Watercolor Pet Portraits: Tuxedo Cat (Black and White Cat)

1. Intro: Tuxedo Cat: Hello, and welcome. My name is Emily, and I am the artist behind Emily Marie Watercolors. Welcome to my home studio here in Madison, Wisconsin. Miss Tutorial, you'll learn how to paint Gus, the Tuxedo Cat, using watercolors. As a watercolor artist, I have found a passion for painting pet portraits. If you already know the basics of watercolor, painting pet portraits can be a great way to turn your hobby into a part time or even full time career. My style is characterized by adding details to the mouth, nose, and eyes, but not getting caught up in painting every single hair or curl. You'll have access to a color reference photo of Gus, the Tuxedo Cat, to use for this tutorial, or you can use your own reference photo of your own black and white cat. You can also use a tracing template that's included in the reference section, as well as some supplies that I used in the video, as well as the complete color palette for painting Gus the Cat. I'll guide you through painting Gus layer by layer. We'll focus in particularly on keeping the black fur from looking flat by adding multiple layers of gray under the black. I'll show you a combination of real time video with time lapses so you can see the whole process from start to finish. We'll end with adding a colorful splash behind our cats and finish our piece by using white gouache to paint the whiskers. As an added bonus, I've even included a quick guide with step by step pictures so that you have an easy way to see how all these layers come together. So grab your supplies, and let's get ready to paint. Don't forget to upload any questions that you have, and I'll try my best to answer them along the way. Let's get started. 2. Supplies: Alright, so let's talk for a second about the supplies needed for painting Gus, the Tuxedo Cat. First, let's talk about your paper choice. In the video, I am using arches, hot press paper. So our hot press paper is a little bit smoother. It doesn't have a texture. I, I buy the ten by 14 inch blocks, and then I actually cut them in four, and then I have four, five by seven sheets of paper. So you'll notice that I'm painting slightly smaller for this pet portrait. It was ordered originally as a five by seven. However, I do think that, for those of you who are just starting out with your pet portraits or are just starting out with black cats or black dogs, you should try first on your five by seven sheet of paper, and then once you feel a little bit more confident, then you can go to a slightly larger size. If you do not like using hot press paper, you can always use cold pressed for this. The only issue that you might run into is you might have a little bit hard of a time using a calligraphy pen for your masking fluid, and you might also have a hard time with the bleed-proof white at the very end for the whiskers, just because you're going over a slightly rough paper. It might not be that much of a difference for you, and so you can try it on both, or you can try it on cold press if you don't have hot press paper at your house. The next thing that we'll take a peek at is our watercolor brushes. In the tutorial, you'll notice that I am using, for the majority of the tutorial, a round size four brush. It's a black velvet brush from silver Limited. I would recommend going somewhere in this slightly smaller range. So either a size two or size four, you can use size six, although that is going to be a little bit more challenging for you since it's a slightly larger brush. And then feel free to use a size zero or a smaller detail brush for smaller details like the nose or the eyes. You'll notice I don't really switch from the size four. I just kind of learn how much liquid is on my brush so that I can control and still paint the fine details, even though I have a slightly larger brush. You will need a paper towel and a glass of water. Sometimes I work with two cups of water so I can easily switch out when I need to. Then let's talk some of our specialty products that you'll need. In the beginning of the tutorial, you'll notice that I will mask out the highlights of the eyes, as well as the whiskers using a masking fluid. I like using Windsor and Newton brand masking fluid. You can either use a worn out brush that you don't really care about for the highlights of the eyes, or you can also use a calligraphy pen for the highlights of the eyes or for the whiskers. You will see how I use the calligraphy pen for the whiskers and some tips and tricks for that during that section of the tutorial. If you do not have a calligraphy pen, you can always use a regular small brush for the masking fluid for those whiskers, or you don't have to use the masking fluid for the whiskers. You can just use a bleed-proof white after you finished your painting. So in the very end of the tutorial, you'll see me use doctor PH Martin's bleed-proof white, which is a very opaque gouache. You'll see me using this bleed-proof white on the whiskers over the eyebrows. So I do not mask those whiskers out over the eyebrows. I'm using this bleed-proof white, and I use a rigor brush, which is also known as a script or a liner brush to paint those tiny whiskers. Now, the reason I use a rigger brush, which has a much longer bristles on them versus a small round brush like this size four times zero, is because the longer amount of bristles on your brush means the more liquid capacity your brush can hold. So instead of the small brush, you might be able to paint a line that's only an inch long with however much liquid is in your brush. With your rigor or script, also known as a liner brush, you can paint a much longer line because it holds a lot more liquid. So for things like whiskers, where you need a fine controlled brush stroke, you might enjoy using this rigor brush. I'm using a size one. A size zero would also work for this tutorial. I would not go larger than that, or your line might be a little bit too long. You might also use some other types of tools that you might have lying at home, something like a glass pen can also work when you are painting your bleed-proof white. One last thing I forgot to mention about the masking fluid. You'll notice on the supplies guide that's included with this tutorial. There is an option for masking fluid that is a fine tipped masking fluid from senilia. This is the fine tip. So it's a different brand. It's not Windsor and Newton. But you'll notice that it comes to a fine point. And so this is also very useful for those fine whisker lines as well. The only thing that you have to be careful with is that you do have to really practice a lot with it because you do tend to get some bubbles in this as you're making your lines, and you really, really don't need to press at all when you're making your lines. If you press the bottle at all, you're going to get big globs where you don't want them. Um, because I practice a lot using the calligraphy pen, this is my tool of choice, but you might choose a different tool to make the whiskers. And hopefully you can find the tool that you enjoy using. Alright, now let's talk about our water colors and our colors that we're using. So you'll notice that the palette that I use in my tutorials is just this plastic palette. Yes, you probably should use some sort of ceramic or porcelain palette to mix your colors. If you purchased a newly purchased plastic palette, and you're noticing your colors are bubbling and they're not expanding very well, take a little bit of sandpaper and just sand where you are mixing your colors, and you'll notice a difference right away. Because