Hey, this is Eric from Cafe Watercolor.
Welcome to another painting demo.
Today I want to share the process of this painting
of a dog in the water.
So her name is Fiona.
This is my friend Kevin's dog.
She is one of the best dog I have ever seen.
She's super friendly, super well-behaved,
and she is a beautiful dog.
So I took this photo of her a couple weeks ago
when we were having lunch,
and it was a sunny day
next to the Lake Washington at Kirkland.
And Kevin just let the dog run wild,
so she's having a great time at the lake.
She jumped into the water and she's having a lot of fun,
and I took a quick photo while she's in the water.
And I just love the overall lighting and the contrast
of her warm fur and the cool lake water.
And I knew I wanted to paint this one
as soon as I saw the photo.
That being said, water surface like these
is not the easiest thing to paint.
So I did do a quick value study,
just to give me a rough idea how do I group the value
and how do I simplify
all the complex ripples and reflections.
So the first wash, I pre-wet the surface a little bit
and I started to paint the color of the light.
So the warm color on the fur
and I have that connect to the actual reflection of the dog.
And do a little bit of wet onto wet while I still can.
And the purpose is just to get the color on the paper.
I'm not worrying about the detail or anything.
I'm not even worried about trying to define the form
of the dog.
I did the drawing underneath and that's pretty much it.
Right now, I'm just trying to get the color of the light in.
And here, I do a overall blue wash
on the background as well.
So I try to be careful not to paint into the dog.
Because I didn't wait for it to be completely dry,
there might be a little bit of blending.
But since to make sure it's not too wet,
it should be okay.
So for the first wash,
don't worry about any ripples or anything.
Just trying to give a clean wash
and transition the color from cool to a little bit warmer
as it gets closer to the shallow water.
I paint into the reflection of the dog just a little bit.
It's going to get a lot darker anyways,
so I don't worry about it too much.
Now, while the paper is still a little bit damp,
I mix a drier mixture and just do some soft ripples
right on top.
Be sure you make sure it's nice and thick
because if it's too wet,
if it's too thin, it's going to bleed out
a little bit to much and get some cauliflower edges.
So be sure that it is nice and thick
so it will soften a little bit,
but it's still going to be in control.
Now as we come down to the shallow water,
the ripple gets less visible.
So I had it fade off in the bottom.
I also try to have my brush stroke follow the shape
of the ripple.
So where Fiona is in the water,
it will have a ripple coming outward,
centered from her.
So I will have a few of the ripples a little bit more curved
just to create that radial effect.
So the first wash is done, so I'm starting to mix
a thicker and darker mixture for the second wash.
So I'm going to start to define the ripples
just a little bit more,
paint a little bit darker reflection,
darker shape on them,
and also the middle value on the dog as well.
So I'm starting to paint the middle value on the ripple,
get them just a little bit more defined.
It is incredibly complicated,
so I am not trying to copy the ripple one-to-one.
That will be madness.
So what I did is I tried to look at the photo
and tried to learn the shape and the pattern
and the value of the ripples,
and I tried to treat it as a visual language.
I actually had another video talking
about how to paint water surfaces,
so be sure to check out that video if you haven't.
So what I'm doing right now is I tried to paint
and leave some light in between all the ripples
that I painted.
Because water surface is uneven,
so some of it might be the reflection of the sky,
some of it might be bounce the sunlight into my eyes.
So some parts are lighter,
some parts are a little bit bluer, a little bit darker,
and this is also a very shallow water.
So you do see a little bit of color underneath.
So try to keep all of that in mind
and paint the water's surface as I go.
And now I'm starting to paint the middle value of the dog,
and this is the part that I start to define
the structure and the form of the dog.
So there's actually not that much light value on the dog.
It's mostly on her back and her fluffy tail.
The position of the sun is around noontime,
so it's directly above,
maybe a little bit away from us.
So she is a little bit backlit
and also a little bit top lit,
so that's why you see a little bit
of this rim light effect on her.
But because the water surface also bounce off light on her,
so even the dark side of her is actually still not as dark.
So I'll leave out some of the highlight on the top,
and the rest of her is mostly middle value.
