Following are watercolor painting tips for watercolor artists whose ability is beyond the basic skills and aiming to come out with good painting results and preserve their work for a very long period of time.
Paper quality
There are different kinds and grades of watercolor and watercolor paper, each has its own consistency and behaves differently. The quality of the watercolor painting is heavily influenced by the grade of paper that the painting is on. This is more pronounced when applying the techniques such as wet in wet and dry color lifting. Texture grade are also important consideration when applying a dry brush technique. The rule of the thumb when choosing a watercolor paper is that the more expensive and popular the brand used, the easier the work becomes for the artist because of the consistency and the high quality of materials that are used.
Working fast
There are a variety of effects that could be taken advantage when working fast. First, to regulate the paint flow will not allow the artist to rest until a particular aspect of the work is finished. The effects that are obtainable in working fast allows for better blending and mixing of colors that could never be done when the paint is allowed to thicken let alone dry. The same goes for color dominance, and the production of feathery, rugged edged and dreamy textures that only a watercolor could produce. Watercolor is not an easy medium to work on. But for those who will or have learned to regulate the flow of the paint, the wetness inherent to watercolor painting is actually a good control device.
Light fastness
Light fastness is also a major consideration when you want the painting preserved. Watercolor pigments have acquired a reputation for impermanence because unlike oil and acrylic that has protective binders, watercolors are painted directly on paper and is exposed. Because of this, that pigments do not retain its color and its brilliance overtime. Today though, major improvements have been done to retain lightfast watercolors which is indicated by a manufacturers numerical rating printed in the tube or the packaging.
The main reason that excellent watercolor paintings are considered less in value than oil or acrylic is its previous inability to hold its color. Today though, technological improvements are achieved for watercolor pigments that in fact, watercolor paintings with high light fastness rating painted on archival paper holds it colors and brilliance longer than oils and acrylics.
Tube or Pan
Choose tube. It is more difficult to achieve very dense color when you use a dry watercolor from a pan. It is also easier to keep raw colors in tubes. Minor difference but it counts for coming with very good, well preserved and well-defined colors. Other than that, there is no visible difference between a tube color and those that comes from pans.
Scumbling
While the preceding watercolor painting tips are relatively new, scumbling dates back to the practice of watercolor application in the 19th century. Otherwise known as dragging or crumbling the color, scumbling is loading a moist brush with large amounts of color and dragging the tuft lightly along the paper to produce different textures and are typically used by watercolorists with more advanced brush handling skills.
A spark of goodness created all of us, so a poet said. In like manner, all of us have that creative spark. In some of us this spark is pronounced, in most, it has to be cultivated. Nonetheless, it is always there whether admitted or not. We feel it all the time. This is why we strive to pamper our senses. This is why all of us are drawn to the beautiful, the grand, and the majestic. We can never be fully satisfied until we create. And until we learn to create, we will always stand in awe to those who do never knowing that we have the same quality in us.
Failure is an Ally
It is painful to admit that. Wish it were not so but wishing would not change that. Vincent Van Gogh for all the worth of his paintings now, only sold one commissioned painting in his lifetime out of the numerous masterpieces that he did. A portrait not very well received by the patron but paid nonetheless. Picasso, Monet, Degas, Renoir, Goya, name it, all have struggled at first until masterpiece after masterpiece were made, accepted, and praised by the public.
A spider can spin a web right after it is hatched and a deer can leap a few moments after it is born but for all our superiority, we have to learn, struggle and learn some more if not from previous mistakes, from the mistakes of others until a task is as perfect as our limitations would allow us to be.
With so little time
A cliché goes "We live and learn" until a wisecrack added, "by the moment we learned it will almost be too late to live". If that is the parameter by which achievements have to be set, then nothing created will have been created. The truth is art is created for the sake of creating, nothing more. Art is a reward in itself. It does not matter if it is recognized nor condemned, praised or ridiculed. History has proven time and again that the opinion of the majority is not always right.
And so Express Yourself
Because you are a co-creator, create. Lives are lived more fully when we create. It is good if the talent is already there if not, it often comes after trying but even if it is said that there is none, who cares. Not every master has the talent when they were just starting. The talent is developed in a manner by which intelligence is also developed. But even when the talent never grows to the level desired, art is still a good way to express oneself. It is a release; it is relaxation and developing focus and coordination. It is development of tastes and expressions that otherwise would have remained dormant. In art, the person runs an entire gamut of experiences translated to tangible forms sometimes known only to him.
It is the only known human activity that to be effective does not require much brain as much as gut activity. More than anything else, it is spiritual and intuition development. An experience that brings us closer to the spark of goodness that created all of us.
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