Watercolor Peony: Pro Techniques Explained

1. About This Class: Watercolor peony was the most requested subject on my channel this year. Thank you, everyone who voted. It's not a surprise. This gorgeous flower is full of light and vibrant colors and it's such a joy to paint, which is why I'm thrilled to share with you my new Skillshare class, the most comprehensive and detailed one I've created to date. It's designed so we can walk through a simple layering system that will allow you to achieve a vibrant, realistic result. Taking full advantage of the transparent qualities of this medium and really capturing the spirit of the flower. If we haven't met yet, my name is Anna. I'm a Canadian designer and creator of all things beautiful and intricate, from Canadian money to best-selling book covers, and of course, lots and lots of vibrant botanicals. That's what I specialize in hyper-realistic flowers and watercolor and ink. They often appear on Canadian silver dollar coins, sometimes even surrounded by real diamonds. If you love watercolor, you know a few basic techniques already and you want to level up your skills or simply practice more advanced techniques with me, this class would be great for you. We will paint in real-time, start to finish so you can follow my every brush stroke. I will be pointing out areas on the reference photo that we're focusing on, explaining my color choices and direction of the brush stroke. The key things we will practice in this class include glazing, which is planning and building transparent layers of pigment to create deeper, realistic tones. Creating a sense of light on a two-dimensional plane by making an underpainting on our flower and carefully building the shadows around our areas of light. We will also take a deep dive into our pigments, learning a simple structure that you can use to organize and select your pigments. Class materials include a black and white outline that I created for you so you can trace the drawing onto your watercolor paper, and it's simplified to include major petal shapes. Our list of supplies, including some alternatives that I love and trust. A high resolution, a reference photo of the pink peony, as well as the selection of additional reference photos from my library so you can continue practicing on your own using all the techniques we cover in this class. A light and shadow diagram to help you build your palette for any botanical subject. By the end of this class, you will have a gorgeous painting that you can frame and be proud of. More importantly, you will be able to apply the watercolor techniques we use on a flower of your choice. Let's get started. If you have any questions, you can reach out to me through Skillshare website by posting a new discussion in the Discussion section of this class. Don't forget to follow me on Skillshare if you want to stay up-to-date on my upcoming classes. I look forward to seeing you in the next video. [MUSIC] 2. Watercolor Supplies: [MUSIC] Welcome to the class. I'm so happy to see you. Before we start let's quickly go over the materials and supplies we will need. The most important thing we will need for this class is watercolor paper. Professional watercolor paper like this, 140 pounds or even thicker, you can go up to 300. You really want to get thick paper because we're going to put down three layers of color and you want to make sure that your watercolor paper can absorb this amount of water without buckling. If you've seen any of my previous classes, you know that I don't stretch my paper, I prefer to use watercolor blocks which look like this. It's just a bunch of sheets glued on the side. You can paint on the top sheet of paper, and then peel it off when you are ready. This way you can avoid the stretching process. I'm not going to go into much detail on the stretching, there are lots of good classes on this channel and also on YouTube. I recommend for example Louis Demasi's class on stretching watercolor paper. In terms of the type of paper, I prefer cold pressed versus hot pressed, simply because the way it absorbs water. With hot press paper, It's a lot more smooth and water tends to sit on top of the surface, whereas with cold pressed, it gets absorbed, fairly quickly and I like this slightly textured look of it as well. In terms of the brushes, It's really simple. What you will need is just two round brushes, you can either use real or synthetic sable or squirrel and what I ended up using is this a Skoda reservoir, which is the real sable brush, and this one is in size four you can probably use something like size six as well. For smaller details that we're going to do on layer two and three I ended up going with this Winsor and Newton, also sable, also round brush. It's a little bit more pointy, it's smaller and so it's size two you may want to go with something like size two or three. If you have a synthetic and even smaller if you have real sable. We'll need a palette of course, I prefer porcelain palettes because they don't absorb paint as much as plastics do and you can really see what your mixture is going to look like on paper when you premix it on a porcelain palette. We'll need some water, typically, it's better to have two jars of water because you want to have one where you clean your brush and then the second one where you give your brush and other bath to make sure that there's no residual color. But in this case, we're working primarily with pinks. So I think just one jar of water we'll do. In order to create your outline, I recommend hard pencil, something like 2H or 4H and you can find that on the side of the pencil. Usually, this indicates how much graffiti will be left on paper as you're drawing. The reason why you want to use hard pencil versus something soft is because you really want to leave really light marks on your paper. You don't have to erase much and if you do need to erase, you can just easily pick up the graffiti marks. Speaking of erasers, I do prefer retractable erasers, very thin,so that when you're putting the eraser and paper, you're only picking up the lines that you're aiming to pick up and not ruining the texture of the paper too much. You will probably need one or two pieces of tissue paper just to dry your brush as we're painting. There will also be a couple of cases where we will be lifting watercolor paint as we're painting to create some highlights. So what you want to do is have a semi dry brush for that and the only thing that's necessary is to clean the brush and then dab it on your tissue paper before you lift paint. Finally, in terms of optional but highly recommended materials, we will need some Masking fluid and I'm using usually this Winsor Newton, it's called art masking fluid. It's a little bit yellow so it's visible when you're working with it on white paper, and in terms of the applicator, I prefer rubber color shapers, but you can use an old brush or a matchstick, the reason why we need to use masking fluid is because we have a few clusters of light yellow stamens in the middle of the flower and so it's a lot easier to cover them with masking fluid before we start so we can go in with our pinks and not worry about getting into those areas where the stamens are visible. Now, if you don't have Masking fluid, please don't let this stop you, you can simply paint around the stamens very carefully. If you accidentally get into that area that's supposed to be yellow with your paints, you can always use white gouache or yellow gouache after the entire painting is done. That's it in terms of the supplies, now, in the next video, we're going to talk about are pigments and how to organize our palette. [MUSIC] 3. Color Palette: [MUSIC] In order to paint our peony, we will need five main pigments for the petals and two for the stems and stamens. There are two optional pigments as well to add some depth and variation to our painting. In the class handout, you will find a detailed description of each pigment along with a list of potential alternatives from the brands I use and trust. You can look for some other similar pigments in your palate. Don't let my list limit you, use it as a general guide. This diagram which you probably know by now if you've taken any of my previous classes will help us organize our pigments and will help you look for alternatives if you need to. Here is a version of this diagram adopted for our peony specifically. In terms of the main pigments, we will need a base color, and by base I mean pigments that are going to be used almost on the entire surface of each petal. From this pigment, we will build up and down around the color spectrum. I'm going to use Opera Pink from Daniel Smith. Winsor & Newton calls it Opera Rose. It's the most fluorescent pink you can possibly find in watercolor sets, and it's the closest in terms of the color to the reference photo. We will use it primarily in the first layer to establish a light background wash, and we will use a more saturated version of it in our next layers to add some vibrancy. Please note, this is important. Opera Pink is highly fugitive, meaning it will fade if you leave it in direct sunlight. We're not talking about days or weeks, but after a year or two, it will definitely lose its vibrancy. I don't mind using this color in my professional work that ends up digitized for patterns or dollar coins or a surface design because it's so beautiful. However, if you're painting something that you plan to sell as an original, to be hanging on the wall, you may want to consider a light fast non fusion pigment. Of course, you will lose the