And now after I paint the middle value,
I try to go back in and paint a little bit darker shape,
darker values, wet onto wet,
just to get a little bit of soft transition
from dark to light.
And I try to connect that to the actual reflection of her
on the water.
So the water surface, we do have some reflection
of the dog's warm fur color,
but also, the water itself
is a little bit cooler and greener,
so it gets a little bit yellower.
So all that color will come into play
when I'm trying to paint her reflection.
And I continue down, connecting her reflection
to rest of the ripples underneath.
And as we approach the foreground,
I start to change the color to something a lot warmer,
just to show the transition from deeper water
to shallow water.
So I pre-wet the upper right corner,
just to paint the reflection of the tree.
Now, the tree is not visible,
but we do see the reflection,
so I thought to paint that in just to give it
a little bit more context
and a little bit more interesting shapes.
Now, while the foreground is still a little bit wet,
I am starting to paint some of the stone
and the rock underneath.
Again, there's countless detail here,
so I'm not able to paint them all.
All I'm trying to do is to give a little bit
of suggestion and hints of the stone underneath
the water surface.
So a little bit of softness,
that will give you the sense of translucency.
It will feel like it is underneath the water.
So just paint the shadow underneath each stone.
Have them overlap a little bit.
It's all visual language,
couple brush strokes here and there
in the right place and you feel
like there's some stones and gravels
underneath the water's surface.
Something will also sell the effect is to paint
around the highlight reflections.
Because those part of the ripples,
we see the highlights underwater,
so we are not able to see the stone underneath the water.
So by painting around those,
it also give you that illusion those stones
are underneath the water.
So it's very important that you really study
your subject matter, you really study the source,
and especially something as complex as these.
Try to find several properties and patterns,
things that will help you to turn that into visual language
so that you don't have to paint all the little details,
but it will still look convincing and believable.
So whenever you find a subject you want to paint,
before you start painting, really try to spend some time
to study it.
Now I'm painting the dark value on the dog.
So now is the time to give it just a little bit of details,
as well as define the form a little bit more.
So by adding somewhere dark,
the light become lighter
and we start to feel the form of a dog a lot better as well.
There's a little bit of contact shadow here.
So water surface is a surface,
which means that it does receive light and shadow.
So just because it's not a hard surface,
doesn't mean the laws of physics doesn't apply to it.
So here I'm also completing the dark value
on the reflection of the dog.
Give some of those reflection a little bit more definitions.
A little bit dark values in some of the ripples.
Now, you don't want to overdo it,
only some of the areas has darker ripples.
Depends on what is reflecting.
So when you're painting something
really repetitive like this,
it's very easy to go autopilot and stop thinking
about where you're painting.
So try to avoid that
and really have each brush stroke mean something.
Make conscious decisions all the time.
So here I'm trying to darken the reflection
of the tree just a little bit.
I start to give some more darker details
of the gravels underneath.
So the painting is almost finished,
but I do want to add just a little bit more gravels
underneath the water,
and I also want to unify the water's surface
a little bit more.
So after it's dry, I start to do a glaze
over all of it.
So fill some of the highlight on the ripples,
make them just a little bit bluer
so we don't have a lot
of the light and the dark jumping around.
And as we come down to the shallow water,
I transition it to darker and warmer colors.
And since I'm painting a slightly darker tone,
it gives me another opportunity
to give just a little bit more contrast on the highlights
on the shallow water.
And since I do a glaze over,
the paper become damp again,
so I can do some wet onto wet details
and paint some more gravels underwater.
So I switch to a smaller brush
and use the tip of the brush to put in some soft details.
Because I'm painting this wet onto wet,
a lot of detail will really soften and fade back.
So these details will be soft and very subtle.
So as you can see, even though it doesn't look exactly
like the photo, I am able to interpret what I see
from the photo into a painting.
And if I take away the photo,
nobody will really see what it looks like originally.
And if the painting can stand on its own,
then I believe it is a successful painting.
I hope you enjoyed this painting and this demo.
This is a special painting for me,
as it brings me back to that sunny noon
having lunch with my good friends.
I'm Eric from Cafe Watercolor.
See you next time.