Techniques 1-3 - Wet on Wet, Wet on Dry & Gradients

The learning continues as does the exploration.  

`Following the following the following video, I explored the various elements discussed.

How & Where to Wart with Watercolor Painting for Beginners

The guidelines prior to beginning are to:

• Ensure purchasing good quality paints.
• As for paintbrushes, you don't need lots.  It is suggested you choose a few but with skill can use one large brush and achieve small think lines - it's a matter of control.
• Paper - need water colour paper....thicker and better quality as it's the foundation of the piece.

Setting up the workspace is important.  You would need two jars of water - one clean to add to paints and one to clean brushes.  You would also need  mixing dishes.and tape to frame and hold down the paper when working.  

Technique 1 - Wet-on-Wet 

Wet on wet is, as the name implies. You wet your paper and with very watered down watercolours, begin to layer.  Wet-on-Dry is when you apply watercolours to a dry paper, but, in my case, on an already dry gradient background.  the dry paper allows for more intense colours, less washed out, watered down.

Technique 2 - Wet-on-Dry

This technique is exactly as the name implied.  Ensuring that the paint is watered-down, it is applied to dry paper.  The colours will be more vibrant and more distinct.  They will not blend as easily as if the technique was wet-on-wet.

Technique 3 - Gradients - Creating a gradient with the wet-on-wet technique.  Start with your desired colours, and create lines of paint, starting heavy and getting lighter and lighter as there is less and less paint on the brush.  If more paint is needed, go back and repeat the process.  Adding other colours at other points makes a great multi colour blend.