vibrancy. However, the resulting painting will be much more resistant to fading. I recommend Quinacridone Rose from Daniel Smith. Here I'm actually painting the same peony with this Quinacridone Rose as base color instead of Opera Pink. You can see that it's a lot more muted. But I thought it was important to mention and show you. Again, if you're painting with a goal of learning and maybe eventually hanging the work in your room with no direct sunlight, perhaps under UV glass, then I wouldn't worry too much and go for the bright Opera Pink. It's absolutely lovely. Regardless of the base pink you choose, our boost color will be magenta. I will use quinacridone magenta from QoR as QoR pigments give the most vibrant results in my experience, because they use a different type of binder compared to other watercolors. You can use Daniel Smith magenta as well for a very similar effect. It's also super vibrant. We will use it on top of our pink in the second and third layers, and it will help us achieve a more realistic effect. Then we will need a color for the tips of our petals. Then part that's almost at the edge, that's almost white, but has some translucent pigment there. We will use purple mixed with lots and lots of water there. You can substitute for warm blue if you want. I will be using dioxazine purple because it's my favorite color in the world. But there are some alternatives you will find in the class handout. Lastly, we'll need a warm yellow and I will be using benzo yellow from QoR, but any basic warm yellow will do. This is truly optional if you want to capture the warm glow of the sun that is being reflected on the right. At the base of some petals, we need to create a layer underneath. This underpainting will be under our pink layer of color. Now supporting pigments we will need are warm red for those petals where the inside roots are visible. I'm using quinacridone red, you can use carmine or another deep red you have in your palette. For cooler shadows, we will need violet. You can reuse your purple here if you don't have a violet or mix your own with pink and purple. It's for those petals where we see the lower back. As an option, you may want to add even a deeper violet brown for the darkest shadows. It will help add some contrast, some saturation, and a sense of realism and variation in your pigments. This is optional. I'm using Perylene Maroon, which is a deep brick red color. You can use Perylene Violet as well, or some sort brown. My Perylene Maroon is from Daniel Smith. For stamens, as a base, you can reuse the warm yellow from your underpainting. To add more definition to those yellow stamens, you can use either some light violet. I'm going to be using Perylene Maroon. You can use brown or olive green. For the stem, we will need two greens, a light warm and a cool deep green. If you only have one green on hand, you will need to mix it with your yellow for the lighter parts and use the deeper green for the darker parts. That's all. Again, you can review the handout at any point. I will be naming the pigments as I paint each petal in real time. If you don't have those specific pigments that I've mentioned or the alternatives that I have in my handout, feel free to use some other pigments that you have in your palette, and just follow the general logic of the palate that we've established. [MUSIC] 4. Painting Process Overview: [MUSIC] Before we start painting, I wanted to give you a quick overview of our process from start to finish, so you can feel confident at every stage and know what to expect. This is very important as we plan our painting as a series of layers. It's called glazing and it involves building transparent layers of pigment to modify the values and the appearance of color on the final painting, creating deeper tones and sometimes changing the colors completely. From a very soft background color with almost no detail to more detailed saturated layers, this is how we can achieve this realistic look with watercolors step by step. That is not to say that we can't have a one layer peony painting. That's one way of doing it and it may be nice to have some loose, transparent color transitions without much detail. But if you want to achieve a more precise look, we'll need to plan it in stages and start with a big color wash, progressing to more finer details. As an optional but highly recommended first step, we will cover the yellow stamens with masking fluid so we can freely paint our pink petals without worrying about covering the stamens accidentally. Our first layer of color, our background layer, will feature only light pinks and purples, and I mean super light. We will paint petal by petal and I will explain my color choices. In terms of the technique we will use wet on wet for our first layer. This is a basic watercolor technique, which means you wet the area you're going to paint first and then very quickly add additional colors where necessary before it's completely dry. You mix the colors directly on paper and letting them blend. Feel free to use your larger brush here. I'm going to be using Size 4. About halfway through this layer, we will pause our pinks and switch to yellow, cover a few petals to create a warm glow. This is called an underpainting. Then when our underpainting is dry, proceed to cover the rest of the petals with pink. Our second layer, we'll focus on defining larger areas of shadow. I call it a definition layer and you will start seeing the shape of each petal emerge. We will use our entire range of pinks, reds, and violets here. You will see a section of my reference photo on the left so you can see exactly how I choose my pigments. I will explain what I see and how I put down my strokes. Try to follow along but loosely, I want you to consider the reference photo and recognize the areas of light and shadow on each petal. If you're hesitant to go with your brush right away on some of the larger shadows, you may outline these shadows with a pencil. First, just make sure to use a very light, hard pencil 2H or 4H so that your pencil marks are barely visible. Then we will erase the masking fluid and paint the stamens and the stem. Feel free to stop at this point, your flower should look fairly real. Of course, there's always an opportunity to add more definition, so you may choose to go all the way with me and follow me through to Layer 3. As we accentuate some of the shadows and add some texture to the petals, we will have an opportunity to create more contrast and add vibrancy. But this last layer is more of a stylistic preference. It's not entirely necessary, but I know that most of my followers want to know how I achieved that highly detailed, vibrant look. You can follow me along to see how these high-definition details are created. For the second and third layer, we will be using a finer brush. I'm using Size 2 round brush, or you can just use the tip of your larger brush if you're using the same brush as you did in the first layer. We will only use wet on dry technique, meaning we will be applying colors with a wet brush on top of the layer that's completely dry. It's a more controlled way of painting and we will be defining our smaller shadows. Let's get started. Our first task will be nailing our background layer and following to the definition layers and you will be able to do all those lovely details. Trust the process, focus on one petal at a time, and if the shadows look too complicated or too intricate, simplify them, combine them together as much as possible. You will see me do this quite often. See if you can relax your sense of discreteness of these petals and just consider areas of light and dark. Alternatively, of course you can just follow my exact strokes. I want you to be comfortable above all else. Use as little or as much guidance from me as possible and as much or as little detail as you feel comfortable with. [MUSIC] 5. Outline & Masking : [MUSIC] Before we get started with our masking fluid or our paints, if you're going straight to painting, just a quick note about an outline. I saved a black and white outline of this peony and you can download it from the class resources section and just trace it. The art of drawing accurate sketching is an entirely different set of skills and we're not focusing on that today. I really want you to focus on practicing watercolor skills. Download the outline and use your preferred method of tracing a light box, a window or graffiti paper and of course, you can simply draw the outline the way I did directly on the paper. Just know that as I was drawing, I've simplified some of the shapes, getting rid of some of the petals so that we can focus on larger areas of light and shadow. Looking at your reference photo, find your yellow stamens and paint them with masking fluid. Just cover the entire surface of the stamen. You'll notice that the tips are fat and elongated. Then they're the stems that lead towards the center of the flower, so you can paint those with the tip of your applicator towards the center of the flower. You have one cluster on the left, another cluster in the middle. I will show you at a different angle what my final result looks like. Don't worry about getting it 100 percent accurately, just paint a couple of stamens where you see fit. Or you can zoom in on your reference photo and get more detailed. There's one or two sticking out here and another one over here and that's about it. This is what it looks like in the end. This will really help us achieve a sense of realism. If you don't have masking fluid, just try to paint around those clusters. [MUSIC] 