I have used this palette for four plus years, my surface has been kind of disintegrated a little bit, doesn't have that shiny plastic new plastic coating anymore. And so my colors will bleed and spread instead of tighten up and bubble. Alright, so let's talk color choice. This color guide is found in the resources tab of this tutorial. On the left hand side, you'll notice the exact color that I am using. All of them are Daniel Smith watercolors. And then on the right hand side, it's a little indication of where in the painting I'm using this color. Now, if you don't have these specific colors with your home palette, I do list a few different options for substitutions on the left hand side, or you can also make your own substitutions according to your own cat that you'll be painting. The last thing that we do need to talk about before we start with the tutorial is transferring your image onto your watercolor paper. When it comes to PEP portraits, I highly suggest that you either trace the template onto your watercolor paper or use some sort of tracing app. If you're interested in an app that I use for my custom portraits, it is in the link on my supply Guide. It's called DaVinci I Um, and you use your phone on a stand, and it helps you to trace the outline. Now, you can sketch it out on your own and sketch out the outline, freehand. However, obviously, that's going to take a lot more times if that's a place that you want to practice and practice your sketching, please do so. If you want to save a little bit of time and focus on the painting part of it, tracing really is a great tool for artists so that you can have the right placement and the right sizing of your eyes, nose and mouth so that your pet has a very good likeliness to the picture that you're using. When you are done tracing your template and you're all ready to go, I like using these little corrugated plastic boards. I find these at Michael's, and I cut them into smaller squares so that they can fit either my five by seven paintings, my eight by ten paintings or my 11 by 14. And I will place it on the plastic corrugated board and then tape around it using either frog tape or a different artists tape such as Kiwi Hub. Um, for sizes five by seven or eight by ten, I don't usually stretch my paper before I paint. If I'm going any larger than an eight by ten, I will stretch it. We're not gonna cover that in this video, but for paintings that are smaller in size, taping them on something like a plastic board will work just fine. Alright, let's get started with talking about our masking fluid and how to mask our whiskers and eyes. 3. Masking Fluid Prep: Alright, so I traced out my photo of our cat that we're going to be painting, and I used two different photos. So the main reference photo I used is the one with the paw up front. The second reference photo I use specifically for the chest area is from the slightly more blurry photo. So when we take a peek at our first reference photo, obviously, we can notice that the eyebrow hairs above the eyebrows, those white ones are very prominent, as well as the whiskers and the face. Now, for both of the sets of whiskers on both the cheeks and on the eyes, you can use a masking fluid with a calligraphy pen, or you can also use a fine brush and PH Martin's bleed proof white. Now, the brush that I like to use when I'm using pH white and painting really long hairs is going to be a rigor or a liner brush. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to actually show you how to do this painting both ways. The reason I'm deciding that is because I have painted all black cats before that have really prominent eyebrows, and I actually don't like the look of the prominent eyebrows with a calligraphy pen. I think it almost gets a little too thick, and it slightly distracts from the painting itself. And so I'm going to do it this time with the calligraphy pen for the whiskers. And then above the eyes, I'm going to use my PH Martin. Now I need to test out my masking fluid and the nib before I start. Now, of course, because I'm making this tutorial, it's working the first time. If it does not work the first time for you, try try again. Sometimes what I do is I will take a paper towel and clean off the nib. You might need to press slightly to open the nib a little bit more, or you might have to add just a few drops of water and just swivel your water or your maskine fluid gently. Don't shake it or you're going to get a ton of bubbles. But the water will just make it slightly more water down so that it'll flow a little bit better with your pen. Alright, so I've got my full pen loaded up. It works once. And so now I'm going to start. I don't need to press very hard. I just need to press hard enough for the masking fluid actually come out. And then as I'm doing these whiskers, I can do about three or four before I need a little bit more. I'm always tapping on the side of my bottle. And then I do like to cross some of these whiskers as I'm adding them, even if they're not crossed in my reference photo, having whiskers that do not cross, actually, in my brain seems too perfect. So they might cross just slightly. I don't need to follow every single line here. And like I said, my my pressure is very light. So if I take a peek at the the harder my pressure, obviously, the thicker the line, the lighter the pressure, the thinner the line. When it comes to whiskers, you want a very thin line, and so you want just enough pressure. Now, I don't want to switch to a brush, so I'm just going to add my little highlights in the eyes using my calligraphy pen. You also have the option of doing the bleed proof white for all of your whiskers and even for the highlights. That's obviously always an option. If you don't have either, another option is a Nibal Cigna white gel pen. This works well for the highlights of the eyes. However, it's gonna be a little bit thicker for the whiskers. And so I would really suggest in purchasing one of these two to use for the whiskers. 4. Painting the Iris and Pinks of Nose & Ears: Alright, so I have my five by seven with a masking fluid, and I taped it onto a plastic corrugated board. I got this from Michael's. And now I'm ready to paint. So I am going to start with a round size four brush. I want to start with my lightest colors first. And so I do always like starting with iris color. So I'll choose the color that's kind of the most prominent in the iris for Um, this particular cat, it's going to be a green, and I can cover that entire iris and the pupil, as well, since the pupil is darker. Now, I do have, of course, remember, I have those highlights in the eyes with masking fluid. I am going to drop in some other color on top of this. And so I do want to be aware of my drying time. So it's still nice and wet. Now here at this point, I'm going to take a peek and see, do I have any yellows maybe that I want to drop in. So I'm noticing there's a little bit of yellow on this left eye. Now, when I drop in any other color into the iris color, you notice I'm not wetting my brush. I'm just dropping in the color directly from my paint brush. Now, when I change colors, I want to grab a little bit of blue, but I don't want that much water on my brush. If I have too much water on my brush, that blue is going to overpower the green, and it's going to push that green away. Um, because I'm introducing too much water. So I don't want that much water on my brush. Here I'm just kind of dotting the blue into the iris. Mainly where I'm noticing this green turned to a little bit more of a teal. Alright, and that's gonna be the first layer. I'm gonna let