying the birds post size and their distance from one another to make it visually appealing. And as they point towards the boat, we are also naturally leaving the eye of the viewer to our focal point. And that should be around here. Take your time to paint the final details and enjoy the process. As cliche as that might sound, it is really more relaxing if you just focus on the task at hand, rather than worrying if your artwork would be a masterpiece or not. So take your time and focus on the details. Add some waves and this artwork is done. I hope you're starting to see how this painting style is really easy on the eyes and has a simple composition, but still is an interesting piece of work. You may use my painting as a reference or make use of the reference photos to draw your own and just add a sign and house. Both are tree is the focal point. And don't forget the words. Here. I've made the mistake of rushing to remove the masking tape. But this still looks good since I am just using a wood pulp student grade paper. Learn from my mistake, and I'll see you in the next video for another painting style 9. Project 2 | Staying: This style is free form, so I will not use masking tape for the borders. Okay, let's start by planning our painting. I'll place the sun at the upper right. And diagonally across that, I will draw some guidelines for a tree and a house on the lower left. Keeping my sketch light so it won't show in the final painting. Again, this is a personal preference. I will paint distant mountains in the background. And to do that, That's what a huge part of the background with clean water. This mountain range will look different from the first project that we did. Make sure to avoid the sun so that we can paint it while letting the mountains dry later. You see, that's the beauty and importance of planning. You can save time and resources when you plan ahead. Then my brush with blue, green and I will paint the mountain shapes. The shape has undefined and has soft edges. It creates the illusion that the mountains are far in the background. Not forget to introduce other shades of blue. Complexity in your painting. If needed. Filter paper or work at an angle to help the flow of the pigments. This isn't looking monotonous and a bit boring for me since I've covered the bottom parts of the mountains completely. So I will lift up some colors in random areas as I see fit. Retouch the top part if needed, using the same technique. Wait for this to dry a bit. Next, we can work on the bottom part by adding a touch of color for the land where the tree and the house ten. Notice that I'm keeping that as a separate shape from the mountains and making sure that the bottom part doesn't touch the wet area under the mountain. That is to preserve the whites of the paper. Like what we did with the mountains. Drop other shades of blue on the land. If you wanted to continue working while one part of the painting is drying, look for an area that's dry. And think of what you can put there. In my case, the upper right part, this guys is, I avoided touching that earlier. So now I can paint this on in a style that I want. And I think an incomplete pink sun will complement the mountains. After that, I'm checking if the mountain shapes are starting to dry slightly. If yes, I can add thicker paint to make the mountain peak darker and more defined. Remember to add it at the top part, only the kipp, the atmospheric effect. One satisfied with how the mountains look. Leave this to dry so we can work on the details. Always check if your paper has dried completely before painting another layer. Or you'll end up with soft edges for the details. And we don't want that. The darkest color on your palette. Paint the details that you like. It can be a person housing the tree, avenge, a silhouette of your bed or anything that would make sense in your composition. I have already decided earlier that a house and the tree would be the best fit for this project. So I am drawing them directly on the paper. For the trees, use scumbling technique where you are in dabbing the tip of the brush repeatedly to make an impression of the foliage. I will then draw the house next. Notice that I'm leaving tiny gaps at the bottom of the house. That's because I want to make an impression of bushes and grasses growing decide the house. Based on my experience, if I draw the bottom part of the house flat and straight, it would look too boring. You can do the same. Relax and do this part slowly. Like the first project, I will draw the birds diagonally as if they are flying away from the house towards the sign, or vice versa. This leads our eyes to look from one place to another in our painting and makes it visually appealing and interesting. Make sure to vary the bows and the size of the birds do where they are facing and if their wings are spread widely or are folded. Once the tiny details are added. This painting is complete. The composition is simple, but I hope that you're also finding joy in creating a relaxing artwork like this. How do you feel about your painting projects so far? Let me know if there are any parts and clear to you via the discussion stamp. I'll see you in the next video for our final painting style. 