6. Layer 1 (A) - Background Wash: [MUSIC] We are about to start our first layer of color. I'm so excited and I hope you are too. If you're a little nervous, it's totally okay. Just trust the process. It may look like a long road ahead for this first layer will likely need about an hour plus the drying time. Review the process overview video if you need to, but I'll give you a quick refresh before we start. Our objective is to cover the entire area of the peony with our first very light wash. Make sure to use very diluted pigments. We will need two main pigments. The rest is optional, but will be helpful. Your base pink and you may want to premix it ahead of time, keep it very light and your purple again, premix ahead of time so you have the same saturation throughout. Supporting pigments we will need our red and you can use quinacridone red like I did, or carmine, and we will use it on those petals where the inside roots are visible. Violet and it's for those petals where we see the lower back at the root and warm yellow. We will paint this layer petal by petal following the exact same process on each petal. This is what will make it more straightforward and more predictable. We'll start with a little bit of purple just below the top edge, where the petal is very thin and is letting the sun through. We'll blend it up with clear water towards the edge then blend it down with our base pink all the way down. There will be some petals where the entire route of the petal will be visible and we want to have more saturation there. Let's use some violet if you see the outer side of the petal and let's use some deep red if you see the inner side. Essentially this area on the inside of the flower where the roots of each petal are visible and are getting some warm backlight, we will need some more warm red there. The yellow underpainting layer will do separately. I did it halfway through so that's the sequence we will use. That is all, although we have lots of petals, the process for the most part is the same with some slight variations. If you skip some of the parts, don't worry, we will have a chance to fix them in the next layer and the next layer. Just focus on creating full coverage of pink with some shadow areas and keep it super light for now. Just as I described a minute ago, we'll start with a little bit of purple just below the tips of the petal and blend it up with clear water so the tip is basically white. Then we're going to blend it down with our base pink and I'm using opera pink all the way down to the root of the petal, or as far as we can see because it's covered by another petal. My strokes are very slow and precise. I want to make sure that I follow the shape of the petal and my mixture of pink is very light for the most part. Just that tip up on top and blended up with clear water. Now let's work on the next petal. Again, the process is the same. Start with a super light purple mixture and blend it down with pink, just following the outline and as you can see, my outlines are quite light, but I can still see the shape of the petal clearly. Make sure I didn't miss anything and move on to the next petal. Start with purple, blend up with clear water, follow with pink. See it's the same process. It's just maybe a little bit tedious, but it will be worth it in the end. Let's do another one. Here it's a bit more complicated because there are lots of highlights. I'm just trying to paint the tip purple but leave a couple of spots blank. Don't worry if you miss them, it will not interfere much with the effect. That's just a way to add more detail and I'm going to blend it down with my pink all the way. Maybe at a bit more saturation there as the pedal goes down, notice that my strokes for the most part are going in the direction of the petal, so top-down from the tip to the root and that's just in case we leave some more saturated marks. You notice that I just added a little bit of violet all the way at the root. Now the next small pedal. The tip is purple, going down with pink, leaving a little spot, a little highlight blank. Now the next one. Notice that I'm choosing petals that are not touching and that's just to save some time I don't want to go in order because I want them to be separated at this point for the most part and I just want to focus on one petal at a time. Another petal. This one is quite dark in the reference photo, but don't worry about making it much darker this point, we will come back to it again and again with our shadow pigments and our boost pigments. Another petal, same principle, purple then pink. Now let's switch back to the left. At this point the first petals I've painted are dry, so I can work on the one in between here. Purple and then pink gently all the way down. See I'm not interfering with the tip of that petal at the bottom because it's dry. If it wasn't, it would bleed. Make sure that when you're painting a petal that the ones surrounding it are completely dry and I just added some violet at the base. Let's finish off this petal, starting with very light purple and then going with pink all the way down and maybe a bit more violet all the way down at the base just to add more saturation. I'm going to come back to the left, right here, dry my brush on tissue paper and when it's dry, just lift a little bit of paint to create a highlight because I feel like I've put too much color there. Now let's do the back of this petal just a small section. No bright highlights there, just purple on the edge, pink all the way down into to the left. Now let's work on this large petal. We see the inside of this petal. It's a bit more complicated compared to others. It has two pieces sticking out and curving towards the center. What I'm going to do is put light purple towards the tip and also a little bit in the middle maybe, and then go with pink all around and fill in the rest of the area. Note that I'm leaving the tips of those two curved parts blank. They're receiving more light and so just leave them blank for now. It will help us when we come back later to add more pigment. It will help us recognize the shape and have more definition there. I'm just going to use dry brush method again and lift two highlights there, lift a little bit of paint. Just use a wet brush and pat it on your tissue paper to get rid of almost all the water and then just drag it where you see the highlight. Now I'm going to use my pink to go all the way down towards the center of the flower. Just splending it down and gently switching to my violet. You can see that area inside the flower. It's a lot darker in the reference photo because it's in the shadow, it's not receiving any direct sunlight. We want to make sure we prep it, but we don't want to go with too much of a saturated pigment because there's going to be lots of layers and lots of shadows and petal details. Let's just maybe give it a little bit of a boost compared to other light pink areas with some violet and going down, I'm using quinacridone red, but not too saturated. Just maybe a shade darker than the petals that are facing the light. Here I'm dropping some quinacridone red just very gently around the stamens, wet on wet. Let it dry and move on to the next petal. Now this one we painted the back of it. Now it's dry. Make sure that fold is dry. Painted but this time I don't think I'm going to use much purple on top, on the tip. I don't see much purple there because it's facing towards the sun in some areas. I'm just going to do clear water at the tip and then pink all the way down, and a little bit of violet at the root. There's also a very strong shadow there, so more violet in that area and we're doing it wet on wet, so it's blended right now with the rest of the pink color, but don't worry about it. We will come back at the right time to add more definition to that shadow and create a stronger silhouette. For now, we're just doing a very basic guiding background color, so don't worry about being super precise at this point. Just keep following the same process. Purple at the tip, pink all the way down, and blending it up with clear water petal by petal. Trust the process, we will create more definition as we move along with this class. This is key because creating layers of color step by step will help us achieve that realistic effect. We can't do this right away in one layer, we want to build our layers builder's saturation at our shadows step by step. Just did a small petal in the middle with pink as a base, and then quinacridone red at the root and at the tip. Now let's go to this petal over here. We painted the back of it. Now let's paint the middle right here, starting with my pink and blending it up with clear water, don't see a lot of purple there. Continue outlining it. There's a little piece of visible here through the folds. Again, just using pink. We will come back to it later again and again to achieve a more realistic color. For now, I'm just going to blend it further towards the base of the petal with my violet and then switching to pink again. There's a shadow there, so I just want to gently mark that spot, put a little bit more pink on those small pieces that are visible between the petals and finish off with that little tip sticking out. It's quite obvious that it has purple, so I'm going to start with that and then continue with pink all the way down bit more saturated compared to the parts of the petal that are around. Then all the way down, there's a piece visible there, so just more saturated pink. Now, let's do this small petal that's stuck in between two clusters of stamens. I'll just go