that dry. Before I move on to the first coat of black, now I also want to take a peek at any pinks. So I'm going to do the pinks in the nose and then probably add a little bit of pink in the ears. Now, this pink that I'm using is an opera pink. Be a little bit cautious about opera pink because it is not very light fast, which means that over the years, it might start to fade in time. So I'm going to do my first layer with this opera pink, but then I'm going to add a little bit of quinocradone magenta, particularly around the edges where it's a little bit darker. And then my second layer on the nose, I'm going to also use that quinocrodon pink. Or quinacrodo magenta. Now with the ears, I do want to add a little bit of this quinacrodo magenta to the ears, so I'm adding it with water. I'm looking particularly at the pinks of the ears around the outside here. Alright, so with this water down quinacridone magenta. I'm going to start with the outside of the ears, and I like to run kind of a line of magenta down the outer edge. And then from that, I'm going to pull a few strands inward. Making sure that I'm keeping the white clean. And then I will dry my brush, and on the center here, I might lift where it got a little bit too dark. I'm not worried about going all the way to the edge here because my black will go on top, do the same thing. Line of quinarcdomgenta, and then from whatever is still left on my brush, I'm gonna pull it in. Making sure that I'm leaving some white so that it's that negative painting there. We're negatively painting the white fluff coming out of the ears. At this point in the painting, if you wanted to drop in darker magenta, if you see, especially in this kind of center area, if it's a little bit darker, you can drop that in before it dries. Remembering that this is just a first layer. Now, I also noticed here there's just a little bit of pink coming down on the bottom of the mouth here, so I might add just a little bit of pink there. Very watered down, and I can lift up the edges using a dry brush afterwards. Now I am remembering that I can always go back and add more pink later. I do not need to have all my pinks in where they need to go at this point. Uh huh. 5. First layer of black fur: Light Gray: Alright. At this point of my painting, now I am ready to start on the first layer of the black of my cat. So with tuxedo cats, obviously, you're gonna have different amounts of black in the face and on the chest, you might have less white than this particular tuxedo cat has. There might also be less white in the face area. So your first layer of this black is going to vary depending on what your cat looks like and if you're using this reference photo or not. So when I paint black, I like to start with a layer of gray first. I tend to use shadow violet. However, if you wanted to use a gray that leans more blue or a cooler hue to it, you're more than welcome to do that. I find that this shadow violet, which is a color made by Daniel Smith, it kind of encompasses a lot of other colors that you might find in those black fur tones, and it kind of leans a little bit more warmer, obviously with the purple there. And so I do like the shadow violet color because I do feel like it blends well with the other colors that I use in my palette. Now, we're doing gray on the base layer, and I want to make sure that my gray color is not overpowering. So I do want it to be there. It's a little bit more than I would say, a light opacity. But obviously, if I were to take my shadow violet directly from the pan, that's how dark it is. So I do need it to be a little bit lighter. And I am going to paint wherever I see the black. Now, starting in the center of the ear here. So I'm going to do a line down the ear. And then just like I did with the outside of the ears, I am going to pull a little bit of this black or a little bit of the gray, excuse me, into that area here. Now with this first layer of gray, I am not worried about particular hairs. I'm just worried about getting this color down where it needs to go. Now, obviously, when I come up against white, I do need to be aware of that. So here in the center of the head, this is where I need to be aware of this line, this edge between the black and white. So once I get up to this edge, I'm just going to start with little hash marks so that I can leave a little bit of that color of the paper shining through. Another spot you might want to be careful with is around the eyes, although all those little tiny hairs around the eyes, those I'm going to use bleed proof white for. So here I'm being careful to kind of use the little tally marks. I'm gonna continue on the forehead here because this edge is starting to dry, especially with hot press paper. It's a little hard to get these edges nice and clean when we're kind of up against time. Now, on my one reference photo, you can see quite a lot of these white hairs shining through. On the other reference photo, you cannot because it's a little bit more blurry. It's taken from farther away. So I'm just kind of doing an in between of both. And I can always adjust and add more white hairs with that bleed proof white afterwards. It's a little bit more challenging, of course, with watercolors to leave that white space. Open to leave that white paper. Same thing. Ear. I'm gonna pull some hairs into the ear there. Try to readjust that edge there. Now, one thing about the shadow violet is it is a granulating color, and so you will have to continuously mix it, or it will settle on your palette. Because I use it so often, I am just used to that fact. However, just know that if you do not continue to mix it on your palette before grabbing it onto your paper, you might notice that certain sections of your gray might be a little bit more blue, might be a little bit more purple. Just all depends on how that color is settling. Once I get to the lower cheek here, same thing. I'm gonna hash it out, leave some white of the paper. As you notice, I am using quite a water down brush here. And I'm also not my edge, my outer edge here. I'm keeping that clean. I'm not adding little hairs. I don't tend to add little hairs around the outside edge if it is a short haired breed, cat or dog. I just find that it gets a little bit too busy for my style to add all these little tiny hairs coming out of the edge. However, if you are somebody who likes to make their painting slightly more detailed, you are more than welcome to add more heres. Alright, so I notice that this gray kind of just comes into the cheek here, but it does not follow below the cheek. It's just kind of under the cheek here. Checking it with its other side just to see, make sure. Now, this is a hard edge. I can either use a dry brush to kind of soften it, or I can just say I'm putting another layer on top, and it is what it is. Alright, I think I've got all of my blacks here for the first layer of black. The layer of black that's on the body here, I can also do now, or if I'm unsure about how far out I want this black, I can always wait until I do the white. I think I am going to do this black here. I'm noticing from both my reference photos that there is kind of an edge of black coming in, and then we've got these, like, big tufts. That are coming into this white fur. So I'm gonna add that. Now, how far out to make it? That is a little bit more tricky. I would start a little conservative. And then as you make this edge here, coming down, you can kind of see how chunky the cat is looking. If you know the cat is a little bit more chunky than what it's showing, then I would extend this edge a little bit. I think this is looking okay. And one of the pictures, he's looking a little chunky, and the other one, he's not. So I'd rather not add on too much poundage to him. Then I'll do the same thing on this side. A on this side, it looks like there's a little bit more white on the right side of the fur here. There's still some of these big pieces of fur kind of coming into this white section. All right. So I think that's it for the first layer of black. Let's work on some white. 