Watercolor Mindfulness - 3 Easy Relaxing Paintings for Beginners

1. Welcome to the Class: Hello friends, welcome to my class. My name is Yana and usually I bring your watercolor tutorials today are focused on various painting techniques. But this class is going to be a little bit different because it's going to be all about you and your well-being. I was thinking about why I love watercolors so much. And I realized that it's because its ability to bring me calmness and peace. Even in the most challenging times, when I'm really stressed out or sad. And I don't have the possibility to paint right in that moment. I'm imagining it, but not like a complicated things and compositions. I imagined how the pigment flows on the wet paper. The soft sound the brush makes when I drag it across the paper and how the colors blend into one another. And if there's one thing I would like to share with you, it is this magical getaway, the art, and to me, especially watercolor, can provide. There is no obsessing over perfection. It is just you and the time you decided to spend with yourself, focus on the moment of creation. I know it can be difficult to find this kind of time. We are all living in a busy world where everything demands our attention, but try to be kind to yourself and ground yourself this few minutes of time when you can forget about everything and just focus on the pure joy of creation. In this class, I have three watercolor exercises for you. There is nothing special in terms of art supplies unit. We will talk about the material in the next chapter. And then once you are comfortable, we can start with the first exercise. 2. Materials: As I said, nothing specialists needed for this class. If you have a piece of watercolor paper and some old brushes and paints from your school days. It's absolutely enough. What I'm using is watercolor, paper, Canson Heritage, watercolor paints, white knights, and borons mop brush size two. I have my masking tape as well to stick the paper to a piece of cardboard. But you can definitely stick it to the desk as well. Of course, a jar of water and paper towels. If you want to speed up the drying of the watercolor layers, you can use your hairdryer. And that's it. Now to make yourself comfortable, maybe your favorite tea would help, or a cup of coffee. Tried to forget about your phone for awhile. With all those notifications, maybe ask your family members to wait with all their requests until you are done with the exercise. You can turn on your favorite music and turn down the sound of the video if you want, or being the complete silence, It's up to you. Take your time to make everything pleasant and comfortable. I'm ready when you are. 3. Exercise 1 - Eucalyptus: The first exercise today is the shortest one. It takes less than ten minutes. What I do is that I fixed my paper to a piece of cardboard so that it stays in place. This exercise is very relaxing because it features simple round shapes and playing with different colors. Letting them live their own life on the paper. Take your brush and using just clean water. Paint, a circle or an oval. Let's paint more of them. Now into the word circles. Drop a bit of blue color, and see how the pigment spreads. Try different color now. Choose any color you like. You can add more pigment somewhere. Some other parts of the circles can be lighter. Try to be present in the moment. See how the colors live their own life, go their own way. Once you drop them onto the wet paper. How they blend together and create lovely new color tones. I'm adding more watery circles now and see how lovely the color spreads from the previous cycle. Again, just play with colors. Let them find their own way on the wet paper. And now I just take a darker tone. This is Payne's gray mixed with azure blue. And I'll loosely draw a stem to connect my colorful circles, turning them into some lovely eucalyptus leaves. Here in the bottom, employing a bit with the last leaf, making it a little bit more defined. The first of today's relaxing watercolor paintings is done. If you find this style of painting calming and relaxing, you can just paint several circles in several colors without even making it a eucalyptus tweak afterwards. Just random bowels of color. 