with pink. I don't think I'm going to use much purple there. Blend that highlight with dry brush just to leave a little bit of a blank spot and add a little bit of warm red. At the tip, I'm not worried about covering my stamens because they're covered with masking fluids, so just painting over them. Now let's do this small edge. The back of this petal with some pink blended with clear water. Another small piece over here, again, just a little bit of pink leaving the very edge of the tip white. Another small piece. Now we're mostly done with large petals. We're just going over and covering smaller areas, mostly pink. You don't have to overcomplicate it at this point, we will come back to paint the details later. In this part here, I'm actually going to go with purple at the tips. Looking at the reference photo, it's quite saturated, so let's add more vibrant pink to blend it down. Vibrant but not all saturated to the full potential of our pink just maybe a shade darker than the petals surrounding it. I'm just cleaning up the edges and bringing my color down. Super warm and saturated there, so I'm going to go with some violet there. Cleaning the edge very gently, making sure that I've covered everything and now I'm going to add warm red, wet on wet. Notice the strokes are going in the direction of the petal, so from the root all the way to the tip. That's very important because if there are any streaks left, they will mimic the texture of the petal, and that's a good thing. Now let's do the back of this petal. Purple on top, and then blending it with pink. It's going to be much darker when we're done with it, but for now, I'll keep it light. Again, just follow the same principle. This is our background layer. We don't need to have a lot of pigment at this stage. I'm going to go around the flower now and look for some smaller petal pieces that we may have left out. I will paint them with my pink and sometimes purple, depending on what I see in the reference photo, I will leave these five large petals facing us completely blank for now. We will work on them in the next video. I'm leaving them blank to give us a chance to add a yellow underpainting first. Note the petals I'm leaving blank, and finish the rest of the peony. This little piece right here, I think I will use magenta. It looks very dark on the reference photo, and so no reason to go with light pink first. [MUSIC] Now that most of the petals are covered with our base pink wash, let's move on to the next video. 7. Layer 1 (B) - Background Wash: [MUSIC] Before we proceed to the rest of the petals, let's pause for a second and look at the reference photo. I see several areas in the reference photo where warm sunlight reflects on the back of some petals. In order to get this effect, we will need to create a soft yellow underpainting. Grab your warm yellow. I'm using benzyl yellow from core. You can use hansa yellow light or any light warm, transparent yellow that you may have in your palate and follow along. This will be very quick, which is cover a few petals that we left blank, and then we will let the yellow dry and finish off with pinks and purples on top, just like we did in the beginning. Before I go with pure yellow, I just wanted to show you why an underpainting is important. See if we simply mix our pink and yellow, and try to achieve the glowing effect in one layer, we'll end up with a sort of muted warm pink. That doesn't really work to communicate the glow, which is why we're doing it in stages, starting with yellow first and then following with pinks. This is a very consequential and often under appreciated step in watercolor painting. But it's very important when painting subjects that have natural sunlight. All we need to do is paint a little bit of yellow on those blank petals, but we're not going to cover them all, just certain parts. You can see exactly where I'm placing most of my color, blending it with clear water towards the edges of the petal. This warm glow is essentially a bounce back light from the petals that are surrounding the petal we're painting. In other words, it's not the sunlight that's going through the pedal, but rather the sunlight that's filtered and bouncing back from other petals around, which is why you see this warm glow mostly on the right and at the bottom. Now, let's do another one. I see most of the sunlight is in the middle, so I'm going to start with clear water and then add my yellow blend it with clear water towards the top. It's a nice smooth transition. Maybe add a little bit more. You can see it's spreading, but not too much. This petal on the right, I see most of the highlight is actually towards the top of the petal. The base is quite cool, so I'm just going to start with yellow and then blend it with clear water towards the base. Now, you may choose to add a light layer of your warm yellow to the base of some other petals where you see a warm glow. The ones that we didn't leave blank. I didn't notice these before, but upon further inspection of the reference photo, I decided that they were necessary. Just make sure that the previous pink layer is completely dry. Once again, these areas of bounce-back light are mainly concentrated on the bottom right. This is following the direction of sunlight diagonally from the top-left and down to the bottom right. You will also find that the glow is visible inside the flower. This area at the base of the petals is definitely receiving some bounce-back light. I just didn't notice it at first. To me, it's now visible in the reference photo as I had been looking at it for some time. Let's add a transparent wash of yellow there and maybe a little bit over here. Now, let's make sure this yellow under painting is completely dry before we finish off our first layer of pink. I will see you in the next video. [MUSIC] 8. Layer 1 (C) - Background Wash: [MUSIC] Welcome back. Time to finish our first layer. Only a few petals left. Let's follow the same process that we started in the very beginning. I've premixed my purple once again to make sure that I'm using the same saturation as I go from petal to petal. I'm going to start with this one facing us. Looking at the reference photo, just start from the edge, a little bit of purple in some places, I'm going to leave little areas blank where I see the highlights. You don't have to do that if you're not sure or if your brush tip is not allowing you to do that, you can just paint a very light wash of purple and then bring it down with some opera pink all the way into the edge where it's going to get more saturated, your base pink. You can add a little bit of magenta at the bottom if you feel like it or you can leave it pink. We will work on this petal more and more in the next lesson. Now I'm going to add a little bit more purple there. Now I'm going to dry my brush on tissue paper and drag it down just creating the highlights, lifting the color as my layer is drying out. I want to create some texture there. I don't want complete coverage, so I'm just going to use this dry brush and drag it in the direction of the petal from the edge and down. You can see I'm lifting the color in some areas, leaving the highlights. As your pigment is drying, this will be easier and easier to do. I'm now about two minutes into it, and I can lift more color. Now I'm going to leave this petal and move on to the one at the bottom, starting with the edge, using my base pink, very light wash and maybe a little bit of magenta towards the edge, just following the shape of the petal. Now let's do this one on top. I'm going to start with opera pink and then continue with magenta all the way down. You can see because we put down a little bit of yellow there, my magenta is coming out warmer than usual and I'm going to make it even warmer by using quinacridone red at the base. You could drop a little bit of green there, make it blend with your quinacridone red just in the area where the stamens are going to be. Now I'm going to come back to the petal at the bottom. The fold is dry, so I'm not going to interfere with that pink. I can now paint the inside of it again. The logic is the same, a little bit of purple on the edge and then moving towards the base of the petal with my opera pink. Just a little bit of purple on the edge there then pink and then towards the base of the petal, a little bit of quinacridone red. Now you can see I'm using super saturated pink here. This petal is facing us. It's one of the main elements. I really want to bring focus to it, so I'm not concerned about using too much pink. I really want it to shine and again, more muted, warmer red towards the base of the petal. I want almost complete coverage here, just leaving the edge light. Towards the base it's darker, much more saturated. I'm going to blend it and that's how I want to leave it. Now let's do this petal on the right. Again, we're seeing the inside, but we're not seeing the inside of the tips. I'm not starting with purple, I'm starting straight with pink, again, quite saturated. We're going to work a lot on this petal later on, but for now pink and now magenta towards the middle and towards the base and quinacridone red in that area where we put down yellow already, I want to keep it warm. So cooler, more pinks towards the center and towards the base, and warmer red in that area where we already put down yellow. A bit more magenta. Those areas are going to be dark when we're done with them. Let's leave it, move on to the next petal. I'll start off with quinacridone red on top of the yellow highlight. Leave the highlight completely blank