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After an absence of 8 months, I get nostalgic about the sights and sounds of Maine. The little village of East Boothbay consists of a couple of boatyards, a restaurant that hangs out over the water, the post office in an old gray shingled structure at the bottom of the hill, and a general store and the Methodist Church at the top of the hill.
Since it was Sunday, and the post office was closed, I could park my car in front where I had a good view of the hill leading up to the church which presides over the small hamlet. The road crosses a reversible falls which flows in and out of Mill Pond at high and low tide. (I think I'll save that for next Sunday!) The sounds of the seagulls and the gushing water tugged at my heart, and I spent a happy two hours painting the familiar sight that I see every day.
Getting the perspective right was the major problem in this painting. The horizon level was very low, about at the point where the road begins to rise. Everything above the horizon line slants downward.
As usual I painted a light wash as the underpainting. You can see the first especially on the road, but also realize that the trees had a first layer of yellow green which I built upon in the next glazes.
The red foundation of the old church conveniently provided the complement to all the green foliage, and helps the viewer focus on the church. The shadows across the road keep it from getting too uniform. I even made up a shadow at the bottom of the paper to keep the composition from running off the page. (More on the use of shadows in compositions at a later time!)
Paint, write, sculpt what you know and love.
"Anderson's Poppies"
Many of my novice watercolor students ask me, "Carol, how do you know what to do first?" Or "How do you know what to do next?"
Over the years, I've developed a checklist. At first I literally wrote it out. Then at the end of the day in my own little private critique, I would go through the list and see if I had paid attention to the elements and principles that are the building blocks of painting.
1. Always start with clear values and shapes. Have at least three values plus your white paper.
A value study is most important. Plan the large shapes; skip the accents and details.
2. Decide what you want to do with color. Will this be a predominantly warm or cool painting? Or is a neutral palette called for?
3. Paint a light first wash with some color changes in it.
4. Think about glazing. Direct glazes are developed by charging color into an area of another color.
Or, when an area dries, you can paint on top of it with a darker value.
5. Plan your darks so they will be at or near the focal point.
In this painting of a ceramicist's front yard which blooms with vibrant red poppies each June, you can see the first and second stages in which I developed the shapes, the complementary colors of red and green, and the underpainting on top of which will later be painted the midtones and darks. I try to start with a wet in wet technique so that I can choose to either keep an area soft or place hard edges on top of it. Since flowers are soft, I tried not to dot the page with hard edges, but rather flowed on the orange-red suggestions of the poppies at the beginning on the wet page.
Also, since I wanted the tree trunk to remain warm, I painted it first and then painted the whole cool background around it.
Begin with a plan. Paint with words in your head. Not "house", "tree", or "poppies", but with wet into wet, color choices, values, and shapes.
First there was packing. Then there was hauling all my stuff down to the car. Then the long drive to New Hampshire where I had hoped to get three days of painting in, but alas, it rained the entire stay. Finally I arrived in Maine, but there are always the start up chores: banking, grocery shopping, gardening, etc. Then the weather was rainy and cold. Today, the chores were done, the weather was perfect, and I headed out to do what I come here for.
What to paint my first day out? I have certain go-to locations, and this time I chose the end of the pier at Sample's Shipyard. I must have painted this two dozen times, but it's nearly a ready made composition, so I don't have to struggle too much on the first outing of the season. I also have painted this boat every summer. Getting back in the routine, for me, means going back to the basics: getting the drawing right, figuring out the values, and remembering the procedures.
I'm sure that later in the summer I'll experiment again, and that will be fun, or maybe a challenge. But for now, I just needed to swing the brush again! More to follow without such a wait. Thanks for your patience.
Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I was packing up to travel east for my annual trip to Maine. Now that I'm in New Hampshire, it decided to rain non-stop for the entire three days I've been here, so plein air painting was out. I finally dug out my sketch book and went to the North Conway Railroad station and did a quick sketch with the windshield wipers going! No instruction this time....just an apology for being absent so long, and encouragement to keep your sketch book handy!
Sometimes a landscape composition will benefit from the inclusion of a figure. The fisherman in this painting anchors the scene, even though the painting is about the waterfall.
I am convinced that most men who fish secretly do it because it gives them a manly reason to be out in nature. The quiet (well, waterfalls aren't exactly quiet!), the beauty, the wildlife....all give a peaceful atmosphere in which to rest, to heal, to contemplate and to slow down. Anyone read Hemingway?
