Simple snowdrops watercolor tutorial Video Lecture - Master the Art

good morning Lindsey here the frugal
crafter it's morning for me I don't know
what how about for you cuz you could be
watching this any time since on YouTube
but I got a crafting distress call from
one of my blog readers Vicki who wanted
to know how to paint snowdrops cuz
they're white and it's a little
confusing so I thought well you know
what I'm gonna get right to that today
she requested that a long time ago and
it was on my list so I thought you know
what you just got to do it Lindsey um
also a couple people had asked me ask to
see my travel watercolor palette which
actually is what I'll be doing a lot of
my tutorials with because I like that I
can have the palette part visible so you
can see as a mixing the colors and know
what I'm doing um this is a lot of
colors here you know the alizarin
crimson the SAP green the ultramarine
blue those colors I use a lot so I end
up refilling them from tubes but these
little paints this is a common set by
Windsor Newton Kim in these little
plastic pans so you can actually take
them out and replace them if you want
order different colors they're a little
harder to find in the tube so when I run
out I just refill it with my Engram and
company tubes that I prefer so let me
just show you that real quick the colors
are going to use today I'm going to just
paint on a little um watercolor card
that I've clipped to a piece of foam
core and the colors we're going to use
today are SAP green I uh already had
that on my palette from yesterday so I
thought I'd just leave that out um we're
going to use some lemon yellow lemon
yellow or cadmium yellow light whatever
you have for a for a cool yellow and I'm
gonna actually go when I'm using cotton
so that's more of a student grade paint
I like to spray my palette first because
it helps release the color when I'm
using my artist quality paint I don't
really need to do that but um you know
just a little tip for you nothing wrong
with using a student grade paint I'm
also going to use some um I think I'm
going to use some Indian red it's very
similar to a burnt sienna but since I
have no other red in this um this
painting I'm decided to go with the
indian red you can use burnt sienna if
you have that instead that's fine and
I'm going to use ultramarine blue and
I'm going to put to that right over here
won't you be it to be able to see where
I am mixing and I think you'll be able
to see that pretty well alright and my
whole paper is in the scene so that's
great all right so we're gonna sketch
we're gonna sketch a snow drop look at
that we're like two and a half minutes
into the video and I haven't even grown
anything yet I'm gonna start by putting
in the flower which kind of to me looks
like a firefly I always reminds me of
like a Firefly when I see a snowdrop I'm
not sure why exactly I think it's just
because I think the petals on the side
look like wings and then um and then
you've got this kind of like statement
in the middle that looks like a little
body to me and then do we have like
three main petals on the snowdrop I'm
going to tuck that guy in right there
and the stem usually kind of comes up
kind of like a shepherd tuck there and
it's gonna go down into the snow we've
got plenty is to know we don't know any
snowdrops peeking out yeah but would
that be nice usually the crocuses kind
of come out first I have a black thumb
I'm really gonna try to grow a garden
this year cuz I'd like to be a little
more self-sufficient but when I walked
the dog in the morning I always know
Springs right around the corner when I
see my beautiful gardens that my
neighbor's garden start to bloom I'm
gonna put another one right over here
I'm gonna put three in just cuz it will
be a little more pleasing of a
composition if I have three let's have
one over here um kind of facing the
other way I don't have too much room to
work I want to make the pedals big
enough that you can see me paint I think
that's what kind of has had me waiting
so long to do the snowdrop because the
petals are kind of small and I tend to
like to work on flowers of bigger bigger
bigger petals bigger flowers so um but
that's alright because this is good it's
good to break out of your comfort zone I
think of course I just just got up
recently so if my if my voice is froggy
I do apologize I think I'm alright I've
uh hopefully my coffee has ended up the
pipe so to speak and let's put one more
right down here maybe a little full
fuller one and I'm sketching with a just
a regular mechanical pencil I believe
it's a like a number two or HB type of
lead it's kind of dark but I want it to
be dark enough for you to see so and
we'll just put that in there I put a few
blades of grass let's put some snow
shall we yes let's put some snow down
below our snow drops that is a it's a
sign of optimism that spring is on the
way put a couple little blades of grass
here and there we go
there we're in good good shape now
something you might want to do rather
than sketch right onto your background
