We are one week away from Christmas.
Sadly, we haven't got any snow yet this time.
So it's not likely we're going to have a white Christmas.
But still I want to share my process
of a snow scenery painting.
Hi, this is Eric from Cafe Watercolor.
Snow is a beautiful phenomenon for us here in Seattle.
It doesn't happen that often, even in the winter.
So I'm pretty excited whenever there's snow here,
because each season here, in the Pacific Northwest,
has a very distinct look,
I always want to paint some snow scenery
whenever it is winter.
But since we haven't got any snow this winter,
I don't really have a new reference material.
So, I decided to paint
from one of the photo I took a few years ago.
I actually painted this one before,
but my workflow has changed a bit.
So I want to see what I can come up with this time around.
Now, there are three things to look out for
when you are painting a snow scenery.
Number one, not all snow is white.
Yes, the local color of snow might be white,
but because of that, it will be influenced
by the lighting even more.
Snow can turn very warm under warm sunlight,
like during the sunset or dawn.
And when snow is in a shadow,
it can still appears to be darker and cooler.
And that leads to our next point.
Number two, the importance of value study.
Because the color of snow can be very misleading,
that makes value study crucial.
Because when you do a value study,
it will force you to disregard the color
and focus on the value,
which is really what makes your painting whizz.
And number three, simplify, simplify, simplify.
This is really, really important.
When you think about snow scenery, what comes to your mind?
I will say probably not complicated or complex.
Since the world around you is covered with white snow,
it should look very nice and clean
at least before it melts and turn black.
And yet, there are a few areas
that can get quite complicated, especially trees
because snow get accumulated on small surfaces,
like tree branches and leaves,
you can end up with a lot of little white spots
all over the place if you don't try to simplify those.
A very good way to avoid that is to kind of squint your eyes
a little bit when you look at your reference.
Some of the small white details will simply disappear
and you can try to simplify those.
With those in mind, let's get started
with the painting demo.
Before we start, if you like my content,
consider hitting like and subscribe.
Hit the bell icon so you won't miss out my next video.
Lets enjoy some snow.
So we'll start off with a value study.
Last time I painted scenery, I didn't do a value study.
I just go for it.
The result is okay.
I actually like the result of that one,
but this time I'm gonna start with the value study
and see if I can do anything different.
The perspective of the road is actually quite tricky
because of the road kind of goes down a little bit
and then it goes straight again.
So I bought most of the perspective here.
As long as the size and placement is relatively correct,
it should look pretty natural.
The scenery itself is not that complicated,
but if you look into it, especially far into the distance,
there are a lot of details
'cause there are several house overlapping each other
with chimneys and the trees,
like we mentioned earlier, have lot of snow details on top.
So it's really up to us to be able to simplify
what we see here.
So I start off with the first wash of value study,
the middle value.
So it's very important
that I connect as much shape as possible.
So from the background tree, to the foreground house,
as in the shadow, the car,
and I leave out some highlight of the snow on the car
in the middle ground.
And I also paint the road,
which is also in the middle value,
despite that it is lit by the sun.
So quite a few things are in the middle value, actually,
especially the places under the shadow.
Even though the local color is white as the snow,
if it's in the shadow, it is still the middle value.
And I connect that to the tree in the foreground.
I leave out some of the white for the snow.
But I do not intend to make it too complicated.
Here is the first wash of the value study.
So let's take that information and start our first two wash
of the color painting.
So this paper is much bigger
so I will have to make a little bit tighter drawing.
The same thing here I need to eyeball the perspective,
get the house just a little bit more detailed.
The foreground car, and the middle of car.
I moved the middle gone car a little bit to the right
so it doesn't stuck right in the middle.
Makes a better composition.
I spent a little bit more time drawing the house
trying to make it look a little bit more correct as well.
There are things I move around a little bit,
just so that it can look a little bit better.
But at this stage, since you're doing the drawing,
if there's anything off correct it right away.
Don't try to correct your drawing when you are painting
that's usually not going to work out too well.
