I've been teaching myself to paint people in watercolor
and I thought that it would be a good idea if I started to do some
studies of different body parts so today I thought I'd share this
eye study that I painted yesterday with you.
Painting people in watercolour is something that I've only just started to
do so I'm no expert but I'm slowly trying
to teach myself. It's not easy especially in watercolour
because you can't cover up your mistakes with more paint.
I painted this little toddler this week and it made me realize how much
knowledge and work is involved in painting the human figure if you
want to work realistically like I do. You've got to think about
skin tones and getting the colour correct. You've got to keep the skin tones smooth
and you've also got to make sure that everything is the correct shape. There's
no room for error because the viewer will notice if you haven't
got the eye or the nose or the arm correct.
So I thought it would be wise to spend some time doing some
individual studies of different body parts. I thought that it would
help me and it would also help all of my patrons.
So today I've got my first study to share with you.
I painted this eye yesterday and it reminded me of how important it is to
really look hard at what I'm painting. Look at the shape. Look at the colours.
Look at the colour values and look at the edges of the shapes. Ask
myself if the edges are hard or if they're soft.
There's a lot to think about and I know that
the only way to improve is to practice. I started out by painting some water
around the eye. I wanted to paint the skin in and I
wanted to work on wet paper so that I would have soft
paint edges. The paper I'm using here is Arches cold
pressed. I wet underneath the eye with water as
well.
I've made myself a little palette with some colours in it that I use
to mix skin tones so here I'm mixing some Burnt umber and I'm going to put
some Cadmium red into it. These are Winsor and newton colours. I'll
water this down and this is what I'll use for the skin.
Then I painted that colour onto the wet paper
and I kept it fairly light at this stage. I knew that I would have to darken it in
different areas.
I painted that colour all the way around the outside edge.
Then I thought I'd put some of that colour onto the fleshy parts inside the
eye.
Then I mixed up that same colour but I had more pigment in it - less water
so it was a bit darker and I started to paint that onto
the dark areas of skin around the eye. My initial wash of the paler colour is
still wet and this is going on to it while it's
damp.
I thought I'd use that to paint in the rim of the eye
and also in the crease along the lid.
Then I mixed up some grey and I started to paint that onto the darker areas.
You can see everything's still wet.
I also started to paint that onto the fleshy parts inside the eye.
I mixed a sort of a plum colour from Permanent rose and Cobalt blue
and I painted that onto the dark area while it was wet.
I waited until the skin area was dry. I got some clean water for myself and
then I started to paint that water onto the eye.
I wet the entire eye except for the two highlights that I wanted to leave.
The I used the grey and I started to paint that onto the white section of the
eye and that helped to make the eye look
more rounded.
Then I put that plum color that I put on the skin
in the gray sections as well.
I used the grey on the iris itself while the paper was wet.
So I left the white sections on the highlighted sections. I didn't put any
paint on those. Now because the entire eye is wet some
of this grey paint is going to bleed out past the edge of
the iris and that's what I wanted. I didn't really
want a hard edge around the outside perimeter of the iris.
I mixed a blue green colour from Cobalt blue
and Naples yellow and I started to paint that onto the grey areas.
Everything's still damp.
I added a bit more of the grey to the white section of the eye. I dried
everything off and now I'm re-wetting the iris and
the area around the iris. I mixed some Cobalt blue with some Burnt
umber and now I'm starting to paint that on.
I paint it on all the dark areas that I see on the iris
and you can see that that paint is still bleeding out into the white section of
the eye which is what I wanted.
I painted the darker area around the pupil
and I started to add the darker lines that radiate out from the pupil.
I painted the little fleshy parts of the eye in wet on wet
and then I waited until everything was dry.
Now I'm re-wetting the iris but this time I'm keeping the water
inside the iris. I don't want the paint to spread out past the edge of it.
Then I mixed up a darker blue. I used Cobalt
blue and Burnt umber again but the paint's thicker this time
and I start to paint that around the outer edge where I see the darker colour.
I use that colour to start pulling some eyelash shadows into the highlight.