and then start blending with clear water towards the top edge and with magenta all the way down. A few lines with the tip of my brush on top of that highlight, just adding a bit more realism. Some grooves, petal groups there always in the direction of the petal. A bit more magenta. Bottom right. I think this is it. Congratulations, your first layer is officially done. It should look something like this, pretty flat at this point, but all petals are covered with some variation of light pink. If you see lots of differences between what you've painted and what I've painted, don't worry, continue with the next layer once this is dry. We will start adding more definition and you will start seeing the shape of the flower emerge. I will see you in the next lesson. [MUSIC] 9. Layer 2 (A) - Definition Wash: [MUSIC] I'm excited to start working with you on the next layer of color. This is where we will add some definition to our petals using wet on dry technique, meaning we will be painting on top of a completely dry first layer. Our pigments will be slightly more concentrated. Use a little bit less water, but still keep it light and we will only be covering certain areas that need more saturation. Very rarely there will be a full coverage now. We will be very selective. Don't stress if you don't see all the variations of color that I use, we all have different sensitivity to light and color. When in doubt, just use light magenta for the majority of the shadows and petals and maybe a bit of purple when you know the area is particularly cool or dark. I'm going to start with a light magenta wash on this front facing petal. I see a deep shadow there. Again, feel free to outline it with a pencil if you're not comfortable painting straight with your brush. I'm simply dragging the pigment down towards this petal that's sticking out to the right. There's no reason to separate them. I want a smooth transition. It's a similar value, and I just added a little bit of quinacridone red at the bottom while my paper is still wet and a little bit of purple because as we've established, there's a little bit of that purple color towards the edge usually. Now here I'm going to continue using my magenta. Just like we did in the first layer, I want to preserve a little bit of a light area in the middle. There's a bit of a fold there, so I'm going to blend it with clear water, but my magenta will be on each side of that light area. Then here on top of our yellow highlight, a little bit of quinacridone red. I'm blending all these colors with clear water and a clean brush. A little bit more quinacridone red at the base. Now I'm going to continue on the back of this petal again, not separating them. The previous petal is still wet. I'm just going to continue with the shadow light magenta all the way up. Maybe add a little bit more violet there towards the base, it's quite dark there. Then towards the edges of the petal, just blend it with clear water. You can see a nice gradient emerging, dark at the base, a lot lighter towards the tip of the petal. Now let's do this shadow here. Again, I'm not waiting for my shadows to dry, I'm just continuing with my magenta. Draw an outline beforehand if you need to, and then a light purple towards the edge. We have two shadows going on this petal framing it on both sides, and a lot of light coming through in the center. Now let's carry on our magenta to the next petal all the way up. We started with magenta, we're going to carry it up with a little bit of quinacridone red. Maybe a bit more saturated on the border between the petal and those lighter folds. While my paint is still wet, I added a bit more saturated strokes just going in the direction of the petal just to create a sense of some shape there where there are some grooves and blended it up with clear water. Now let's do this petal over here, quite warm. I'm going to start with quinacridone red and blend it with clear water towards that highlight. Continue down with magenta, a little bit cooler, or at least that's how I see it. Again, blend it down with clear water and then finish off on the left-hand side on top with magenta, blending it with that red that I started with. Clean up that highlight, add a little bit more magenta. Now this area that we see peeking through, it's very dark in the reference photo. I'm going to start with my magenta, maybe mix in a little bit of violet just to make it darker. Remember watercolors, when they dry out, they look a lot lighter. Don't be afraid of these dark areas are starting to look a little bit too dark. They will look somewhat lighter once the water evaporates. Now let's move towards the center and up. This petal looks quite dark and warm on the back here. I'm going to start with quinacridone red, and continue with magenta up. A few grooves there that I need to identify. I'm putting my pigment there first and then blending with clear water towards the areas that are light. You can see a transition from warmer deep red all the way up to cooler magenta. I'll clean it up. Maybe drag my brush with some pigment in a direction of the petal just to create a sense of some grooves there wet on wet and maybe a little bit of purple on the edge. Let's move up. Here again, we're just going to focus on the shadow areas. I'm starting with quinacridone red, moving up, and adding a little bit of purple. As we're getting used to, there's always a little bit of purple towards the tips of these petals and leaving some areas blank. I'm just painting the shape of the shadow I see, a few tiny shadow spots there. I think this should be it. Now, this small petal facing us, I'm going to start with magenta and just paint the shadow and the texture that I see. There are a couple of silhouettes that we can outline there just following the grooves. Again, the grooves of the petal will go from the tip all the way down. I'm just trying to paint what I see, areas of light and shadow. Add a little bit of purple again on top, a few small details, and it's now starting to gain some volume and some shape. Now let's paint the inside of this petal. I'm going to start with quinacridone red just very carefully around the petal that we just painted. I'm going to continue blending with clear water towards the edge. My red is transparent, so all the pinks are still shining through and especially on the left there where we painted a little bit of yellow, we can still see that highlight. We're going to continue boosting that color a little bit and leaving some areas blank, just pink. Now, let's paint the back of this petal. There is a strong warm shadow there so I just did that with quinacridone red. There is simple, just full coverage. Then continue with a little bit of purple there. Very small shadow that I see. Again, look at the reference photo and consider the shape of the shadow that you see and the shape of the highlights that are left behind when the shadows are framing them. This petal all the way in the back I'm going to use violet, I think and just literally paint the shape of the shadows and those groups that I see with my violet. If you are not using violet or these optional supporting colors, you can just mix some purple with magenta. Then I'm going to blend it down with more saturated magenta. Just pure magenta all the way down there. Another little bit of a shadow left there all the way in the back and let's leave it. Now, let's move on to the left-hand side. Our process is the same, our colors are the same. Just looking at the reference photo, let's paint that shadow, starting with a light magenta, blending with clear water, bit of quinacridone red. Here's another shadow that I see. Light magenta, just painting the shape of the shadow as I see it. Switching to a warmer red. Again, if you don't see the color variation, just use magenta and outline the shape of the shadow. Just keep it light. A few smaller shadows, grooves that I see. I'll clean it up and move on to the next section here. Actually just pink, just opera pink. It's the back of the petal. It's getting some lights, so let's keep it that way. Maybe blend those shadows again here and add a little bit of pink. Next on the list, let's do the back of this petal. Quite a defined shadow there. I'm going to start off with my purple and maybe mixing a little bit of light magenta into it. Just going to paint the shape of the shadow. I'm going to blend with clear water towards the tip of the petal and then continue on. By the way, you don't have to follow the same sequence of petals. You can switch around or paint another one or skip if you want to. I'm just going in this circle and we started at the bottom, went to the right, to the top and now we're all the way back down on the left-hand side. Now, I'm going to paint the shadow at the base because it's at the base, it's a bit warmer. I feel like quinacridone red is more suitable here. I'm going to blend it onto the next petal with a little bit of pink and clear water. Just a few more darker details. I'm going to add some violet there. I want to make sure that it's saturated more in some places. Then come back to this petal and just notice a few smaller shadows there. I'm using magenta and a little bit of quinacridone red towards the base, clear water on top to blend it. Pretty defined for there. So I'm going to use a sharp outline, quinacridone red and then blending with clear water. Maybe a little bit of pink towards the side that's facing the sun on the left. Now, the big petal facing us let's outline some shadows. So here again, I think you may want to draw the shadow with a light pencil first