6. Painting the White Fur: So while this layer is drying, I'm going to add more water to this layer of shadow gray. We are going to work on some of the white sections of the face. Yeah. And adding some shadows in the face area and the chest. So the shadow gray that I'm using, I'm using that for the white fur as well. Using the same gray that you're using for the first layer of your black is going to help to connect your painting together and make it so you have a little bit more color harmony. So I have a slightly lighter or more transparent. I'm going to start on the bridge of the nose here. I'm noticing that there's quite a predominant shadow here. So you notice that I am using my paper towel to kind of guide how much liquid I have on my brush. And so when I add the color onto my paper, if I'm noticing that it's too dark, I simply tap my paper towel to release some of that liquid, and then it really helps to lighten it up. Now, on these edges, I'm doing the same technique that I did for the white to gray, where I'm just adding a little bit of hash marks here at these edges just so that it blends into the white a little bit better and it gives a little bit more of a fur look. I'm gonna grab a little bit darker and drop in just where I notice that it's a little bit darker. So on the side of the nose. And now using a dry brush, I'm gonna blend that out since it didn't really sit very well for me. We'll come around the edge of the nose here. Alright, now, this is where I also have to be aware of the fact that the original reference photo is very much so up close. And so I do want to add some of these shadows, but I do want to keep some of the white white, as well. So right now I'm adding some little dots on these whiskers where the hair is attaching. And I am dabbing my paper towel, and now I'm going to just kind of blend, slightly blend those together, lifting up to where it got a little bit too dark. Can also use my paper towel if it got too dark anywhere. No, I'm noticing behind the cheek here is darker. So I'm gonna add some shadow behind the cheek still on the head here. It's probably where it's gonna be the darkest of the white. And now let's look at the lip here. So I do want some darkness along this line of the lip, this edge of the lip. I don't want it to get too dark, however, so I am going to kind of keep it a little bit lighter at first. I can always add a little bit more color if I need to. So I've got that line coming into the nose. Now, for the chin here, I am going to dab my paper towel, and I'm going to add a little bit of shadow on one side here. So I'm going to pull some lines out from the center of the mouth, and then I'm going to pull some lines just on one edge here. And I'm gonna leave this other edge open. So I don't want to pull these lines on both edges. It looks like in my reference photo, especially 'cause there's a window on this right hand side. So this right hand side is gonna be a little lighter in color. I'm gonna do the same thing with the whiskers on this right side. However, it is gonna be a little bit lighter in color. Um I'm gonna lift up some of that. I just want to get some color down here. Alright, now I can use my dry brush, kind of lift up a little bit from where it got too dark. So I'm just using that dry brush to soak up or my paper towel or once I soaked up some of that, if any of those are still looking a little too dark or a little too perfect, I can use a wet brush, kind of blend the edges of some of those, make them kind of run smoothly into each other. A little tiny shadow there. Okay. So now I'm going to wait to do the nose. I'm going to look at the chest, so I need to mix a little bit more of that white color. So I'm using a slightly different reference photo for the chest, and the chest photo is looking like it doesn't have a ton of detail. And so I might end up making up a lot of the chest. Usually, what I tend to do with a triangular chest like this with tuxedo cats or any other cat that has a white chest. Is you do want your strokes to go in the same direction as this curve. So here on this left hand side, my strokes are going to curve outward, and then as they come inside into the center where it's a little bit longer and triangular, it'll kind of lengthen out. And then I come to the right hand side, and it's going to kind of curve to the right. So it gives you this sense of shape. Within that triangle. So obviously, this is within the triangle here. Now, you want to be careful that you're not adding too much gray onto the white or otherwise, it's just going to look too muddy. And so when I take a peek at where I think most of the shadow is going to be, it's mostly going to be on this left hand side, because, remember, our sun is coming from the right. So I'm going to start on this left hand side with kind of a larger shadow under where the mouth is, and then I'm going to pull using whatever is left on my brush. I'm going to pull some some lines. No, I'm keeping my brush really light. I'm gonna pull some lines down in the front. And now with whatever's left on my brush, I'm gonna pull some lines to the edge. Now, I know I did that really quickly, and you're probably at home wondering, how the heck can I do that myself? Well, I would suggest that before you do this on your final piece, take a scratch sheet of paper. Let me look and see if I can find a scratch sheet right next to me. And then on your scratch sheet of paper, you're going to want to try using the edge of your brush. Not the tip. You want to use the tip where you want these little finer lines. Load up your brush, start where you're needing it to be the darkest. Where you need it the darkest, press down with your brush a little bit more and then come down to the center. Now, this is different paper, so it's gonna look slightly different. And then come and curve around to this right hand side. Okay. So I know I'm going a little bit faster. You can take your time a little bit more. However, if this is something that you're doing more of, and you're really focusing on wanting to do pet portraits, I would suggest that you know, with a few pet portraits under your belt, really try to do these sorts of movements a little bit quicker than maybe you normally would because the quickness of your brush strokes is actually what makes it look believable. So these little tiny brush strokes of where I'm moving my hand quickly and I'm kind of flicking my wrist a little bit, that's what gives it that light airy feel. However, if you're just starting off, don't feel upset if you're if you need to take more time as you're doing your little brush strokes there. Hmm. 7. Second layer of black: Dark Gray, Part 1: Alright, now, from here, I'm going to grab more of this shadow violet. And now I want to have a more of an opaque medium. So it's not directly from my pan. I'm still mixing it with water, but it is quite a bit darker. So I'm doing one more layer of this shadow violet on my black areas, and then I'm going to do a layer of black. So at this stage, it's looking a little oh iffy right now because I don't have a lot of details. This is what we like to call the ugly phase. So continue to