4. Exercise 2 - Green Leaves: I love walking in the deciduous forest, listening to the leaves. So whispering in the wind and watching the light dancing in the crowns of the trees. My favorite thing is to come under an oak tree or a beach. Three, look up and watch the leaves moving and the sunlight flickering between the branches. The tiny pieces of shadows and lights. This work I took a week ago was an inspiration for this painting. Calming green painting of leaves and twigs. I find leaves to be one of the easiest subjects to paint or draw. It. Is there simple shape familiar to everybody that makes them so relaxing to draw? I again, stick my paper to a firm board. I don't want to worry about my paper getting all wavy once it's wet. Now I have a light yellow color and I just paint the whole paper with it. Switching it for the light green here and there. And now into still wet wash, I add few drops of darker yellow color. See how the paint runs and gets lighter. Same with green color. We are creating the flickers of light. Now I have a light mix of Payne's gray and into still damp painting, either of several lines. These are the background branches. See how the color again blends into the background a bit, leaving the branches out of focus. Now it's time to turn your attention to the lovely beverage you're prepared. Take a sip or two. And if you don't want to wait till this layer of paint dries, you can speed up the process using a hairdryer. And now just paint simple light leaves growing out of the tweaks. I use both yellow and green color. Now some of the leaves are already dry. I paint other ones over them, creating layers of foliage. Paint the leaves wherever you want to see them, wherever you feel, they need to be. Let's your paper dry and once ready, take your brush and the gray color and draw a long thin lines for the foreground. Two weeks. Draw them however you like them. Mine are pointing downwards. And now it's time for the final layer of the leaves. I'm using darker green and the yellow color. And I'm painting the leaves growing out of the biggest cause us to branch. You can flip the paper if it makes it easier for you to paint the leaves in certain parts of the paper. Now let's have fun and add a bit of the texture to some of the leaves with the very tip of the brush and drawing thin lines. Those are the little veins of the leaves just here and there, not to every single leaf. But of course you can draw with every single leaf if you like it that way. And there's a final touch. I'm sponsoring a bit of yellow color over to painting for the light particles, dancing amount the leaves. I'm loading my brush with yellow color and then using another brush, I'm beating the color out of it. I know it doesn't sound very relaxing, but it's fun. Nice job. I hope you had a nice time creating this simple calming painting. 5. Exercise 3 - Underwater Plants: The last exercise features my favorite watercolor technique. It's a negative painting technique, but there's nothing negative about it. It's fun and easy. This style of painting requires some waiting time until the layers of paint dry. In case you need to speed the waiting part up. Feel free to use a hairdryer. My paper is taxed with a firm surface now and what I do is today paints the lower part of the paper with very light mix of ultramarine blue, smooth than the upper edge of the wash using clean water. And into still wet wash. Let's add a few drops of darker ultra marine and the green. Now it's time to wait or use the hairdryer. When the paper is already dry, I mix the green and ultramarine together and create a nice turquoise color. With this color, I draw an oval shapes along our shapes. These are the leaves, are the plants growing side-by-side. And the upper part of the wash. I always smooth and with clean water, you can darken the areas between the plants I playing a rich pigment here. Especially if those areas are still wet, the pigment will create natural gradient effect. As to create the texture for forming row of the plants. Put just a few drops of color into the whitespace about the existing plants. Now just a sense of the plants are leaves. I'm adding similar detail as in the previous chapter. So engaging the tip of the brush, I draw thin lines, thinner veins. To continue, you again need to let the paper dry. I used my hairdryer and here I go. I repeat the process, and the process will stay the same to the end of the exercise. So I will stop talking now and let you focus on the painting. We are done. How did you like this painting, guys? I really did have great time painting this underwater plants. I loved the calming combination of glue and the feeling of depth. If you like this style of painting, you can create similar artworks with different color combinations, different shapes. It does not have to beliefs. It can be houses or trees. Anything you like. 6. Thank you!: Guys, thank you for being here with me. I hope you liked this class. I know it's different from what I usually do, but I must say that I really enjoyed it. I had a good time, especially painting those green leaves. The second exercise, that one is probably my favorite. If you liked this class and will depreciate more classes like this, let me know in the discussion or in the reviews. And of course, if you gave a tried to some of those exercises, you can take a picture and upload it in the project section for me and your classmates to see. And don't forget if art or watercolor in particular brings you joy and peace of mind. Try to find these few minutes for yourself. You don't need to be creating masterpieces. What matters is that you can take a break from outside world and nourish yourselves. See you soon. Bye.