if you're not entirely comfortable free handing it. I'm just doing it with my brush. But you don't need to outline before if you want. I'm going to start with purple on those grooves towards the tip of the petal and continue with magenta towards the middle all the way in. It's a large shadow being cast by the petals up on top so you can zoom in on your reference photo and really see it. See the shape. Where it's going towards the stem, towards the center of the flower, I'm going to add violet, make it even deeper. And just put a few very saturated strokes, again, always in the direction of the petal and continue on, more violet. Make sure the edge of the shadow is sharp. Add more red on the right-hand side and continue with that red all the way back to the edge. There is another fold there. I'm going to start off with magenta and then carry it out a triangular shape. It's more saturated on the right. Just a few smaller shadows with my magenta moving towards the right and underneath that little cluster of shadows maybe add a little bit of purple towards the edge and a little bit of red towards the center. Let's blend those shadows down. Add a bit more saturation. Now, let's work on that tip and leave it for now. Let's leave it for now and move back to the center of the flower. There's this small curved petal and it's quite warm in the middle. So I'm going to use quinacridone red a little bit also on the tip. Then I'm going to carry my quinacridone red up. There is another curved petal there painting on top of my masking fluid, so I'm not worried about putting a pigment on the yellow stamens. Now this petal over here, again, quite a defined shadow. There's another petal on the reference photo, but I did not include it in my outline, I wanted to simplify it. So just magenta, strong shadows, silhouette and a little bit more magenta under those curved little pieces of the petal. I really liked that shape. It's really cool. That's why peonies are so beautiful. I divided this video in two parts so you can take a break in the middle if you need to. You can continue straight to the next video to finish off this layer. [MUSIC] 10. Layer 2 (B) - Definition Wash: [MUSIC] Let's finish off our second layer using the same principles and the process we've established in the previous video. You can review the intro from the previous video if you need a reminder of the pigments and the methods we're using. Let's work on this section of the petals first. I'm going to paint that shadow that we see clearly in the reference photo with magenta, and then add a little bit of violet at the bottom. Blend it with clear water towards the top and add warm red in the middle. Again, if you don't see that color variation, just use magenta. Now on the back. Bit more magenta blending with clear water, and then I'm going to add a little bit of a pink boost there. The shadow is quite warm. I'm going to paint it with quinacridone red, and then continue to the left with my base pink. Very careful strokes. There's no purple at the tip and we didn't paint it during our background layer. Just blending with clear water up and then magenta, all the way down at the base. Maybe a little bit more pink. Now, warm red at the bottom. More magenta on the right, and blending it all the way down. Now it looks more realistic. Now the back of this petal, I can see a shadow there. I'm going to do that with my violet blending up and maybe outline just a bit. Let's do this piece over here. I'm going to start with magenta. Just tiny strokes in the direction of the petal, leaving some highlights blank. Now the inside of the petal, I see it as a bit warmer, so I'm going to use quinacridone red, and then continue up to the background petal. Add a few more lines to add texture. Now, another layer of magenta for that shadow that we've already painted, just making it a bit deeper, and adding a few lines for texture. Let's add some violet, blend it, and move on to the next petal. I'm going to start with a violet here and paint the large area of shadow in the middle of the petal. Again, feel free to outline with your pencil before you start. I'm just free handing it and some areas I want to keep sharp and some areas I'm going to blend with clear water so that the highlight is smooth. I'm going to continue with a bit of my magenta towards the top. There are a couple of overlapping pieces. I'm just trying to paint them, keeping my mixture fairly light by adding more saturated strokes and some areas here I want to add some pink and blend it down by dragging the color and the shape of petal grooves. Another small shadow area. Again, simplify if you don't feel comfortable just paint a large area of the shadow in the middle and on top around the highlight and leave it at that. I'm going to continue with my magenta to the next petal. Few more lines, and that little tip sticking out. Outline the other tip with my magenta, and maybe add a bit more saturation in the middle. Let's add a bit more definition to this petal on the left. I'm just going to go with a light magenta and paint some of those shadow areas that I see. Leaving some areas lighter blending with clear water. More deep red under those two folds and then blending all the way down. Let's go down. Here in the center of the flower, I want to add more texture. I just painted one petal and then left some areas blank. Now I'm painting an outline of another all in the direction of the petals. Going from the left and to the right, down diagonally, just creating a sense of several petals there in the back like stripes. Don't worry if you don't get all the detail. Just put a few lines down with your red, making sure that it's not too dark because we have one more layer to go on top. But this warm red will help us set that area part visually. From cool pink petals that we've already painted. This area here, I'm going to use the same quinacridone, red. It's a lot darker in my reference photos. Let's just add a little bit of color there and then paint the back of the petal. Lots of shadows, lots of texture there. Let me try and simplify it. Combine some of the shadows into larger areas. Again, use your pencil if you need to. My lines are going from the top-down. I'm leaving some of the areas blank. Just building that texture, as I see it. Again, we'll come back to it later to add even more saturation and smaller shadows, but for now, let's just identify larger areas of shadow. I'm going to blend it down with my warm red, add a bit more magenta in that little piece visible through the petals and maybe a bit more pink on the left here, just a couple of strokes. Adding more texture, more visual interest. We're so close to finishing this layer. You can see the definition is a lot more realistic right now. We've been working really hard on identifying light and shadow areas, so it's starting to look more and more realistic. Just going to add a few more details on this petal sticking out on the left. Some purple and vibrant pink. Just adding more color slowly and carefully. Lots more pink here. I'm going to use careful strokes just to identify some of the highlights paint around them, leave them blank. Don't worry if you end up covering more areas compared to what I'm doing. Just try to follow the general principle. Maybe add a little bit of violet into your pink towards the base. But more pink here. Very light, transparent layer. This fluorescent pink will help those areas pop, and now I'm going to use a dry brush and just remove some of it from the highlight. We have a nice variation of a light and shadow going there. A few more small pieces left on the right-hand side. On the back of this petal, I'm going to use magenta and just paint around the very tip of the petal, leaving the edge blank. Add a bit more saturation in those shadow areas, with my violet. They're super dark and we're going to make them even darker in the next layer, and again, a bit more violet here. This part is also very dark. Just a few final strokes, the back of this petal, just adding a bit more texture with my magenta. Congratulations, layer 2 is done now and you should now see a bit more definition in our flower. Our next step will include accents. I'll see you in the next video. [MUSIC] 11. Stamens & Stem: [MUSIC] Welcome back. Before we paint our final layer, let's erase the masking fluid and add some color to our stamens and maybe also paint the stem while we're at it. So I'm just using a soft eraser. It's a retractable eraser which allows me to really get into those small details and I don't like using a finger to remove masking fluid because it's too risky and can smudge the paint. So just remove the masking fluid and if you didn't apply masking fluid in the beginning and you were painting around your stamens, then just proceed to the next stage, which is where we're going to add a little bit of color. I'm going to use my smaller brush and gently add a very thin light layer of yellow on those areas that I have identified as stamens. Although I'm trying not to cover the surrounding areas, I think it's fine if that happens. My yellow is quite light. I'm not going to cover the entire area of each stamen. I'm going to leave a couple of small white highlights. I'm just going to paint around them and that's just to add a sense of volume and some definition. Now, you may choose to leave your stamens simply yellow or come back later and add a little bit of definition. The way you would do it is wait for the yellow to dry and then pick either your warm brown or even one of your reds, you may choose to use even green and just gently