push through the ugly phase. What I like to do at this phase is actually start working on some of the details around the eyes because I do feel like once you add some details into the eyes and nose and mouth, then you can start feeling a little bit better about your portrait. So right now, I'm going to start by outlining around the eyes at this darker shadow violet. No, I'm still using my size four brush here. If you are wanting to switch to a smaller brush for this, you are more than welcome. And then I will fill in the pupil of the eye here as well. I do like to fill in the pupil, of course, with this shadow violet first because as you can see, it is a lighter color. If I go in right with a black right away, it's a little bit more challenging to lift than if I make a mistake with the shape. Now, I'm going to let that dry a little bit, and I'm going to go to this left eye and do the same. Checking my reference photo just to make sure. Most of the time, this is you're gonna be outlining. On occasion, there might be a certain area around the eye here that maybe isn't quite as dark or it's a little bit thinner of a line. I got a little too thick there, so lift it up and try again. Honestly, I probably should be using a smaller brush here. Part of it comes out of laziness of just not wanting to switch brush sizes. Part of it also comes out of practicing brush control. Now, having these two pupils be the same shape is probably the most challenging part of the whole painting. Start slightly smaller, if you will. You can always push out and make it a little bit bigger in shape. It's much more challenging to make it smaller. No, I'm gonna go back and add some shadows. So I'm gonna try to tell myself to stop futzing with it because I'm gonna add shadows and it'll help with the shape as well. Alright, so while I let that dry, I am going to start looking a little bit at the nose. Now, with our cat noses, when you have a light colored nose, you are going to want to just focus on the V here, the bottom V. Because the top of the nose here, you actually won't really be outlining at all, so I am working just on that. Bottom V. Still outlining it with my shadow violet. Potentially you can be grabbing more shadow violet directly from your pan. If I had my smaller brush, I probably would be using that here. And then I'm gonna extend that mouth just slightly here. I don't want to extend that darkness too far out. I can always add some darkness coming in, but I don't want those two lines to connect here. The reason being is the minute you connect those two lines, you now have a Joker cat, and we don't want to do that. So I can have my lines almost connecting, but not quite connecting. Okay. 8. Second layer of black: Dark Gray, Part 2: Alright, so now that we've got a little bit more detail in the face area, now we can work on our second layer of the black fur here around the outside. I'm gonna go back and obviously rework the eyes a little bit, add some shadows, things like that, but I want to give those outlines really time to dry. So my next layer here is where I can start to add a little bit more brushstrokes. However, it's still going to be quite extensive the area that I'm going to be covering with this darker gray. So I can pull a little bit of hairs off the ends of the ears if I'm noticing that. Now, the biggest area here of highlights because it's kind of hard to see where highlights are happening on our black cats, on the black part of the tuxedo cat and black cats in general. And so on the top of the head here is where I see the most highlight. And then I do see a little bit of highlight on this right hand side because of the sun coming in and left side is pretty dark. So I'm going to continue to do this left side pretty large turning the brightness all the way up on my computer so I can see that on my reference photo. Now around the eyes is where I'm also going to be cautious about leaving a little bit of highlight here. So here around the top of the head, I'm going to try my best to leave a little bit of highlight. Once I come into this center of the eye here, now I also want to be careful to start with those little hash marks. Alright, so we've got the darkness pretty much coming up to the edge of the eye here around the top. We have it coming into the center of the eye here, so it's pretty dark here in the center. Under the eye, though, is a different story. So there's a little bit of a light ring under that eye here. And so we're going to keep a little section under the eye open. And then we're also going to be cautious about where our dark is coming here. So it looks like it's coming quite to 90 degree there. Now, obviously, the eye area is gonna look weird for a little bit until we add some shadows, sit with awkwardness. Mix a little bit more. Instead of going down to the neck, I'm going to go into this right hand side. Being aware to leave a little bit of this section at the top with a highlight. Alright, so what I'm noticing on this right hand side and what you might notice in your own black cats is that just above the eye, it's going to be dark, but then there's going to be a little bit of almost like an eyebrow on top, where it's a little bit lighter. So sometimes I'll do this kind of shape above the eye, where I will come directly above the eye with my dark color. And then I'll leave a little bit of that under color to come through to shine through, where it's kind of arching like this. You can always soften those edges after you make them. So if you have edges within there that's not looking great, you can always soften them. Right now, we're just getting the color down. Once again, we'll add a little bit of a lighter ring under the eye. It's not as prominent in this eye because it's in the highlight or, like, where the sun is, but we're still gonna add it under the eye. I personally don't like how it looks when you're painting black cats and you have almost an overabundance of fur strokes in the dark area. Um, sometimes that can look too busy in my opinion. So here I'm just adding some extra dark hairs, the very light touch coming from the inside here. Gonna wet my brush, and then I'm going to add a little bit of that dark shadow on the inside of the ear. Trying to keep that white highlight. And then going back and dropping in a little bit darker of that shadow violet where it's a little bit darker. Same on this other ear. Inside these ears, it's a little bit darker. I do have that pink undertone that you can still see. So it's still shining through, but it is quite a bit darker than what it looks like on the on my paper right now. So I'm using, once again, my wet brush, trying to keep those whites clean as much as I can. And then dropping in a little bit darker if I need it a little bit darker anywhere. Use a damp brush, just kind of blend this edge a little bit, not liking how dark that edge is. Alright, now I'm gonna move on with the second layer on the chest. So the second layer of shadow violet. I need to mix a little bit more. And I'm reminding myself that this left hand side is going to be a little bit darker. So pretty much the whole section here is gonna be dark. I'm not gonna really leave any highlights. Now, when I'm going in, we're into these little grooves that I first made, I don't need to go into all of them. I can leave some open. I also once I get towards the bottom here, I don't have to go all the way to the edge. I can leave some of that lighter shining through. Maybe just one or two of these. I'll have a little bit more of that black being pulled in. F my reference photo, it kind of shows these larger tufts on the