10. Project 3 | Waiting: For the final project, I want a clean border, but since I know from experience that masking tape is not so compatible with my student grade watercolor paper. I will pick up some lint from Mike loads. I'm only doing it on this rod so that you can see it. But they actually picked up some lint from my blouse before taping it down on the paper. This way, it will reduce the stickiness of the tape and hopefully it will be easier to peel off later. I will place the sun at the upper right. Once again, two mountain ranges on each side, and the person standing diagonally across the sign. For the final style, we'll be combining project one and project two, mountains. One has soft edges, while the other will have defined mountain peaks. Let's begin by painting the background area off the mountains on the left side with clean water. Make sure to avoid wetting the sun. I will also place a masking tape to tell this a little bit and start painting the mountain shape with deal or turquoise. I'll keep the middle part white to give it an atmospheric look. Then with a very light mixture of zero Alien Blue or other shades of blue that you prefer. Let's paint the first layer of the foreground and make that mass of land darker, where the person is supposedly standing at Duchess of the same color on the mountain range for a variety. Now, for the mountains on the right side, start by painting the shape with clean water like project number one, and extend that downwards. Then load your brush with blue and paint the outer parts of the shape. At this point, you can already see the difference between the two mountain ranges. The left ones appear farther because of the soft edges and lighter colors. While the right ones appear closer to us, we define mountain peaks and brighter, darker colors. Three dots in the background and foreground as needed, and darken the landmass where the person is standing. It's time to paint the sign. For this project. I'll go for an incomplete red sun, where there are white areas or white gaps in the middle, instead of just painting the upper half like what we did with project number two. I hope you're not getting too concerned with how perfect that circle is. Embrace any imperfection that you might accidentally create. And consider that as a part of the learning process. Keep retouching as needed to give it the texture that you want. This partner is already tried. So now I can work on this figure by painting her dress with the same color as the sun while living the hair shape untouched. I think this land mass is also too light, so I'll paint another layer of cerulean blue and let the dress blend with that color. Make sure to leave the dress to dry first before painting the hair. Now as I look at it and observe my painting, there is a defined mountain range at the right and a dark landmass on the lower left. And it feels too heavy on the right. So I decided to add another defined mountain at the left side to balance the composition. This also works as a frame for our son and provides an area where the birds can be placed later. Before doing this, make sure that the first layer has dried completely or everything will just blend with each other. And you'll end up with a huge blob of soft edges, mountains, which are brilliant blue. I'll paint some horizontal lines that could work as a body of water. Make sure also to give the area below the mountain light and white. When painting the additional mounted on the left, they also made sure to avoid wetting the head of this figure. So that is the mountain dries. I can paint the hair. Like our landscape. This is also an oversimplified figure, a here and a dress. And we can already tell that it's a person. That's the beauty of a minimalist painting. You don't have to stress too much about details and still feel satisfied and rewarded with your artwork. One final step, and we're done. I hope you're painting along and finding joy in creating this type of art. As usual, let's paint a flock of birds flying from the person to the sign. I find this part of the painting the most relaxing, since it is the last step and we're only minutes away from completing another work of art. To me, it is a form of forced meditation, is we're only focusing on each brush stroke instead of the demands of life. Okay. Time to see if the lint picking technique correct. I should mention that it's also a good practice to make sure that the paper has dried completely before removing the masking tape. Another mistake I did with project number one is not letting it dry completely. And 100% cotton papers shouldn't have this kind of issue. I guess it. See you in the next video for some more tips. 11. Final Tips and Summary: Congrats on completing this class. We created three projects that tell a story. One where the character is traveling. The second, another character stays at home. And the third one, where the character is waiting for the return of someone. Aside from the stories we were able to portray in this landscape paintings, we learned about different watercolor techniques that are useful in achieving a Chinese style look. Danger that you'll be able to produce paintings with atmospheric effect. Please keep these things in mind. Use a brush appropriate for the size of the area that you are covering. If you make a mistake, Braddock dry with the paper towel immediately to lift the colors and scrub it clean with a wet brush if needed. Better see what you're painting with clean water. They'll care paper at an angle. Or just use a very light mixture by adding more water to your paint. Maximize gravity and let the colors blend with the water. The pigments do their magic. Make sure to leave some white spaces in your painting for a distinct Chinese style look or use the lifting method in case you already did some parts. And finally, avoid flat washes and make sure to add touches of a secondary color. I'll be waiting for your projects in the project gallery. And you're honest glass review to help other students decide if this class is for them or not. If there's one lesson I want you to take from this class, that is to take things slow. Let the water and paint flow and relax while painting. Focus on the task at hand and allow your artwork to take you to different places. You can also try the same techniques with other paintings, subjects such as flowers, animals, or an abstract piece. Literally any topic would do. That's it for this course. I hope to see your output in this class and many others offered here on Skillshare. And together, let's make this a little bit more colorful with our artworks.