go over each shape. If your painting is large enough and your brush is small enough, you may be able to create some additional details there. I'm using my perylene maroon, which is a brownish color and when I put down a very thin layer, it works really well on top of my yellow. Maybe fix some of the shapes. Masking fluid is not perfect and so some of the shapes are a little bit broken here. That's about it. We don't want to put too much detail on the stamens because our focus is really the beautiful pink petals. Now let's do the stem and we're going to do it wet on wet. First covering the entire area with your light green. Or if you don't have a light green just mix your yellow with green and then pick your cooler more saturated green and while your first layer is still wet, just drop a little bit of color in the middle. You can see I'm starting from the top with the tip of my brush going all the way down. This is to follow the natural direction of light. On our flower it's coming from the back, so the darkest area is actually the one closest to us and the light is coming from behind which is why we're leaving the edges quite light. Now I'm just going to lift a little bit of color on the left with my dry brush and leave it at that. Now again, just like with stamens, you may want to come back when you first layer is dry and just add a few more details with your darker green. Perhaps look at the reference photo closer and find that there are a couple of lines there. This is not necessary, but as long as you're keeping your green pretty light and not very vibrant so it doesn't compete with your pink details, I think that a second layer may be useful. That's it. Very quick. Now, let's return to our petals, and I'll see you in the next video for our final layer of color. [MUSIC] 12. Layer 3 (A) - Accent Wash : [MUSIC] We are getting so close to the finish line, the flower is starting to look more and more realistic. You can see the end of the second layer on the left-hand side and now it's time to take it one step further with what I call an accent layer and you can see what we're working towards on the right. The objectives for this layer are as follows. We want to accentuate areas of light and shadow by adding more saturated pigment layers around the highlights and on the petals that are hidden away from the sun. We may double down on some areas of shadow, building more value and adding saturation. You can also spot those areas primarily on the right and under some of the petals if you look at the reference photo. We also want to create pedal texture by adding thin grooves that run from the base to the tip of each petal. For this part, our strokes will be very thin and following the direction of the petal at all times. We will likely not touch any of the tips. Just concentrating on the middle and bottom parts of each petal as well as our deepest shadows. We will continue using the same palette, and I will be naming the colors as I use them. If you're not sure, just stick to your magenta, deep red and purple here. Just use a slightly more saturated version than what you had in the previous layer. Let's get started. Start on this petal facing us with a little bit of magenta where I see there's a tiny little fold and then go down. Using up and down strokes in the direction of the petal, I'm going to connect my shadows from the very first one that I put down and all the way to the edge of the petal. My strokes are really thin, so I'm just creating those grooves. Now with the same magenta, I'm going to add a few shadow details up on top. It looks a little bit messy there, but just look carefully at your reference. Now I'm going to switch to my purple, to the same thing add a couple of spots, a few thin lines. Just trying to follow the logic of the shadow as I see it in my reference photo. A little bit more magenta in that groove and then going down with very careful strokes, perhaps I'll add a little bit of opera pink in some areas just to add a little bit of a vibrant glow. Then at the base of the petal, where it's going all the way down towards the stamens, I'm going to use my warm red and just build a bit more saturation there very carefully around my yellow stamens and then painting those strokes upward. Let's switch to the next petal. Look at the reference photo. There's a deep shadow there, so I'm going to start with magenta. Paint that shadow spot, and maybe even add a little bit of my warm red just to make it even deeper. Now, here, again with magenta first just outlining the shape of the shadow, making it darker, and then blending it towards the top and now quinacridone red. A quick outline around the petal, just doesn't get lost in the white background. Now the back of the petal, a little bit of magenta, blending it with clear water so it doesn't touch the edge of the petal. I'm going to grab my violet now, make that shadow really dark as it goes down. Switch to red. Continue the shadow and then blend it with clear water all the way down. Outline the edge of the petal, and move on to the next one. Here I see a lot of warm deep reds, so I'm going to go with my quinacridone red, maybe add a little bit of my perylene maroon. Do a couple of strokes on this petal fold, more quinacridone red on this deep shadow, more red. I'm going to outline this fold right here. I see it in the reference photo. Just using the same red blended with clear water. Now let's do this fold here, and I'm using magenta now with red on top, blending it so it's not all dark throughout. And now this one, just a little bit of magenta, followed maybe by purple. I see it's a little bit colder there. Now that pedal at the back, use purple or violet. It's all the way in the back. The shadow is really cool, so I'm just going to set it backwards by adding, I think violet will work best here. Notice the folds. Just going to outline them with the tip of my brush. Tidy it up and add a little bit of a pink on the back of the petal. Maybe a little bit of red there too, some opera pink on the edge and now lots of vibrant opera pink right in the middle. Just connecting the shadows that I've painted a minute ago. The pedal was really dark. As you look at the reference photo, you want to build that layer with more saturated color. I've outlined the tip of the petal as well, and I'm quite happy with how it turned out. Now, let's do the next petal. I'm going to start with magenta, and I'm going to blend it up with clear water towards the tip and then follow down with opera pink. The middle of the petal will be very vibrant, but towards the edges, it's going to be darker and cooler. All the way down, it's getting lighter. I'm just going to use the tip of my brush and just outline the grooves. I'm not going to carry that pigment all the way down. On top, I'm just going to add more and more magenta. A few more defined lines. It's nice to have some texture and the closer we'll get to the petals that are at the forefront, the more lines and grooves I will outline. Typically, objects that are closer to us appear more detailed, so that's the visual trick I'm going to use. Next petal. I'm going to start with magenta and follow down with opera pink. All the way down. A little bit of violet there. Then inside of that pedal that we see that one's really dark, so I want to add a lot of contrast and I'm actually going to use my Bardo. You can use violet if you want. Bardo is in-between violet and deep red. I'm going to bring that Bardo all the way up to the middle of the petal that we just painted. The colors are still wet there, so it's going to fit in nicely right there on top. I'm going to also outline the pedal up on top and then finish up the details on this fold using codon red and a little bit of magenta. There's a cluster of smaller shadows there. Now that little detail in between the petals, quite dark. Again, I'm going to use Bardo there. It's quite bigger than what I see in the reference photo, but that's just how my outline turned out. Now let's move down. This petals sticking out. There's a really dark shadow there and I'm going to use my deepest darkest brown, which is perylene maroon from Daniel Smith. Just to paint that shadow, you can use violet or brown, whichever one you have, whichever one is the darkest warmest shadow pigment and I'm going to blend it further with quinacridone red all the way up and towards the center. I'm going to then blend it with clear water in the center because there is a light area there and continue with my magenta on the back of the petal. Blending to, again, my brown, which is my perylene maroon. Now, on this side of the petal, I'm going to start with magenta blended with clear water towards that light area and then follow all the way to the edge with my violet. Stop right here. There is a bend in the middle. Come back to my deepest shadow area and add a little bit more pigment there. You can see it's almost a nontransparent at this point, and I'm not worried about that. It's super dark. I'm not going to follow up with any color. It just more perylene maroon there. Then towards the top of the petal, so closer to us, warmer quinacridone red. Remember we painted a little bit of yellow there, so it's going to help us keep that area warm and light. The back of the petal here, starting with magenta and blending with clear water all the way towards the top. I'm going to maybe come back to this side again. Just a few finishing touches more red, a few grooves, and I think I'm happy with this petal now. Now this one we skipped, it's quite uniform in terms of the color, or at least the way I