A few years ago there was an obituary in the Boothbay Harbor Register that read: "In lieu of flowers, take a young person fishing." I didn't know the deceased, but I sure wanted to.
"Morning Harbor" by Maine Artist, Carol Jessen
As artists, we sometimes seem to think that the more paint we spread on a piece of paper, the more saleable it will be. In depicting this quiet harbor scene, though, I felt that I had to convey the serenity of the scene by limiting the number of "busy" areas in the painting. This painting was all about the warmth of a quiet morning light, and the reflections in the still waters.
A big wash of mostly warm color suggested the sky and water in the scene. Cluttering up the painting with more objects would have only destroyed that calm feeling. It's not about buying a painting for the amount of paint expended in creating the work; it's about selectively leaving out anything that would destroy the mood.
"All Saints By The Sea Chapel"
by Carol Jessen, Maine Artist
Last week I gave a workshop in St. Charles, Missouri. My students were great! We had a fun time, and I hope they learned a lot, too.
One piece of advice I gave them is to work towards the dark shapes. In order to do that you have to know how to mix a really dark paint color. And that requires a lot of pigment!
So many students are not squeezing out enough paint on their palettes. You can't mix a dark with a tiny bit of paint.
A couple of years ago I visited the Wyeth Museum in Chadd's Ford, Pennsylvania. There was a special exhibit that taught me a big lesson. As I walked around looking at wondrous paintings by Andrew and Jamie Wyeth and Rockwell Kent, I began to notice that much of the drama of their work was due to the ability to create very dark shapes to set off the lights. Get a book of reproductions and study it and you'll see what I mean!
Speaking of workshops, don't forget my Maine workshop July 20th - 24th in beautiful Boothbay Harbor, Maine. Here is one of many possible spots we may paint that week. Please notice the dark shapes around the front of the church and especially the steeple.
"Tying Up" by Maine Artist, Carol Jessen
In this painting of a lobsterman tying up his dinghy, the sky area provides a foil for the hard edged shapes of boats. Creating soft edges requires speed so the transition areas are still fully wet and not just damp or else a hard edge or jagged edge will result. It also helps if you have some courage when hitting a wet area with a fully loaded brush of pigment. Remember that if the paper is fully saturated, you need not bring more water to the paper when you dash in the color in that area.
You can also wait until the paper is completely dry and then re-wet it with a light stroke before hitting it again with a darker color. The paint will spread and create a soft edge.
This takes quite a bit of practice to understand the ratio of water to paint. It's like practicing the scales. Skip at your own peril!
"Mountain Village" by Maine Artist, Carol Jessen
Creating a sense of depth in a landscape depends on both value and color.
As things recede in space, they become lighter and lighter with ever so much more atmosphere between the viewer and the landscape. Since the watercolorist usually proceeds from light to midtone to dark, the lightest value is the sky, the farthest plane is a light midtone, the middle plane is the middle to middle dark, and you will find the darkest values in the foreground.
Also in landscapes the coolest colors are likely to be found in the far distance. Colors tend to become warmer as they advance toward the viewer.
In this painting of a little town in Germany where I taught for a year, I used a thalo blue-green, light toned color for the sky. When transitioning to the farthest mountain, I switched to a warmer ultramarine blue which I grayed. A little more ultramarine in the nearest mountain which is a little darker as well. Finally the dark green foliage which surrounds the center of interest is warmer, too, because of the addition of yellow and burnt sienna.
If you can begin to think in terms of these planes, your paintings will portray distance in a much more believable way.
"Regatta" by Maine artist, Carol Jessen
This is the first of the series of sailboat paintings I've been doing. Everything was wet-in-wet, soft edged. In subsequent paintings I tightened edges up, and then loosened them up again. Scroll down to see other paintings.
Sometimes just playing around will show you a new possibility. Colors, edges, shapes, accents....all can be changed around and manipulated. Staying with the same subject and taking a different approach can be very educational.
"Larry Lobster Goes Out On A Date" by Carol Jessen, Maine Artist
In this painting of lobsters, I wanted warm colors, especially red, to dominate. But a warm themed painting needs a bit of cool colors to provide some relief. So, in the first wash underpainting, I splashed in some blue. This takes some courage! Don't let the white of the paper fool you. Be bold!
I titled the painting "Larry Lobster Goes Out On A Date". Just having some fun with this one!