So the background building, there's a little mailbox.
So again, quite a bit of details in the distance.
I'm gonna try to simplify as much as possible.
So erase some of the lines and start to pre-mix the color
that I need to use.
Start with the color of the sky,
cobalt blue, cerulean blue,
a little bit of alizrin crimson.
As we come down to the horizon,
you can see the cloud there,
and some light kind of golden color
for the wall of the house.
So I pre-wet the paper a little bit with a sponge
and I just start off with the sky.
You got one shot at this.
It's usually not preferred if you go back
and glaze over the sky, if possible.
So try to mix it a little bit more intense if you need to.
So in the middle of the sky,
I switched to a little bit cooler color
with some alizrin crimson.
I use some damp brush to lift some paint,
to create some clouds.
And then I just come down and paint the golden color
of the house.
Even the roof I add a little bit
of this kind of pinkish color there.
Because as far as I concerned, it is not completely white.
There is a little bit of the color temperature
because of the sun.
Now, I starting to mix some middle value colors
that I'm going to use.
This house I took this photo about two years ago.
And since that I tear down the house
and I rebuilt it into a new house
that looks a lot more modern, which it looks pretty nice,
but it does lose that kind of old house charm to it.
Definitely not as interesting for painting like this one.
So I'm glad I snapped some photos
before it become another thing.
So starting from the background, background trees,
some cool and warm,
and then I connect that to the house in the front.
And like we did for the value study,
I'll try to connect all the shapes as much as possible.
So to the car and to the snow in the shadow
and that connects to the shadow of the house.
So this is why value study is so important
because it can help me to simplify
and goop the value together.
So when I'm painting, I can just focus on that.
And even though the color changes in the middle of the wash,
it can get quite hectic if you try to mix it on the fly,
but still at least you got a very solid plan to follow.
The cast shadow from the house and the trees.
And you notice that I didn't leave a lot of white
for the background trees because I thought I can come back,
with whitewash to paint some snow on top
if I really need to.
But I'd rather have a nice, clean, solid wash,
than try to sacrifice small for the big.
So I continue the shape to the background
and connect that to the tree on the left.
So connecting is definitely one of the most important thing
when you are painting a watercolor scenery.
And it is also very, very challenging sometime
because you really need to think ahead
and you need to really have a solid plan
for you to go forward.
Painting the chimney in a house in the middle ground,
a little hint of chimney in the back,
get into a little bit of the detail,
but the overall shape should remains pretty simple.
So the foreground tree.
Again, I leave out some white,
but I'm not gonna worry about that too much.
So I go back to the background
and start painting some of the trees in the background.
There's quite a few pine trees in the back
and breaststroke become very, very important
because I do want to capture the feeling of the pine tree
without going into too much details.
And here's the first two wash for the color painting.
Compare that to the first wash of value study.
Definitely following the plan that I had in mind.
So let's come back to our value study.
All we need to do now is to paint in some darks
within that major shape.
So start it from the background trees,
the dark side of the tree,
and bring that into the foreground, some shadow on the roof,
the window, and to the car in the foreground.
So it can get a little bit tricky
because you're not always sure
which part should be the dark value,
which part should be the middle value.
So, sometime you do have to make your own judgment
to see which were work better for your painting,
because sometimes you do need to bend the rule,
even though you see some dark value, like in the background,
doesn't necessarily means
that you need to paint everything dark.
You do want to leave a little bit sense of depths
when you are painting.
So in this case, the trees in the background
way into the distance, I decided to leave it
a little bit more to the middle value so it doesn't compete
with the middle ground and the foreground.
I'm painting the dark on the left, the tree on the left,
those are also very important.
And now I come back and paint the shadow darker as well.
So especially the shadow on the ground, on the road.
The road itself is darker than the snow.
So when both in a shadow, the shadow on the road
should be darker than the shadow on the snow.
Here is the finished value study.
And now let's continue to the final painting.
Homestretch for the final painting.