That area there where the highlight is is dry. I haven't wet that area.
I'll just speed this section up a bit.
So I finished off the eyelash shadows and then I continued painting it around
the outside edge. So the iris itself is wet but the
highlight where I painted the eyelash shadows isn't wet it's dry.
I added a bit more water here and there too because it was starting to dry.
I mixed some green from Cobalt blue and Naples yellow
and I painted that onto some areas. Everything's still damp.
While the paper was still slightly damp I started to paint the pupil in.
I didn't bother mixing up some black. I just used my Lamp black.
I kept it fairly light to start with and again I didn't mind
if the paint bled out slightly around the edge of the pupil.
I got a bit darker with the colour
and then when it was dry I painted the deepest darkest colour.
Once the pupil was dry I wanted to add a bit more detail to the iris
and I wanted to work on damp paper again so that I could have those soft fuzzy
edges. So I carefully wet over the iris with
some water again and then I used my little brush and some
of the darker blue and I started to paint on some detail.
I patted the colour on with this fine brush.
Because there's water on the paper that kept all the paint edges soft and fuzzy
because I didn't want any hard lines in
here.
I darkened around the edge of the iris as well with this colour.
This was a mix of Cobalt blue and Burnt umber.
I also put a light wash of grey inside the highlight.
I did that on the dry paper. I darkened the skin on the eyelid.
I did a bit more work in the corner of the eye
and now I'm starting to paint the eyelashes on.
I'm doing that on wet paper
so the eye itself is wet and also that little area around the outside part
of the eye is wet
and that gives me those soft fuzzy edges.
I kept going around the outside edge until I got to the longer eyelashes.
I painted them on the damp paper as well
and then I came back when it was a bit drier and I started to add a bit more
definition. Here I'm painting underneath the eye
with some water and I'll paint the little eyelashes on
under here as well. Painting them on the wet paper keeps
those edges soft. I need to make sure that my paint isn't
too wet when I pick it up otherwise the paint will spread too far
so I use dryer paint when I'm working on the wet paper.
I wet the eyelid with some water and then I painted in those creases that
I could see.
I smudged some of the edges where the eyelashes go into the skin
and I further defined those creases on the eyelid.
This time I did it on dry paper. I left it overnight and I came back and
looked at it with some fresh eyes in the morning and I
could see that the shape of my iris wasn't quite
right at the top right underneath the eyelashes.
So I did a bit of repair work up there and fixed the shape of it.
I also decided to add a bit more grey to this section of the eye over here. I
thought that it was too white so I wet that area and I dropped some more grey
paint in there.
I fiddled with the eyelashes a bit more. I added a few more
particularly on that area where I had to fix up that
shape of the iris
and then I was done.
Obviously this eye is larger than what I would normally paint
and I won't need that much detail in a smaller subject
but as I said it was good for me to study the shape and the different edges
and the different colours and it made me look really hard at what
I was painting. Now what I need to do is paint eyes from
different angles and also paint them smaller
so that I can see how much or how little detail that I'm going to need
and then of course I'll move on to doing studies of other body parts
so stay tuned because I'll bring you on that journey with
me. I plan to make a full length tutorial of this
eye study and also the painting of the toddler that I did this week.
I'll post both of them on Patreon when I'm finished making them.
Thank you for watching. Please give this video a like
and subscribe to my channel if you don't already
and I will see you next week with a new tutorial.
keep the skin tones smooth and you've also got to make sure
that everything is in the correct place
yeah there's no room for error because the viewer will notice if you haven't
got the eye or the nose or the arm in the correct shape
doesn't make sense
so i thought i'd be wise to spend some time
doing some individual studies of different body parts
i thought it would help me and it would
come on please
i thought it would help me and it would also help
all of you
obviously
obviously this eye is larger than what i would normally paint
obviously this eye is larger
obviously this eye is larger than what i would normally paint
and i won't need something in my eye
eyelash
subscribe to my channel if you don't already and i will see you
next week with a new tutorial why am i leaning in