PaintBox Tip #30 Secret 7 Watercolour MO's

Process strategies every watercolour painter needs to know!!

Start with less pigment 
Good quality pigment that has been in your palette for a few days will work fine for MONTHS!!). Just give it a wee spritz with water when you’re ready and it will be good to go!! Then give the pigment a wee tap with a damp brush, mix with some water.
End with more pigment
During the latter stages of your painting, add fresh, creamy paint to your palette and increase the amount of pigment you use, particularly in your focal area. A painting made with the same paint to water ratio throughout can look lifeless and dull – variety is the spice of life!!

Start thin                   
start with thin washes – lots of water, a tiny touch of pigment. Then add a little more pigment, then a little more pigment until …  think of each “layer” as tea, coffee, milk, cream and butter.
End thick                                 
towards the end of your painting, continue to increase the amount of pigment until its almost straight from the tube.

Start big                                  
your initial blocking-in will be big (background) shapes. For example, sky, mountain range, land, treeline, foreground, shadows = no detail
End small                                 
Add detail marks in the final stages of your painting eg, one or three sheep, fence post, letterbox, gumboot, Farmer Brown etc.

Start soft edged           
the most wonderful thing about blocking-in is creating a soft edged underpainting – allowing the colours to blend and bleed is the natural wonder of watercolour – given to us on a plate!! Continue to create soft edges as you progress through your painting.
End hard edged                       
As your painting dries more, hard edges will appear and draw the viewers eye to your focal area.

Start with big brushes               
Start a painting by blocking in with a big brush, bigger than you think you can handle or is right for your paper size
End with small brushes             
your final marks will be calligraphic detail marks with smaller brushes
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Start with light values                
Similar to pencil sketching, your lightest to mid value colours can be washed in around your areas of planned whites – it’s better if the whites are too big, they can be solved later. Then you can build darker values on top of that until you have painted all the values you planned in your value sketches.
End with dark values                 
our final values will be the darkest you planned in your concept and value sketches.

Start with more water                
this is when you need your big full bodies soft brush – to load up lots of water or colour tinted water and to create your blocking-in washes.
End with less water                   
progress your painting with less and less water all the while increasing the amount of pigment. Your finishing marks may be almost paint straight from the tube.

BONUS SECRET!!
Start holding brush at tip           
for less control and brush strokes from the shoulder while you block-in and create your foundational BIG shapes
End holding the ferrule  
like you’re writing a cheque, my Glaswegian tutor used to say. This is where you’ll need more control, as you are “writing” your calligraphic finishing marks  

Have fun!!