Watercolour PaintingI am sure that like me you have childhood memories of painting and drawing - it's one of the activities that all children enjoy. Yet so many of us forget what fun we had as we grow up and the pressures of life take over. But if you look for it you can still regain the magic of losing yourself in the joy of creating a work of art personal to you.
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Porofino - This is one of my earlier paintings, lots of fine details, but still many things to learn
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What do I need to start?
To start you will need some paper, paints and a brush. You'll also need two containers for water - one for mixing paint with and one for cleaning brushes - and something to mix paint on - a plate will suffice for this. A board and some tape to secure the paper is ideal although you can use the paper still in the pad. Get some tissue handy to dry brushes. A pencil and rubber will be needed to sketch out your picture before you start painting.
Ideally you should use proper watercolour paper - this can be bought in small pads and you will find it much easier to paint on than cheaper thinner papers. If you have never come across it before you will be surprised at how thick it is - around 4 to 6 times thicker than photocopy paper. This is necessary as when it is wetted thin paper will just wrinkle up and maybe fall apart. Get a paper with some texture - this will probably be called NOT (this means not pressed to make it smooth). You can use cartridge paper if you have nothing else, but should avoid wetting too large an area at one time.
Paints come in either pans (small tablets of colour) or tubes. Either are suitable, pans are more portable, tubes make it easier to mix a lot of paint for larger paintings. Avoid children's sets - the round tablets in these contain mostly chalky filler and very little colour so they give a pale washed out colour which fades a lot as they dry. Watercolour paints come in two qualities - student and artists. Student colours are more reasonably priced and quite sufficient for beginners. Artist colours contain more, higher quality pigment and do produce a better result, but they are priced at 2 to 5 times as much as the student quality equivalent. The easiest way to get some paints to to purchase a small set of pans or tubes. You do not need one with lots and lots of colours - six to ten will suffice as you will be able to mix any other colours from these.
If you buy a set it may well include a brush. Get a round brush about a size 6, and make sure it has a good point - this will allow you to use it for fine details with the point or larger washes using the whole brush. You can buy small sets of synthetic brushes quite cheaply that perfectly adequate for beginners.
That should be enough to get started. Before attempting a painting experiment with mixing colours and doodling on a sheet of paper. Try diferent strengths of paint by adding more or less water - this will help you to get to know how strong to mix the paint. It should always be mixed with some water - it should always form a flat liquid wash without any texture on the paper. Also try using diferent amounts of paint on the brush - try dabbing the brush on a tissue to soak up most of the liquid so that the brush is almost dry and just leaves paint on the texture in the paper. Try mixing some colours - yellow and blue make green, red and blue purple. You can make black by mixing a brown and a blue.
Once you have got an idea of how it all works together try painting a simple picture. Don't worry if it does not turn out as you expected - just make a note of what went wrong and think about how to do it differently next time.
Ideally you should use proper watercolour paper - this can be bought in small pads and you will find it much easier to paint on than cheaper thinner papers. If you have never come across it before you will be surprised at how thick it is - around 4 to 6 times thicker than photocopy paper. This is necessary as when it is wetted thin paper will just wrinkle up and maybe fall apart. Get a paper with some texture - this will probably be called NOT (this means not pressed to make it smooth). You can use cartridge paper if you have nothing else, but should avoid wetting too large an area at one time.
Paints come in either pans (small tablets of colour) or tubes. Either are suitable, pans are more portable, tubes make it easier to mix a lot of paint for larger paintings. Avoid children's sets - the round tablets in these contain mostly chalky filler and very little colour so they give a pale washed out colour which fades a lot as they dry. Watercolour paints come in two qualities - student and artists. Student colours are more reasonably priced and quite sufficient for beginners. Artist colours contain more, higher quality pigment and do produce a better result, but they are priced at 2 to 5 times as much as the student quality equivalent. The easiest way to get some paints to to purchase a small set of pans or tubes. You do not need one with lots and lots of colours - six to ten will suffice as you will be able to mix any other colours from these.
If you buy a set it may well include a brush. Get a round brush about a size 6, and make sure it has a good point - this will allow you to use it for fine details with the point or larger washes using the whole brush. You can buy small sets of synthetic brushes quite cheaply that perfectly adequate for beginners.
That should be enough to get started. Before attempting a painting experiment with mixing colours and doodling on a sheet of paper. Try diferent strengths of paint by adding more or less water - this will help you to get to know how strong to mix the paint. It should always be mixed with some water - it should always form a flat liquid wash without any texture on the paper. Also try using diferent amounts of paint on the brush - try dabbing the brush on a tissue to soak up most of the liquid so that the brush is almost dry and just leaves paint on the texture in the paper. Try mixing some colours - yellow and blue make green, red and blue purple. You can make black by mixing a brown and a blue.
Once you have got an idea of how it all works together try painting a simple picture. Don't worry if it does not turn out as you expected - just make a note of what went wrong and think about how to do it differently next time.