One way to insure that the paper will accept the pigment is to pre-wet the page using a natural sponge. First, this removes the sizing on the paper, making the application of the paint more uniform. Second, it slows the drying time down. Finally, it creates soft edges that can later be contrasted with hard edges.
In this painting of a sailboat regatta, I wet the entire page and then lightly brushed in the first wash. When this was dry, I made the decisions about what to keep soft and where to emphasize subject matter with hard edges. Gradation is a form of soft edge formation, too.
Last, I added textures and calligraphy for interest and movement.
My goal in this painting was to suggest the movement of a regatta race. I started by painting the negative space around the white sails. The design of those sails was crucial. The big shape of the foreground sail was balanced by the shapes of the other sails as they recede. I created a sense of movement with brushstrokes and with the tilt of the sails which gave the negative spaces different sizes and shapes as well. Once that was done, the colorful accents and darks were dashed in to create texture and visual interest in the white shapes.
Keeping the negative shapes relatively neutral in color was also helpful to keep them subordinated to the sails. As a result, any orange and black accents stand out.
Don't forget about my May workshop in St. Charles, Missouri, and my annual Maine workshop in July!
Several autumns ago, I drove down to Carthage, Missouri for some fall painting. I discovered a little recreated farm village. I even met the man who conceived it and transported the buildings from far and near. I also sold a painting of one of the buildings to its owner!
This morning I found two photos of my trip. I combined the farm and windmill from one, adding the little cupola to break up the straight line of the roof, and then added the chicken from another shot.
Don't be a slave to your photos. Play with composition, values, colors, adding and subtracting where necessary.
"Hendrick's Head Summer"
15" X 22"
Most watercolorists will tell you that you begin with the lights, proceed to the midtones and then punch it up with the darks. Goodness knows that's the way I was taught and how I've painted through the years.
However, some watercolorists begin with the darks, among them Ted Kautzky. I've always resisted this idea because when I first tried it, the darks would bleed when a midtone was placed on top of it.
Also, certain color combinations would create muddy darks. It always resulted in an ugly mess.
Now that I understand a lot more about the amount of water, brush pressure and color combinations, I've once again tried the darks-first method with a little more success than my first attempts at this sequence.
Here's an example of this approach.
"The Bay Lady" 15" X 22"
I placed the Friendship sloop Bay Lady on the third, but needed something else on the other side of the teeter-totter, so I placed the distant three sails near the shoreline to balance the large boat in the foreground. The sailboats at shore's edge also helped break up a straight line to avoid what Edgar Whitney called "monotony en route."
Consider balancing one large shape with several smaller shapes on the other side of the page.
Hendrick's Head Lighthouse "22 X 30"
I'm so happy to announce my 6th summer workshop in Boothbay Harbor, Maine July 20 - 24th.
Contact me at caroljessen@yahoo.com or call me: 314-968-5567. This is a beautiful area with loads of subject matter. Check out this painting of one of our painting sites.
Lessons change every summer. I still encourage beginners as well as seasoned painters to come enjoy the Boothbay Region, and to try out new techniques and especially to figure out how to begin a new painting.
This is Hendrick's Head Lighthouse. I've painted it at least a hundred times, but never tire of the challenge of different ways to approach the subject.
" Cornwall Beach "
15" X 22"
I am happy to announce a two day spring workshop to be held at the Missouri Artists on Main Street in historic St. Charles.
Dates: Thursday, May 7th and Saturday, May 9th.
Time: 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
Tuition: $150
Subjects: Landscapes in Three Steps
1. Wet-Into-Wet
2. Gradation (of color and values)
3. Drybrush and line
Underpainting/Glazing
Contact Jean McMullen at 636-724-1260 or jmcmullenart@aol.com
There is a limit of 10 students for this fact-packed workshop. Make your reservation soon. Last fall's workshop filled up quickly!
Sometimes it's a good idea to de-emphasize the foreground or background by painting wet-into-wet to keep the edges soft. But in some landscapes, I like to look past something interesting in the foreground to something interesting in the mid-ground and the far distance.
In this painting, I looked through the trees at a serene lake scene. In the foreground I placed a focal point of a birch tree on the left. Knowing that a flat lake would hold little interest, I added some sailboats in the middle ground. And finally, a low hanging cloud and its cast shadow on the distant mountains provided a point of interest even farther back.
In this way I supply a pathway through the scene.
Watch this space for a workshop announcement soon!
