Step by Step Watercolor Painting By Alistair Butt
March 27, 2008
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Below is a wonderful step by step watercolor demonstration by the very talented artist Alistair Butt.
Please take a moment to visit Alistair’s site when you are finished reading through this demonstration. There a handful of other demonstrations on his website, tips on painting supplies, limited edition prints for sale and more. |
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Stage One |
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A drawing of the subject was produced on pre-stretched Bockingford 250lb watercolour/watercolor paper. Before any painting is started all the white areas of the painting are masked, in this case all the swans (I used colourless masking fluid from Winsor & Newton). Next the whole paper area is given a wash with plain water and while this is soaking into the paper I’ll pre-mix the first wash colours/colors on the palette. The first wash is to establish the sky and remove the remaining white areas of paper. A light grey/blue for the sky which was extended down to the river as this colour/color would become the highlight areas on the river and the beginnings of the shadows placed in the foreground. |
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Stage Two |
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| Two methods can be used for the this stage. The first is to mask all the foreground leaves and paint the background first or second (as I have done here) is to paint the leaves first and then mask before painting the background. The leaves are created from three washes, each of changing colours/colors working from light to dark. |  |
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Stage Three |
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All the leaves painted in stage two had masking fluid painted over them plus highlight areas on the water were also masked. Having pre-mixed the colours/colors needed, the background was painted using two wet into wet washes, the first wash was allowed to dry before applying the second, softening any edges that were too sharp using clear water. I also painted the reflections while the correct colours/colors were on the brush. Some loosely applied detail was added to the middle distant trees. |
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Stage Four |
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With the masking fluid still on the leaves I painted the foreground tree trunk with four washes. Starting with the highlight colours/colors then starting the modeling with a mid to dark colour/color wash followed by adding the details, like the branches, splits in the bark etc before the final shadow wash. The masking fluid from the leaves was then removed and some softening of the edges is done. More detail for the reflections on the river is added before a darker version of the sky colour/color is washed over the whole river. |
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Stage Five |
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| Moving to the foreground. The whole area is given a wash to establish the sunlight parts of the grass and tree on the right |  |
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Stage Six |
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| Two darker washes followed in the tree and on the grass to start creating the shadows cast from trees to the right hand side. The washes were a mixture of wet into wet and wet on dry. |  |
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Stage Seven |
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| Further detail was added to the tree on the right. The final grass shadow wash was added and as sharper edges were required the details like the twigs on the grass, gate and the plants by the river edge were painted last. |  |
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Stage Eight |
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| The final part (having removed the masking fluid that covered the swans from the beginning) was to paint the swans. The swans were painted with four washes, the first being a warm wash to capture the sunlight on the swans with the following three for the modeling and shadow areas working from light to dark and allowing each wash to dry before progressing, whilst being careful not to paint a shadow wash over a swan standing in sunlight. The details for the heads and legs being the last parts to be painted. |  |
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All Images and Text are © Copyright, Alistair Butt
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