﻿Hi it’s Anna Mason and in this watercolour
mini class I'm going to show you the stages I went through to paint this
sweet little kitten sitting in a tree of blossom.
Let's take a look...
Working from my reference photo, I made a detailed line drawing,
then prepared myself to paint by applying masking fluid, using a
fine-line-applicator to key areas where there were light, defined hairs against a darker background -
mainly to the ears and the whiskers.
Once that had dried, with my large size 14 brush, I began mapping out the areas of colour in the background
with a super watery wash, starting with the blurred blossom 'bokeh' effect background...
...adding in the lightest tones and hues to the branches...
...and all the other colour areas in the background.
I then painted the lightest tones in the areas surrounding the kitten's eyes...
...and next concentrated on painting her eyes,
taking them to a stage of near-completion.
I always love to get the eyes painted at an early point in an animal portrait,
to help the painting begin to come to life.
I'll show you the how to paint the kitten's eye in lots of detail in a separate video.
Now it was time to map out the markings in the kitten's fur. Using my size 8 brush,
I applied a watery grey colour to isolate the very lightest areas in her tabby pattern.
I used short brush strokes to start to create the furry texture right from the start.
With that layer dry, I then went down to a size 3 brush,
and still with a very watery mix, I layered up the grey paint to darken every area of the fur
which was going to end up this hue and tone or darker.
As before ,I used short brush strokes to create little lines that would create a furry effect.
Then I painted in the kitten's nose...
...and mouth area.
With a thicker grey mix, and my size 1 brush, I then painted in the darkest
areas on the kitten's fur, which was now dry, using a stippling technique to
allow the lighter fur underneath to show through.
Next, I turned my attention to the blossom flowers in the foreground.
Keeping watery, I worked on the lightest areas of tone in the petals...
...and when that was dry, I then went in with the darkest tones in
the surrounding branch and leaf areas...
...before working on the midtone areas, including the dried leaves, which
echo the colours in the kitten's eyes.
I added the darkest tones to the front branch...
...and then worked on the midtone areas, allowing the paint to dry between each layer, and adding plenty of detail to
create the rough texture of the bark, which was most in focus on this nearest branch.
I repeated these steps on the other branches...
...before going on to build up the areas of colour and tone in the bokeh.
With that darkening done I could see that the very darkest parts of
the painting - the branches - needed to be darker so I added an additional
layer of paint to them in most places...
...and then working all over the kitten's fur.
Though it would have been quicker to darken the fur in one or two layers, I wanted to capture as much
of her fluffy visual texture as possible. So I used several watery layers to build up the tones,
always allowing the previous layer to dry before painting over it.
I came back to the blossom flowers next, adding details and darkening in and around them.
The different elements of the composition were now coming together,
and needed to be brought into tonal balance.
So I did a round of darkening across the whole painting, beginning again by darkening further the branches and background
and adding more detail there as I did.
This darkening up led me to need to darken parts of the kitten a little too...
It was time for the bit I'd been waiting for! The removal of the masking fluid to the ears.
Making sure the surrounding paint was dry, I rubbed off the fluid.
I felt at this point that I wanted to darken some areas even more, so I did another round of darkening...
...and then I came in with my smallest brush to add extra details and definition
to the areas that had been masked.
With the fur so much darker now, I went back to the eye to darken that some more in each colour area...
And then I did the same to the nose and then added masses more detail to the
fur - all in short little strokes which also served to darken the fur some more.
And I continued to add detail and darken a little in the process
to the flowers, branches and kitten....
Only once I was certain I didn't want to darken the areas around the whiskers any more,
I removed the masking fluid to reveal them...
...did a touch more darkening on the front branch...
...and then used my smallest treble zero brush
to paint along the whiskers to make them appear finer.
After a few final, furry details, my kitten painting was finished.
A set of 5 detailed video classes showing how to paint the key areas of this kitten
and background are available now in my online School.
If you’ve enjoyed this mini class, please subscribe to my YouTube channel, then pop over to
AnnaMasonArt.com where you can take a full length video class FOR FREE
and find loads of resources to help you pick up your brush
and paint the way you’ve always wanted to.
Thanks so much for watching and I’ll see you soon
to help you create watercolours with “wow”.
...er, no! No! Shoo! Shoo!
Aah?
Ah, cats!