Now that I have to start thinking about packing up to go back to St. Louis, it's finally gotten warm enough to paint outdoors in a T-shirt. It is 76 degrees here on the panhandle this afternoon! I'd stay longer but I have an important doctor's appointment.
As with many trips, I find the view from my room quite memorable. This is my second painting of the view from my balcony. I like sitting in my room looking up river past this old tree and will miss it when I return to the frozen north.
You don't always have to find the "iconic" view of the area you are visiting; the familiar view will do just fine!
I've been in Eastpoint, Florida for most of the time since Dec. 21st. The weather has been completely uncooperative, not allowing me to paint outside even once. Today I finally had the opportunity to paint in my tee shirt. I could have driven miles to find a subject to paint, but instead I chose to paint this scene off my balcony here at Sportsman's Lodge. The reason was because I saw the layers of landscape as the subject matter.
Look around you, and you'll probably be able to find suitable subjects not far from your front door!
In this painting of an historical meeting house in Manatee Village Historical Park, I was trying to set the feel of the day, which was overcast and rather spooky with the Spanish moss lending its ghostly mood.
A scene like this does not call for carnival colors. Grays were the order of the day. The only relief comes around the bottom of the old building in the form of some warmer colors.
Part of the challenge of painting is to convey a mood to the viewer. Consider color as one of the most powerful allies in accomplishing that goal.
When I'm on vacation, I always take my sketchbook everywhere. Lunchtime is a perfect time to make a record of where you've visited. While waiting for my food down by the sponge docks in Tarpon Springs yesterday, I took advantage of the view from my table. Rather than trying to include the whole harbor, I zeroed in on the reason for the docks: the sponges.
First I drew lines to indicate the direction of the string of sponges. Then I carefully drew some of the individual sponges while suggesting the outlines of other strings. The values and details fade the farther they are from the focal point.
I still maintain that drawing and painting focus your attention from a casual glance to an intense study of your subject. So take that sketchbook with you!
"Coquina Beach"
15" X 22"
Concentrating on values rather than color can make the painter's job much easier. The wet-into-wet sky and foreground first wash employed yellow ochre with a touch of burnt sienna very lightly applied. Work quickly so the colors will blend. If you don't work fast, the page will start to dry.
The second wash is a series of graded washes which establishes the major shapes. Steer clear of any textures at this stage. You can shift from cool to warm within a shape, but try to grade the wash from mid-tone to light.
Finally, suggest textures at the edges of the darker shapes. Try to connect the darks so those areas don't "float" alone on the top of your previous washes. This is also the time for some calligraphic marks and accents.
Three steps: Wet-into-wet for soft edges. Graded shapes for the midtones. And dark shapes with some textures at the last stage. And that's how you K.I.S.S. (Keep it simple, Stupid!)
In the 1860's, the French Impressionists veered way off the course chosen by their traditional predecessors. First, they rejected the salon-type of subject matter, i.e. mythological or religious subject matter, in favor of landscapes and the play of light and effects of color on the viewer.
Second, they moved their studios outdoors to experience the light firsthand rather than rely on memory or sketches.
I've been a plein air painter for most of my adult painting life. I love being in the open air, with the sounds, quickly changing light and tides, and even the effect that the temperature and smells have on me while painting. Looking long and carefully at the scene in front of you gives an intensity of experience that is less likely to occur when working from a photo or sketch.
However, in winter or when you have limited time which makes being outside difficult or impossible to paint on the spot, I need to keep my hand and brain engaged in the activity of painting, so I have resorted to using photos to generate a value sketch and then produce a finished painting.
In doing so, I've become less of a snob about having to be outdoors. I find pleasure in working up a value sketch and painting from it. I've also found that this gives me the time to think about how to proceed: which values to paint first, second, third, etc., as well as considering what colors to choose. This is the case with the value sketch in the previous painting and the finished work above. I would like to have been on the spot in Austria where I snapped this scene from a tour bus in the early '70's, but I couldn't be. But I painted anyway.
I still recommend a value sketch when working indoors rather than working directly from a photo. We tend to restrict ourselves and become too literal with only the frozen scene captured on film. It gives you more leeway and familiarizes you with the scene without becoming a slave to the mentality that proclaims defensively, "Well, that's the way it was."
Happy painting on this day before the big blizzard of 2015!
A couple of workshops ago when I told my students that I would prefer to see a value sketch before they started painting, one student produced a revealing effort.