see it. There's some groups there, so I'm going to use magenta and just following the direction of the petal. Paint, a few strokes. If you shadow areas and then switch to opera pink in the middle. I'm not blending with clear water towards the edge, but you can do that if you want. What I'm doing is just dragging the color up to create some grooves and then the very edge of the petal. I want to keep very contrast against the white background, so just adding a bit more pigment there. Just a few last strokes on the back of the petal right here. Just to add a little bit more intensity and let's move on to the next one. We have this small petal in the middle sticking out awkwardly and it's too light right now. I want to add some color there. I'm going to use quinacridone red at the base and also all the way at the tip and in the middle, you're going to connect the colors by blending it with clear water in some places and just leaving some highlights blank. Then another little petals sticking out there. Just a little bit of my violet just to keep it dark. [MUSIC] 13. Layer 3 (B) - Accent Wash : [MUSIC] Now let's do this cluster. On the left, I have a tip of a petal sticking out. I see a lot of purple there, so I'm going to use light purple, thin strokes. Then going down, it's getting darker. You can see the inside of the petal there picking out, so I'm going to use my Perylene Maroon, make sure it's really dark, and then Opera Pink on the back of the petal. Very light. Just a few strokes. Lots of shadows there. I'm just going to simplify it. I'm not going to paint every single one of them. Outline the tip with light purple. Now moving on with this cluster towards the right. Lots of opportunity to make it darker, so I'm not sure right now exactly where I want to place my shadows. I'm going to use magenta and just to start very light, dragging my brush up and down in the direction of the petal, trying to recognize the areas of the shadow. I'm slowly getting more and more confident. I see a few shadows that I really want to accentuate, so I'm just doing that. Again, use your judgment. Look at the reference photo. You don't have to follow my strokes here. It's totally fine to simplify, which is what I'm going to do. I'm just going to leave it because I'm afraid I might overpaint, make it too dark. Less is more. Now there are two little folded pieces of a petal sticking out there. I see them as being a lot darker than what we have, so I'm going to use magenta, add a little bit more saturation there, and then continue with Quinacridone Red, all the way down. That area, the inside of the petals, it's quite warm. It's darker than the tips of the petals that are sticking out and are closer to us. We want to make it much more saturated. It will make the stamens pop as well. Using Quinacridone Red, your warm red, just paint a layer all the way there. Make sure it's dark. Because we're using transparent red, you can still see the layers that we painted underneath. There's still some detail there, but overall it's darker. This little petal sitting in-between two clusters of stamens, I'm going to add a little bit of magenta there and then move up to this petal right here. It's quite complicated. There's lots of shadows there. I've already tried to simplify it. During my outline process, I removed an additional petal sticking out there. I'm going to just make it a little bit darker on the top left with my magenta and then add a few strokes just going down in the direction of the petal to mark some grooves. Another petal is sticking out in the back. A little bit of magenta just to make it a little bit darker. Then again, these two pesky little pieces of a petal sticking out, I still feel like because we're seeing them against the light but there is a petal behind them, there's an opportunity to make them even darker with a little bit of magenta and then Quinacridone Red at the base as it gets closer to the center of the flower. Now let's work on this petal sticking out to the left. First thing I'm going to do is use magenta and a little bit of purple to make the shadows darker where I feel like they need to be darker, just to add more definition. It's one of the petals that are closer to us so I can be a bit more aggressive with my pigment here. Make them dark, maybe continue with just a few very light magenta lines in the direction of the petal outlining the grooves, just adding a little bit of texture. That's all we need. Now next to this cluster right here, the backs of the petals, again, we're seeing them facing us, but there's lots of other petals in the back, so there's not a lot of transparency and opportunity to add more shadows and more details using magenta and making them a little bit darker. I'm going to carry forward with Quinacridone Red, swarming it up. Let's do this one now. I really left it quite light compared to the reference photo. There's a big shadow there. I'm just going to go over the shadows that I've previously painted. Magenta and purple, just making it a little bit more darker, and a little bit of Opera Pink for some areas just to give it a little bit of a pop. I think that's enough for now. Now let's do this large petal that's facing us. It's the one that is getting the most bounce back sunlight, or at least that's how I see it. There's a lot of warm red here as opposed to magenta. The shadow is quite warm as well, so go with your brown or deep red. I'm using Perylene Violet, which is a brick red. You can see how saturated it is towards the base of the petal. Now, as the shadow continues all the way to the edge of the petal, I'm going to switch to my dioxazine purple. The closer you get to the base, the warmer the shadows, the warmer the base color. Then as we move towards the edge, cooler, more purple. There's another bent petal area here. I'm going to just use a few strokes of purple just to make that shadow more pronounced. Then this area, quite complicated, but I want to get those folds right because it's so close to us visually. I want to make sure that I get the detailed right. I don't want to simplify too much here. Using Perylene Maroon and magenta, I'm just trying to paint what I see, areas of shadow that need to be darker, blending with clear water. Now let's do the back of the petal. What I'm going to do is paint the shadow with my Quinacridone Red and then blend it towards the edge. But instead of blending with clear water, I'm just going to use those thin lines so it's semi-dark there but not completely dark if you look at it from a distance. A bit more dark color here, I'm going to use violet just to add some contrast and also violet in that little groove right there. A few more details, and I think that's enough contrast. Now, let's do this nice round petal that's facing us and it's glowing. It's full of light. There's a lot of variation of color. I'm going to start with the shadow at the bottom. Again, I don't want a large blob of color, so I'm going to start with my magenta. On the right give it full coverage but on the left towards the edge, just some very nice lines, just texture. Maybe even add some warmer red in that area. Don't worry if you don't see all the variations of color. We all have different sensitivity to light and color. You can just stick to magenta and purple if you don't see all the different temperatures in that shadow. Like here, I'm just going to start with magenta and blend up with purple. This comes from a little bit of experience, but also a lot of just looking at reference photos and trying to understand light. I'm not always painting exactly what I see. Sometimes I paint what I intuitively feel like should be there. You don't have to follow my exact strokes, but just the general logic. Again, I used magenta, Quinacridone Red, and purple on the shadow areas, and now in the middle, I really want to give it a bit of a boost. I'm adding Opera Pink, but not all over, just in the middle and tiny little strokes towards the edge and that's about it. I really don't want to overpaint it, I'm keeping my Opera Pink light. Did I say I didn't want to overpaint it? I'm going to paint a little bit more on that shadow at the bottom. I feel like it's dark enough, so it's safe to do so, but keeping the center light. You can see I painted around some highlights with my brush just to add more texture. Here, I feel like I made a mistake when I was doing my outline. There's no fold there, so I'm just going to fix it with my Perylene Maroon. Fix that edge and we're done. [MUSIC] 14. Final Thoughts: Congratulations on finishing the class. This was a lot of effort and you should be so proud about putting it all this work. Above all else, this class was about practicing structured layering of watercolors, so you can approach any watercolors subject with confidence. Now your final result may look a little bit different from mine, and that's totally expected. As you can see, I'm painting this peony twice using different color palette and sometimes switching up my approach a little bit. It's looking a little bit different. Every time the goal is to enjoy the process, practice the techniques, and by the end of the process, you should feel more confident about your watercolor skills and excited to try something new. Once again, don't forget to post your projects in the project section of this class. If you have any questions, post on a discussion board in the discussion section of this class. I also absolutely love seeing your projects on my social media, so you can tag me on Instagram. I hope you enjoyed this class and I hope to see you in the next one.