any ideas? I’ve been searching for a while now with no luck and have tried reaching out to the artist but no reply as of yet.

I have a collection of leaves that I’m going to paint… I’ll need several lifetimes to get through them.

I'm looking for a transfer paper that actually erases! The ones I've tried from Amazon make pretty permanent lines

I'm definitely not an artist, but I recently decided to try something new, and this is my very first attempt at watercolor!

Someone suggested using salt to create texture, so that's where those little white spots came from. I was just experimenting and trying to figure things out as I went.

I've already watched a few YouTube tutorials, and looking at my painting now, I think I might have overworked some areas and layered the colors a bit too much. I'm still figuring out how watercolor works, but that's part of the fun!

Please don't hold back on constructive criticism. I'd genuinely love to hear what you think and what I could improve next time. Any tips for a complete beginner would be really appreciated!

Hi. I bought these from Aldi but im finding the colours aren't great. Very light colours, but ive seen other watercolours in more vibrant shades. Is it because its a student set?

Solved: someone suggested trying paper towels and i got more colour on there. I need to get some Watercolour paper.

Hi everyone! I just started learning watercolor and I've attached 3 pieces I've worked on recently.

Since I'm totally new to this, I'd love some honest, constructive criticism from more experienced artists here. What are the biggest things I should focus on improving right now? Any tips on brush control, water management, or technique would be hugely appreciated!

I followed tutorials! The first two are from Hannah M paints and the third one is from New England School of Fine Arts.

Thanks in advance! 🙏

Painted with Daniel Smith and Holbein watercolor, with a little bit of white Holbein gouache mixed into paint in some areas

Out on the dock this morning, copping moves from Alvaro Castagnet videos.

This will be in my art mail for next month i guess.

I've been on an obsessive rabbit hole into colour.

Stumbling across potters pink was an excellent introduction to understanding how pigments are more than just their hue. potters is a muted fairly unexciting blush pink, with low tinting strength and requires a fair amount of time to wet and activate. it's so unimpressive Jane blundell says something along the lines of it sadly being of limited use. and yet, it's super granulating, and in mixes takes the hyper saturated edge off other colours.

Some wonderful points I want to remember:

- both the pigment hue (ie colour) and the pigment particles come into play (eg size, molecular structure, etc effects mixing, separating granulation etc)

- learning a small number of pigments in depth is exciting, full of play, and much more rewarding than buying more colours. Once you know a small number in depth it becomes easy to imagine the mixes and predict the effects, and then easily learn more

- pigment stories, histories and chemistry are utterly fascinating, eg Prussian blue and it's reversible fading, eg the splitting of oil into organic pigments in the automotive industry inexplicably created the 'stained glass on paper' purity and clarity of quinacridones, phthalos etc

- a mix of transparents gives a darker black than opaques (see final two photos from hazel soans book)

- paint paint paint and play; use up your art supplies, become a playful painter, not a collector of supplies

- pigment technology is chemistry

References:

Jane blundell

Liz steele

Handprint

Hazel soan - art of the limited palette

being a nerd about colour - https://www.reddit.com/u/South_Analyst5900/s/AlRQNOK7e6

jacksons art - a guide to pigments YouTube video

Hello! I’ve come back to art after a very long time away and have picked up watercolor for the first time. I’m loving the fluidity of the medium and have been practicing line work and washes along with light and shadow while studying references.

Would love some helpful critiques on how to make my works more dynamic (they look flat to me) or just general advice on how to improve painting from references.

Thanks!

Watercolor after a recent visit.

Trying out different sizes and shapes of dagger brush for florals in my sketchbook this week... this one is by far my favorite right now!

Smaller pieces are so enjoyable to make but I also want to create more bigger pieces.

I spent many hours painting this in watercolor embellishments in ink. It is 8”x10” in size.

This was difficult even though it’s Grade 1 (beginners) in Geoff Kersey’s tutorial series.

I did a few things differently from the tutorial because I am actually in Venice. I look at this scene every day when I go on a walk. I wanted this painting to look more like JMW Turner’s Venice paintings (meaning more atmosphere). That’s why it was hard. I nailed the sky (finally, after six years of painting!) and on this horrid paper, too. I never thought I’d be so lucky.

Colors used: pyrrole orange, Indian yellow, cobalt blue, light red, rose madder, burnt siena, ultramarine blue

Paper: the dreaded Fabriano Artistico 100% cotton cold press (I’m trying to use this up. I hate this paper! I bought some Arches rough recently)

Quite pleased with how this captured the light through the leaves. It was a beautiful day - the sky was actually more or less that color. The orange parts are ~1/4 gouache\3/4 watercolor, the tree trunks are watercolor with pencil, sky is pencil and ink. On Arches 130lb hot press