So again, we got our plan,
I put it right on top of my painting
so I can focus on the plan that I have for myself.
I look at the photo mostly just for the color reference.
One of the trap is that you looked photo
so closely You forgot the value study that you did.
And when you just want to get some color information,
but instead you start to copying the detail you see
from the photo.
That's a trap that many falls into and I fall into that trap
quite a few times myself.
So I really try to remind myself
that the value study is my map.
I'm just getting the color information.
And to be honest, most of the color information
I already got it from my first two washes
of the painting anyways.
So the dark is mostly just some very subtle color changes
like the warm and cool.
So we really don't need to see too much
into the reference photo anymore.
So similar to the value study,
I start from the background, the dark side of the tree,
connect that to the foreground house
and connect that to the foreground car.
Now I'll go in and paint on dark next to the window,
underneath the bush, the top cover was snow,
so I'll leave that into the middle value.
The dark side of the chimney.
I also darken the cast shadow a little bit more,
just so that it can pops out a little bit better,
a better sense of lighting.
And the house got quite a bit of details,
but I'm not going to paint all the details
and focusing on the big shape.
So I'm not painting
around all the white window trims and stuff.
That's just not necessary.
It doesn't really affect the read of the whole painting.
So you don't really have to include all that.
Some dark underneath the Bush.
Here's a little bit of this plum, pinkish color trees.
So I'm just hinting those.
Some dark details on the back.
Keep it very simple.
I don't think I even draw that very accurately.
Just try to match the size and position, that's all.
Some darks in the background.
Those are going to be quite simple.
Just some suggestion of the details.
You don't really even need to paint them very literally
they're just different breaststroke and marks.
So I come back to the middle ground and paint the car
and I connect the dark underneath the car
to the dark side of the curbside.
The tail light one is in the shadow, one is in the light
so I give them a slightly different tone.
Make some more neutral dark,
go back into the background
and start to paint some dark of the tree.
I tried to make this specific one a little bit darker,
so it just feels like there's a little bit more layers.
The trees in the back.
I add a little bit more dark just to have the light pop up
a little bit more, but I try to keep it simple
and not as dark as the tree in the foreground.
Now, very important, I'm gonna paint the foreground tree
on the left, try to make my mixture a little bit drier,
a little bit thicker
because I'm going to scratch out some branches
when it gets a little bit dryer.
And then from the dark brown color,
I connect that to a darker green color
as it goes to the top.
And here I scratch out some of the branches and stuff.
Use my finger now to do that.
And you need to make sure your paint are thick enough
and is starting to dry a little bit.
So timing is actually very important for this.
Just add a little bit more shadows,
some dark side for the snow in the foreground.
There's some snow accumulation there.
So a little bit of shadow, suggest some volume,
and I'm going to paint the dark on the road, on the street.
We're almost done here.
So just a couple details in the dark.
So compared to the last one that I did,
the last painting I did for this scenery,
I feel like the last one, even though I have a rough idea
what I'm going to do, I make a lot of decision on the fly.
But this one specifically,
I feel like the value study definitely helps a lot.
So the painting looks a little bit cleaner
and a little bit simpler.
Now I come back with whitewash
and I start to paint some snow back in.
And again, simple does it.
I don't want to paint a lot of little white dots.
And make sure your gouache is thick enough.
If it's too watery it's just going to dry
kind of semi-transparent
and that's actually not going to be a good look.
And here is the finished painting.
I hope you enjoyed this painting.
I really like how it turns out.
I hope you do too.
I hope this is helpful for you.
The un-edited full lens demo of this painting
is available for students
who got my Watercolor Essential course,
along with many other bonuses and lessons and demos.
I wish you have a wonderful holiday wherever you are.
Stay safe and healthy.
I'm planning to do another video before the end of the year.
So stay tuned on that.
If this is your first time, welcome,
be sure to go to my website, at cafewatercolor.com,
to get my Fast Track Watercolor PDF guide
and some bonus videos.
I am Eric from Cafe Watercolor.
See you next time.