There was a fairly accurate line drawing of the lighthouse, with an outline of the roof, the windows and doors, and the top of the light. There was an indication of trees along the shore and the rocks on the beach. The problem was that there were no value differences in those shapes. Inside the tree shape there were some squiggles, an attempt to provide a textural suggestion of leaves, I think.
More squiggles on the sides of the building and on the rocks. All these areas were fairly light and tentative.
When I asked the student to point out the #1 value, she correctly identified the sky, but suddenly realized that the beach and water were also #1 values in her sketch. She then identified the tree line as #2, but that was the extent of the the #2 value. There were no #3 or #4 values.
The problem was that she was confusing a line drawing with a value sketch. There was also an attempt to indicate textures rather than values. With only two values present, and those so close that they were barely distinguishable, her value sketch was basically useless. A good value sketch can be a map as to what to paint first, second, third, etc. traditionally proceeding from light values to dark. It can also be useful in conveying where the greatest contrasts in values occur, creating an area of interest. Last, a value sketch can also tell you where to preserve the white shapes.
See if you can clearly label five values (not including the saved whites) in this value sketch.
A couple of posts ago, I spoke of the power of a white shape. White shapes have to be carved out. In this painting of a local theatre here in Apalachicola, I used the local color of red to be the positive shape. Being such an aggressive color, the red draws you in to the focal point. Add a few figures waiting to purchase their tickets and you have an area of color and people who form the interest in the painting.
Happily, the painting sold to the owner of the theatre!
The "rule" of format is that landscapes are primarily horizontal and portraits are vertical. But once in a while, a vertical format is the best choice for a landscape, which in this case emphasizes the narrowness and height of a city street in Rothenburg, Germany.
And don't forget the figures!
White is a powerful attractor, especially when the shape is interesting and it is surrounded by very strong midtones or darks.
The white area in this tugboat didn't require much alteration to achieve an interesting shape. The challenge was to emphasize it with strong and colorful colors and accents.
Covering a large area such as the sky in this painting can be daunting. If you start on dry paper, the wash can quickly become filled with hard edges where you stop to pick up or mix more color. In order to avoid that, I first mixed up a large puddle of thalo blue/green. Then I wet the sky area with clear water almost to the white area. It was then easier to flood the area with color and adjust it by picking up some ultramarine blue or more thalo green.
Values were extremely important in exploiting the pure white of the paper. The white of the paper can fool you into thinking you're going dark enough, so I tried to think of going darker than I thought it should be.
When the sky and water were dry, I began to further punch up the whites with the trim on the boat. I changed my blue to cobalt so it would be dark enough but warmer than the cool blues of the sky.
The final stage was to add the little red accents.
The first washes of a watercolor are likely to be covered by succeeding washes. So why include them in the first place?
Because watercolor is transparent, the first washes can influence the second or even third wash. The first wash may also determine the temperature of the finished painting. Will the painting be primarily warm or cool? The first wash may provide the relief from the final temperature. A warm undertone may be the contrast for the cool dominant hues.
In this painting of a Roman piazza, I wanted a warm hue to dominate the painting. I flooded the middle part of the paper with yellow ochre. Then quickly I extended the first wash with cooler, more neutral hues. After all was dry, I placed darker, but same temperature colors on top. If you glaze a cool over a warm or a warm over a cool, you will probably wind up with "mud".
Finally, be bold with the underpainting. If it is too diluted, it can't do its job. The white of the paper can fool you into thinking you've gone too dark, but the second wash will prove that wrong.
Happy glazing!
In my previous post I showed you the value sketch for the painting of St. Mark's Plaza in Venice. I painted it this morning and it was just yucky! There wasn't enough going on. There weren't enough interruptions in the straight line of the bottom of the building, and my brush strokes got too careful and slow. What to do, what to do?
I remembered all the little cafes around the plaza, and of course, the crowded square. I decided that some umbrellas would echo the domes and by placing them where I did they also repeated the oblique line of the shadow coming from the bell tower. I kept the sky quiet, and the large shadow area is also without texture. That way the "action" stays in the focal area of the buildings and with the people sitting having their espressos.
I think the rapidity of my strokes helped to keep the shapes simple and not too overstated. In my first attempt, I used flat brushes which lead me to define the edges too carefully. I switched to a big mop brush in the second painting which caused me to be looser.
The lesson of the day was to speed up my painting process and keep the details to a minimum.
I spent my Christmas Eve sketching the value study for the painting of St. Mark's Plaza in Venice that I will do today. It's from my collection of slides I took in Europe many years ago. The lacy quality of the buildings and the big shadow from the bell tower attracted my interest.