edge. Now come to this right hand side, and this is where if I wanted to, I can leave a little bit of a highlight in the center here, only if I'm able to. When it comes to adding adding fur detail on the chest, I will always attempt to add more detail onto the face and less on the chest. Because, of course, we want most of our eyes to be focused on the face instead of the chest. So I left a little bit of highlight here. And I'll pull, same thing, trying to get the same curve almost that I got on the other side. Okay. 9. Details in the eyes: Alright, let's take a peek at the eyes again. So I am going to use more shadow violet in the eyes here. Alright, so, first off, I noticed that there's quite a dark shadow along the inside of the eye here. So I'm gonna take that shadow violet and just do an extra line here on the on top of the iris. And it's kind of almost coming down around. There's a little bit of this shadow coming into the center. Um, I'm going to do the same thing on this right eye, even though I don't see a huge shadow, but by doing this shadow just on the top of the eye. And then, of course, I see a little bit of shadow around where that highlight is. Yeah, and I also see a little bit of shadow coming around the inside. Now, what I did is I left just a little sliver of that color of the iris poking through, the same on this side. And what this does is it gives the eye a little bit more of a shape. And so it looks like it's sunk into the eye instead of sitting on top of the eye. Now, this is also where I might add a wet on dry layer of color. So just to give a little bit of that iris look to the eye. So here I've got my sap green. I mix it with just a little hint of, like, a golden yellow. And now I'll come in and I'll make some little tiny almost like cache marks that are pointing towards the eye, going around the pupil. All that is going to do is it is adding just this second layer of color, a little bit of detail, and then I'm going to let it dry. The last little the black then that I add is going to help out quite a bit here. All right, I'm going to take a peek at the nose and add any shadows around the nose that I see. So using this shadow violet, actually, I'm gonna water it just a little bit more. So I see there's a bit of a little line on top here, a shadow. This left hand side, just a little tiny shadow on this left side. And then it looks like I can actually add a slightly darker shadow on the left side of the nose. Looks like it's not quite dark enough here on the left side. Same thing, adding just a little few ash mark lines here in the center of the nose just to kind of emphasize that area just because I'm noticing it's a little bit more prominent than what I'm painting. And I want this chin, this left side of the chin just to go just a little bit more, so I'm using that shadow violet just on this left side of the chin, just a little bit. Maybe adding another stroke or two on the left hand side on the white. Alright, I think, too, before I add the layer of black, I do want to fix the shape of this eye here. So I'm noticing the top of this eye is a little bit more curved than what I did this left eye. So all I'm going to do is wet my brush. I'm gonna try to fix the angle of this. So I'm using my wet brush to kind of take away a little bit of this shape here. And then what I'm gonna do is I'm going to extend the corner of the eye and have this corner come up a little bit higher. It looks like it's not up quite as high. So I think just by upping that corner a little bit, it gives it a little bit more symmetry. Now, it's hard with your reference photos. Um, simply because with your reference photos, they might be at an angle. So the whole head could be tilted slightly, and so it might look off. And so when you are painting and you're noticing that something is off, you have every right as the artist to try to fix it to make it look a little bit more symmetrical unless that's kind of a main feature of the pet, and you know that. Most of the time, making it just slightly more symmetrical um, is helpful and is gonna make the portrait look a little bit nicer for the client. 10. Black Layer: Alright, so now we're ready for our layer of black. So here I'm going to grab some. This is lunar black, which is also granulating color by Daniel Smith. I am mixing it with water. I am going to start with the darkest areas around the eyes and nose and mouth and then go into the fur. The reason I'm doing that is because I want to make sure that the areas of focus have the darkest of darks. And if I start with the black of the fur, there is a risk that I make that fur too dark, and then it competes with the eyes a little bit. So I'm using the black pretty much directly from the pan here to fill in those pupils. And also to outline around the eye here. I'm going to do that with the other eye. So using a wet brush directly in that lamp lunar black, excuse me. I wait, and now I'm going to use that same dark lunar black outline just this bottom V, mainly just in the nostrils even. Um, you could do just, like, a touch of black in the center of the mouth just to get that a little bit deeper. I hesitate to do the whiskers here. I'm gonna wait and see what it looks like with the rest of the black. Alright, now that we did the darkness of black, now I can add just a little hint of water. And now we're going to use this water down lunar black. So if I were to add it on top of a different layer of that gray or add it here, you're gonna notice that it is lighter than what it looks like directly from the pan. So directly from the pan, of course, it's a little bit more opaque. The granulating feature happens mainly when you have larger pools of water. And then once it starts to dry, you'll be able to see the little grains. So if you look at the palette here, once it's starting to dry in the palate, even, you can start to see the granulating effect. I like that in cut portraits. I think the lunar black makes it really easy to lift if I made mistakes. It also allows for the color underneath to kind of shine through. However, some people really do not like it because it gives a texture without you trying. And some people really want that nice smooth surface. So if you're somebody that wants that nice smooth surface, you might want to look for a lamp black or a black that isn't granulating. So once again, I'm going to start with the ears. Outlining the ears. At least on this inside curve, I'm trying to keep the lightest part. So there's still a light highlight on this right hand side. Now with our black layer, we're trying to add this only to where we see our darkest colors, our darkest shades. I do want to be cautious about overdoing this black. And here is where I'm going to try to add a little bit of this same almost eyebrow on top, even though it's not showing it necessarily in my reference photo, but I know that it's there. Add a little bit more water here. So once I get to this section, her. I'm going to do the same as on this right side and kind of follow that curve. Here leaves some of that shining through. If I don't like how it looks or it looks awkward or weird, I can just go over it. But it does give a little bit more shape in that area of the face. Now, this lunar black is it can be, like I said, it can be a little frustrating to use because the minute that you add more water to it, it is going to lift very easily. So test it out. Maybe test out if you like using lunar Black in your pet portraits, test it out before you do a portrait that you're going to give away as a gift. And then we're doing the same concept here. Once we get to the edges where we