No medium of visual art ever succeeded without understanding the properties of color and how it works on objects and the corresponding effect that it carries. To understand fully the colors and its usage, it is best that to learn the structure of colors in a color wheel. Understanding the structures will help later on to break it down to get the utmost effect that coloring provides in any work of color art.
Typically, a color wheel is divided into twelve colors. These colors form imaginary triangular lines for the primary, secondary and the tertiary colors. The primary colors are red, yellow, and blue that form the first triangle. This is followed by the secondary and the tertiary colors. Other more complex color wheels include other shades and hues but just the same the colors triangulate as it relates to one another.
Most watercolor artists can do entire masterpieces using only primary colors. The red the blue and the yellow are mixed together in varying degrees and temperaments to come out with all colors possibilities that they want to use. In fact, a few decades back, there is actually very limited option when it comes to color selection. Artists buy primary color pigments and mix together colors that they use.
The Primary Colors
Blue, Red and Yellow comprises the primary colors. These are so-called primary colors because these are the color from which all other colors are derived. There is no possible combination anywhere that could create these colors and so this is where other colors are based on.
The Secondary Colors
The secondary colors also form a triangle on the wheel. These are the orange, violet, and green. Secondary colors are the result of combining two equal amounts of primary colors. For example, Green is a result of combining Yellow and Blue in equal proportions, Violet is a result of Red and Blue while mixing Yellow and Red will give you Orange. Again provided that the combination is exactly of the same proportion, the result would be the colors already mentioned. Changing the proportions will give an altogether different color other than secondary.
The Tertiary Colors
This is the third color group in the color wheel. To come out with tertiary colors you will mix a secondary color with the primary color that you would want to dominate the hue. For example, to create red orange, you will mix orange with red, blue green is a mixture of green and blue and so forth. There are six colors here, Blue Violet, Red Violet, Blue Green, Yellow Green, Yellow Orange, and Red Orange. To change the tint, you will add a portion of a primary color that you would want more pronounced in the new color created; doing that will give you infinite color possibilities for your palette.
Warm to Cool
Depending on the color (or the dominant color chosen), you could create degrees of coolness and warmth to your art. Red is the warmest color while blue is the coolest to the eye. Coloring in warm hues will make the object in the work seem to stand out while using cool colors give the effect that the objects recede.
Whether natural artist or not, there are always rules to follow first. Mastery of the rules allows us to break it with wonderful results but that will come later. It all starts with the basics.
In watercolor as with any other disciplines, there are several techniques to be learned first. Mastering the techniques will allow you to gain control of the medium, ease you nicely into the art form aside from cutting the learning curve.
Thumbnails
This is the planning stage. Thumbnails are not basics in watercolor painting but unless very skilled, you will experience a lot of difficulties without the thumbnails first. Thumbnails are the sketches you do that in order to break down the images you would finally want on the painting. Doing thumbnails first makes the painting more manageable and prevent errors. And so during this stage, draw thumbnails until satisfied of the image that would finally appear in the finished painting.
The Wash
There are different watercolor washes and corresponding effects. Basically though, a wash is a term used for loading the brush with plenty of water and some pigment and painting it over the paper. Washes are typically used for backgrounds in watercolor painting. It is almost synonymous with laying the foundation from which the images desired in the painting is laid. To develop and learn to control washes, try experimenting with different color intensity and hues. To lighten a particular shade, all you need to do is add water. Conversely, to darken an area would be to add a little more pigment.
The Glaze
Glazing is similar to the wash except that it is used to change the temperature of the color underneath (the wash). To glaze is to add another layer of color to an existing color, not really to erase the coloring underneath but to change the temperament or create another color in combination with the wash color. It is well to note that watercolor being a transparent medium cannot be fully erased or fully covered by another color. To this end, glazing has become a tool unique to watercolor painting.
Tinting
To apply additional tint to an existing wash or color, wait for the color that was first applied to dry before applying a tint. To apply tint on a wash that is still wet would create effects that unless that is the intent, the painting would be ruined.
Erasing
Watercolors are never erased totally. When an undesired color has already been painted, this could partially be washed but only to minimize the color strength. Use you brush dipped in water and brush very gently. This way you can lift the pigment from off the paper but avoid damaging it. When part of the paper is damaged, the painting will be damaged too as the color is drawn by the roughness of the scrub done.
Once the basics as mentioned above are mastered, you are well on your way to painting in watercolor. There are different methods that could be learned later but so far, the above are the most important and the most common practices when starting.
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