A question I'm often asked is how do I paint white subjects on white watercolor
paper. That's the topic of today's video.
As you probably know when we paint in watercolor
we don't paint white. Instead the white of the paper becomes the white areas of our
subject. We paint shadows around the white areas to help create the form of
what it is we're painting. What do you do if the subject of the whole painting is
white? Today I want to quickly show you a few of my paintings that have white
subjects and I'll demonstrate how I painted this Cockatoo. Over the years
I've painted quite a few different white subjects. While they are different
subjects my method of painting remains similar on all of them. There's quite a
few things I do when I paint white subjects. I work from photographs most of
the time so before I start painting I look at the photo and I determine what
colors I see. I determine where the lightest parts of the subject are and
then I look for the darkest areas. I also look for colors that are reflecting in
the white and I have to decide whether I see warm colors or cool colors. Sometimes
all I see is gray and to make the subject more interesting I'll paint the
shadow areas of it in gray but I'll drop in other colors to liven the gray up. The
other thing I try to do is I keep most of my colors on the pale side. Let's have
a quick look at this white rose that I painted.
It was easy to see the colors in the cup of the Rose here. I was able to use warm
colors to separate the petals from one another while I left the white of the
paper showing on the lightest areas. Then I had to turn my attention to the
shadows on the outer petals and that's where I noticed some reflected colors.
When I look closely at this shadow here for example I see cool blues and purples
and I made sure I dropped some blues and purples onto the gray while I painted
that area. Over here in this shadow the main color is gray but I see some green
so I dropped some green to the gray before it dried. Here I see some warmer
colors. So I used some of the warmer colors that I'd painted in the center.
Sometimes when I paint I'll take some artistic license and I'll add colors
that I don't necessarily see on the reference photo. I know I need to liven
it up a little so I try to make it a bit more interesting - like I did on this cow
painting. I didn't really see these blues and purples in the shadows but I wanted
to liven her up and improve on my reference photo so I added them to add
interest to my greys. I'll show you how I painted this cockatoo painting but
before I do I want to thank Skillshare for sponsoring this video. I've been
working with Skillshare for a few years now and I've just published my
eleventh class with them. My latest class is all about using the wet on wet
technique to paint fur. I've put links to all my classes in the description of
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go and have a look at Skillshare. I've put a link at the top of the description
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your creativity. Alright let's have a look at this cockatoo. This is a piece of
Arches hot pressed watercolor paper. This is watercolor board which unfortunately
they don't make anymore. I'm using a DaVinci Casaneo mop brush and I've
just painted on some water onto the head of the cockatoo. I want to paint on the
wet paper because I want my paint edges to be soft. This is a gray that I've
mixed up from burnt sienna and French ultramarine. I'm beginning to paint in
this shadow that I see sitting above the beak. I've extended it behind the eye
and over the top of the beak there. To make this gray more interesting I'm
dropping in some Winsor violet and that helps to take the drabness of the grey
away and I plan on repeating this color on the background which will help to tie
everything together. Watercolor paint tends to dry lighter than it looks when
it's wet so here I'm increasing the pigment and making it darker.
When I look at my reference photo I can see a warm color in that shadow so I'm
dropping in some burnt sienna as well.
Moving down a bit further I see a darker shadow under the cheek feathers so I've
wet this area with water again to keep my paint edges soft and I'm painting the
gray that I mixed up there. Now I'm dropping in some violet on top of that
gray again just to add the interest to the color. Apart from the beak and the eye
this is the darkest area on the cockatoo so I can make the color a bit deeper
here. Over here the color is lighter so I'll suggest a few feathers but I'll
keep the paint fairly pale. Now I'm wetting this area below the eye and I'll
use some of that gray paint to suggest a few feathers there. There's not
much going on in the reference photo so I just put them wherever I think I'd
need them. I think I'll put some violet there as well.
Now I'm going to paint the beak. I'm using French ultramarine to paint an
under wash that will sit underneath a darker color. It will show through in
places. Before that blue dries I use some Payne's grey to darken the beak. Because
it's wet the colors blend together softly. I've got a fair amount of pigment
there. It's quite dark and up here it's quite dark under the feathers so I've
got a lot of pigment there as well. This is Payne's grey that I'm using and
before the beak dries I drop in some water droplets to create some water
colour blooms. That will create texture on the beak. Now I want to add some
detail to the feathers around the beak I paint these feathers by wetting the area
underneath each feather and then applying the paint while the paper is damp. That creates a shadow where one feather sits over the other. I use the violet
here too to make the gray more interesting. I've demonstrated this
technique before in one of my other videos so take a look at that if you
want to see me painting some other birds like this. That's violet that I've
just put over the grey
and as I said before the water on the paper keeps those painted edges soft. If I
need to soften them further I'll take a damp brush and wipe over the edge of the
paint.
Then when I've painted all those in I can add some little extra details over
here on the dry paper. I make sure that I keep my paint fairly pale. To make the
cockatoo stand out more I decided to paint the background as well and it's
the background that will form the edge of the bird in places. I paint some water
onto the paper before I put the paint on because I want to keep all the paint
edges fairly soft on the background as well. I paint it carefully up against the
feathers because that forms the edge of the feathers and then I can relax when I
get away from the bird. This is cobalt blue that I'm using. I'm going to use a
combination of cobalt blue and Winsor violet. I used the Windsor violet on the
bird so I want to repeat it on the background. Here I'm using the Winsor
violet. You can see that that's forming the edge of the bird there. I've gone quite
dark there because I have water on the paper. I know that that will dilute the
paint and I know that when it's dry it won't be quite as dark as this. I keep
going all the way around but I put the darkest color at the front of the head -
that's where I want the focus to be. So the paint's quite wet.
Then I had some extra water droplets to disturb the pigment after its dried a
little bit and that creates some texture in the background. That should give me
some interesting effects when it's dry.
So I let it dry and then I take the tape off. So there's my finished painting. This
painting only took me about an hour and a half or so to complete. It was quick
and it was lots of fun to paint. Recapping what I talked about at the
start of the video - when I paint white subjects I look hard at the photo or
whatever it is I'm painting and I look for variations of colors in the shadows
and I look for a reflected light as well. Sometimes the color of something nearby
might be reflected on the subject. I usually keep my colors fairly pale on
the subject itself. Sometimes I'll exploit what I see and I'll take some
artistic license and add colors that I don't see and accentuate colors that I
do. Sometimes I'll paint a background and other times I don't feel it's necessary.
So there you are - white subjects are beautiful too and
they're not that difficult to paint. Thanks for watching. I hope I gave you
some useful information. Give this video a like, hit the subscribe button and I'll
be back soon with a new video for you.
sometimes all I see is gray and to make
I've painted quite a few different stop sometimes all I see is gray and to make
the subject more interesting I'll paint the shadow areas of it in gray so there
you are white subjects are beautiful too and
they're not that difficult to paint