One more advantage of doing a value study before you paint is that it gives you a chance to think about color choices. Since the sun is behind the buildings, I decided that the sky should be a gradation of yellow. That choice leads me to think that the complement of yellow--violet--should be featured in the silhouette of the architecture. That contrast will enliven both colors.
I'll keep the details in the interior shape of the cathedral to a minimum. The abstract shapes of the piece are then emphasized and the color should further carry the day.
What a happy way to spend my Christmas day while the turkey is in the oven!
After going through the same stack of photos for the umpteenth time looking for something to paint, I suddenly thought, I wish I could paint some of my photos of Europe. Only trouble is, they are on slides. I didn't want to burn up the slide projector bulb finding and then sketching or painting the great scene.
I solved the problem by projecting my slides on the wall and then photographing the projected image with my instamatic camera. It worked great, and now I have about fifty photos to work from this winter when I'm in Florida and the weather isn't cooperative.
I'm still a convert to the belief that a value sketch is a desired first step to creating a well designed painting. So here is the value sketch and painting of a couple of tin mines along the coast of Cornwall, England.
With all that's been happening in my hometown these days, I just haven't felt like painting. Sometimes our emotional state affects our ability to concentrate on our painting life. But finally I forced myself into the studio. I combed through my photos and found a pic I took in Mystic Seaport, Connecticut years ago. I returned to an old theme: dockside subject matter. I also love painting reflections in water and boats. Finding quiet in this kind of setting soothes my anxieties.
I'm thinking that with Christmas coming, maybe I ought to try a snow scene. A return to thinking about painting leads to actual painting.
Lately I've been emphasizing the importance of the value sketch as a prelude to painting. There are enough decisions to make while painting; pre-planning an important one like value placement is paramount. Because watercolor is such a fast drying medium, knowing where the big shapes and their associated values will be located is a big factor in the outcome. Mixing up a puddle large enough and dark enough to cover that area requires a plan.
This is the demo that I did for the Art World Association at their monthly meeting last week. I had the value sketch in front of me so they could see what I was thinking as I was in the process of painting. Without that roadmap, neither they nor I could guess what I was thinking as I painted.
I also find value sketches and drawings extremely satisfying in their own right. I have dozens of sketchbooks that I've kept throughout the years. Many times instead of going through hundreds of photos looking for subject matter, I pull out a sketchbook and thumb through it for inspiration. And then, half the work is already done. Whatever makes our work easier!
I've posted several recent paintings that feature the saved white shapes of barns. Here's one where I tried to emphasize the bold color in the sky area by placing a dark silhouette against it. Also, to avoid monotony in the fishing gear on the dock, I used a few well-placed reds.
Bold color doesn't have to appear everywhere in a painting. It can be emphasized by using contrasting darks with little vibrant color.
Knowing where your darkest darks and lightest lights will go is an essential step in getting a painting that "reads." The shapes will be easier to paint if they are clearly stated in your value sketch. In this case the dark trees do not need to be individually created, but are suggested at the edge of the shape so I could make a good shape which interlocks with its background. The dark also sets off the focal area around the barn. Painting them first allowed me to key the value of the barn and its shadows and to keep them light enough .
Study the dark tree shape also for color changes. The trees are dark, but I was still able to change colors to provide interest. A mixture of warm and cool darks mixed on the page provides an entertaining shape.
Doing the work of making a value sketch makes painting quicker and therefore, I hope, fresher.
This was a demo for my workshop to illustrate the importance of darks. The contrasts between darks and lights will automatically draw your eye. But, there is a tendency to be timid when painting the darks. I suppose it is the fear of going too dark and not being able to retract your decision.
That is why the value sketch is so important. If you know that you are going to place a dark value shape in a certain area, you can apply the dark with more confidence.
Also knowing where the darks will be placed allows you to paint through that area with a midtone before placing the dark on top of the first wash.
Darks are powerful as shapes or accents. Use them smartly to accentuate the areas you want your viewers to be drawn to.
This is the demo that I did from the sketch in the previous post. I was trying to illustrate how to get bolder colors in your watercolor paintings. One way is to mix the colors on the page, especially with two warm colors or two cool colors. Another way to get glowing colors is to place complementary colors next to each other. A third way is to place a dark valued color next to its complement. In this painting, I've employed all three techniques. See if you can identify where each of the three approaches occur.
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