have the edge of the white to black, we're just doing these little hash marks. And now with this black is where I can really add some of these smaller marks in the center to really give it shape. Almost looks like from the reference photo that there's a little connecting black section with this highlight under the eye. So that's what I did there. Alright, it looks like this right side is going well, so I'm going to move along to this or to the left side is going well, so I'm gonna move along to the right side. Same thing. I want this little dark edge around the ear. Maybe a few hairs, a few of those dark hairs coming in. And now on this right side, we're trying to conserve this highlight above the eye. Trying our best to kind of keep that arch shape. I'm just keeping a very, very light touch. And then on the upper edge of this eye is where it is the darkest. So there's almost, like, dark mascara or eyeliner, if you will, not mascara, dark eyeliner at the top. Now, because we're using this lunar black, it is going to be very easy to blend edges. Once it's dry, it's going to be a little bit more frustrating to blend your edges when it's wet because you'll end up pulling those edges up. So if you're starting to notice that these black edges are lifting and you're getting frustrated, lay down your black, let it dry, and then go back in with a damp brush, and I'll show you how to do that, as well. Kind of demo it just a little bit here for you. But go back then once it's dry and then lift up some color because it's going to be a little bit easier to blend those edges that are looking a little too rough. Wherever I'm seeing dark sections of black, where it's kind of very dark, I am using the edge of my brush. So in this cheek here, I might go in and use more of the edge of my brush or up here above the eye, more of the edge of the brush. So that it gives it a little bit more uniform. So even this here, I'm noticing it's a little too light. I'm gonna go back and adjust that afterwards. If I try to do any adjustment now while the color is still damp, it's just gonna end up kind of turning it into it'll end up lifting it a little bit. So I'll come back and make some adjustments after. Alright, so let's move into the chest area. So I'm gonna do a little bit more black color. Same thing for the chest area. Wow. Now, even though in my one reference photo, I'm noticing some white strands here in the black section. I'm not gonna add that just because I don't want it to take away from the rest of the painting. You can always add that with your bleed proof white. But that's gonna be really hard to keep those little tiny white hairs as you're painting with watercolors. Go back and add some more little hairs in the ear here. I'm noticing it's a little darker in the ear than what's showing. Even this is a little bit darker. So it's much easier to kind of cover up any of those sections. I'm noticing the white tufts are more at the top of the ears, so I just kind of covered up those are at the bottom. I forgot the little little tufts out of this ear. 11. Color Corrections: Alright, so at this point, we're going to do any sort of color corrections that we see as we are kind of finishing up here. So I added a little bit of water. I've got a little black on my brush. I'm just going to add a little bit more of a shadow to this left hand side. And what I'm doing here is I'm connecting the face with the chest. So I'm incorporating this shadow and bringing the shadow across those two sections. I'm taking a peek right now at the nose. I'm taking a peek at the eyes, taking a peek kind of all over and seeing First are my areas where it's black? Is it black enough? Do I need to add another layer of black anywhere? Um, do I need to blend out any sections? So here I'm adding just a little bit more black in these big areas. Now, here I had talked about that before. So what I can do if it's too bright is I can just take a damp brush, go over it very lightly. Same here with the eyes. If any sections of these highlights in the eyes are the highlights under the eyes, if they got too bright, just go over it with a little bit of water, blend it out a little bit. Right, and I'm pretty happy with that. I'm happy with kind of the shapes. Obviously, it's not meant to be like an exact picture, portrait, um, replica. And I do know that once I take those highlights off the eyes and add the little eyebrows here, it's gonna look a lot more like their pet. So now we're ready for the colorful smash. 12. Colorful Background Splash: Alright, so for the colorful splash around my pet, I'm gonna switch to a size six. I'm gonna switch out my water, so I've got a clean water. Now, normally, I ask my clients, Well, I ask all my clients if they have a particular color that they want around their pet. For this tuxedo cat owner, they did not want a certain color so that I could choose based off of their pet's coloring. And so, particularly with a pet that has such light coloring or well, without color. So just black and white. Sometimes it looks really nice to use the same color that you have in the eyes. And then it helps the eyes to pop a little bit. If you're not somebody who likes this kind of yellow sap green, you can always use a teal, so you can add just a little bit of blue to it, or you can add a little bit brown to kind of dirty it up a little bit to make it not quite as bright. The only thing that I would suggest with a black cat is if you are going to do a darker color, like a purple, that you really water it down quite a bit so that it's not too dark because we don't want to just have dark upon dark. So for my color full splashes, I mix my color first, and then I'm using water to kind of create these little blobs around my pet. So I'm going to start on one side. I don't go all the way to the edge, but you can kind of play around with your bob blob shape. So I kind of like to have water going at least over where the whiskers are so that you can see them. And then I'm going to have a little section of this ear pop out so I don't have that whole ear with color. I'm going to do a little section at a time. Once that section is wet, then I'm going to drop my color in. I like to drop it closest to the body, and then I can use a dry brush to kind of help me move that pigment where it wants to go. I might continue this little shape. Uh, down a little bit. Kind of doing the shapes here is probably the hardest, one of the hardest parts, too. We're trying to make a shape that will work with your painting that won't take away from your painting, and that won't look weird. So you can either leave it like this and have it dry however you want, or you can also wash and dry your brush, and then you can lift and blend some of those edges with a dry brush so that you don't have as hard of edges. Then here at the top of the head, I'm going to do just a little section of this green. Ears are gonna stick out. I don't do I personally don't do any sort of background, like, scene in for my pet portraits. One, because it would take me much longer, I'd have to charge a lot more. Two, I just don't like it. I think it helps to actually keep your eye on the pet. And then I do think it actually helps give it more of a modern vibe, where it looks a little bit more modern when you're hanging it on your wall. So you notice just how light that green color is. It's not overpowering. It's just kind of picking up the green highlight from the eyes, giving it just a little extra color without overpowering it. And, of course, those edges are kind of all warped. I personally like that. However, you might find with your style that you might want it a little bit different. So we'll let this dry, and then we'll come back and we'll look at the final details, including the masking fluid and the um white the bleed proof white. Now, I do suggest that you leave this to dry for at least a few hours. I usually leave it to dry overnight, and then I come back with fresh eyes, add whatever details I need. But it all depends on when you need it done by make sure that you have it dry for a few hours. 13. Final Details: Alright, so I let my painting dry, and I am ready for removing the masking fluid, adding some final details, and then also adding those whiskers on top of above the eyes. So first, I'm using a needed eraser to remove the masking fluid. Of course, you want to make sure that your painting is completely dry, so I've let it dry for a few hours. Now, using an need eraser like this is also going to simultaneously take away any of those little fine pencil marks that you have on, um, on any whiskers that you did not draw over. Alright. And then I'm also going to take off the masking fluid in the eyes. Those were the only two places that I had masculine fluid. J two little dots in the eyes, and then the whiskers. Now, a few things might be happening that you might need to adjust. The first thing, being particularly if you're painting a tuxedo cat that has a white or sorry, that has a black face, where the whiskers are attached, you might notice that where the white is coming out, it might be a little bit too intense, where it looks very obvious that it's coming out of, you know, that it started there. You might just want to take a damp brush and just kind of soften where those are coming out of the cheek. It's just gonna help to kind of blend it into the painting a little bit. It's not gonna be very obvious when I do it because it's white on the cheeks. The other thing that you can do, depending on your cat is you can also take a damp brush and move a damp brush just on top of the white where it's going over the black fur if it's too dark. So, especially if you have an all black cat or if you have a tuxedo cat that just has the tiniest liver of white here, sometimes these white whiskers get a little too white and too intense. And so you can just take a damp brush and go over those white whiskers and it'll just dull them slightly so that they aren't sticking out so much. The next thing that I'm going to do is I'm going to look at the eyes and see if I need to adjust the highlights at all. This is going to look like I might need to grab a little bit more black and adjust the black. I actually think it looks pretty good. Sometimes the white of the highlights comes out really well, and I don't need to make any adjustments. You can either use a paintbrush and some black or if you need something a little bit darker, you can also use a micron pen around the eye area and around those highlights of the eye. Like I said, I think it looks pretty good. So I am ready to take the tape off, and then I'm going to use some bled proof white for the whiskers. Alright, now, the doctor PH Martin bleedproof white is a very opaque substance. It is activated by water, so it is not oil based. We don't have to get any sort of type of cleaner to clean our brushes. We can use our own watercolor brushes. And I brought an example here to kind of show you how fine of linework you can get using this PH Martin bleedproof white. So all of these white furs on the Tiger's mouth I used this PH Martin bleedproof white, and I used a rigor brush. So, like I said, you're able to get slightly finer lines than what you can get with the masking fluid. I showed you two different ways here. So when you do your painting, you can always choose to use just the bleedproof white. I am going to take a spare sheet of paper just to practice this a little bit. I do want clean water. This rigor or liner brush is a size one. I would suggest getting kind of the smallest rigor brush you can. Now, the reason I'm using a rigor brush is because I do want to be able to make long lines. And if I use just a small round size zero or double zero, triple zero, I can't get enough liquid on the brush to get a long enough line. And so these rigor brushes, also known as script or liner brushes are great for that. It does take a little bit of practice, though, because you do need the lightest touch that you can possibly get. You also need quite a bit of liquid. You do need quite a bit of water on here to get that nice light line. Now, of course, the harder you press, the thicker the line. I don't want it that thick, so I am resting my wrist on my paper, and I'm keeping my hand firm here. I'm barely touching the paper, and I'm just using my wrist. I'm moving my wrist without moving my hand. I want that continuous arch so I'm not gonna try to move my fingers at all because I might create a weird arch. I'm moving my wrist here. Alright. I'm gonna open up my reference photo because I have my computer closed, and let's take a peek at how these eyebrows are. So I am going to start with kind of the smallest of the eyebrows. Um, once again, I'm making sure that my brush is nice and wet here. It's not necessarily so much that I need really opaque pigment, but I do I do need quite a bit of liquid on my brush so that it flows really well. Alright, so with this tuxedo cat, it's a few coming out of just above the eyes here. Now, with this of bleedproof white Ooh. That was close. Um, so it is pretty dark. I'm doing just the lightest touch. Now, this last one didn't connect. I'm not worried about that. I actually don't mind. I want these hairs to kind of blend in a little bit more than what I can get with the masking fluid. Now, just to kind of help them blend in, I'm going to see what it looks like to add just a few of these little white hairs along the edge of where the white is meeting the black here. Because in my UpClose reference photo, of course, there's a lot more of these little white hairs around the eye area. You can also see what it's like to add some of those little white hairs in the lower cheek. Now, this is where you can add as much extra detail as you want. If you wanted a little extra highlight in the eyes, you can add a little extra highlight. A little extra white in the eyes there. Sometimes depending on your pet, if you had little white areas, like in the corners of the eyes, you can also use bleedproof white for that. Just be aware that although you can kind of scrub it out, you'll never be able to lift it up completely. It will stay on that paper, so just be cautious of that. Now, I'm going to twist and turn this so that it's a little bit easier for me to do this other side. No, I think I'm gonna do the biggest one first, 'cause I've got quite a lot of liquid on this brush. Oh, that came out kind of thick. Little bit thicker than what I was hoping. So it's kind of always the risky run when you're doing any sort of fine detail line work. And then I want one of these coming in. One more here. One. Try to connect it a little bit more and make it a little longer. Alright, so I added a few more little tiny hairs around the eyes here, and I added just a few around the neck line, and I am all done. Oh, and I also added just a few in ears here. So really this bleed proof white you can use wherever you're needing a few extra white hairs. 14. Follow me!: If you enjoyed this video, I also have a variety of online tutorials on my website, Emily Marie watercolors.com, as well as SkillShare for SkillShare members. And I do sell completed physical watercolor kits where it comes with everything you need to paint at home. Visit Emily Marie watercolors.com.