would be to sketch on copy paper and
then transfer it with some transfer
paper but for a watercolor card I
actually think it's kind of fun and
charming to see the lot of the pencil
lines underneath you can erase them
knowing you're done painting and go
right in with a soft vinyl a tracer you
know the white kind and and go ahead and
erase your lines if you don't want to
see him it's complete personal
preference when I was a more beginner I
wanted those pencil lines gone I wanted
to go the magic of painting now I
actually like seeing the pencil lines
look at thuggish got paint on my paper
or I didn't want um now I kind of see
that as um kind of like a hint of to
what the artist is doing I'm just look
at that I'm not gonna erase my paint
just by brushing over with water and
dabbing it with a clean tissue and if I
put a background and it's not gonna make
any difference whatsoever all righty I'm
gonna do this painting with a number six
round let's keep it simple to choose one
brush and we're gonna wet the snow
underneath
okay just with that up and then we're
gonna make kind of a grey by taking some
of our Indian red or burnt sienna and
some of our blue our ultramarine blue
it's gonna give us kind of a grayish a
cool gray it's kind of like a purpley
grey and I'm just gonna kind of dab some
of that in there so when you're dealing
with white and this was the problem that
Vicky was having and sure a lot of you
guys have that same problem you don't
want to point Vicky out oh she's so
patient um is that we see white but we
have a hard time identifying the color
so you kind of really have to look for
in this case we'll have some Grey's in
our in our snow there and if it's too
dark remember watercolor does dry
lighter but if you feel like it's too
dark then just gently tap it with your
with your Kleenex or paper towel okay
it'll soften it right up so it's hard to
see with the glare but if I tip it you
can kind of see there so that I'm going
to take that same color now the great
thing about using ultramarine blue and
Indian red or ultramarine blue and burnt
sienna is that their sedentary sedentary
not sedentary there's sedimentary colors
so they they want fur to draw the center
on this they will be easy to lift so if
you make a mistake you can lift it away
which is nice so I'm going to go ahead
in here on my dry paper because it'll be
a little easier to control I'm going to
go in and paint some shadows on this
blossom over here okay and since we know
this isn't easy to lift color look what
we can do I'm gonna rinse my brush off
I'm gonna pinch it to get off any extra
water so it's just slightly damp and I'm
gonna go around that go on the edge and
look at that I can lift it I can soften
it and I can lift up any color that I
don't want I could play with it move it
around that's the benefit of having a
sedimentary color now if I used red and
green to make my gray I could not do
that because those colors would stain
okay so as you can't you get to know how
your paints behave and um I got a little
more yellow over there I could throw it
a background later but I really want to
get the flowers painted because that's
what what Vicki was having some trouble
with and it's probably something that
you all have a little bit of trouble
controlling so let's do that again on
one of these other petals we're going to
go ahead and just throw in some gray my
brush a little bit wetter mix up a
little bit more of that so if you had
more blue you'll have a cooler color if
you had more of the brown you're gonna
have a warmer color and I'm using Indian
red that's that's the red that I'm using
for this picture um it's important I
think not to
go to crazy with your colors we're using
four colors here mixing all our colors
from those for use an economy of colors
and you will have a better looking
picture because you're making sure all
your colors go you're mixing your colors
so they're all going to look like they
belong it's you know so when you define
local color we have local color and an
object you know you keep going back to
the same color so everything looks like
it belongs looks like it's part of the
scene in the landscape you don't end up
with these awkward colors which is
really kind of the mark of like an
amateur painting is when you see like
colors that don't belong like they've
used every box every color in the box of
crayons which is charming and it can
look very very charming and very
primitive but if you're looking to get
something more natural and sophisticated
you want to limit your color palette
it's okay to have these all of these
colors that's fine you just don't use
mom when painting um all right now I'm
gonna let those on mellow out a bit and
let them dry and soften up and I'm going
to go ahead and work on the blades of
grass so I want to have a I want to have
a nice vivid smooth color Here I am
actually going to paint a blade of grass
here and to keep my vibrance I'm not
going to mix my colors in my palette I'm
going to let them mix on the paper so
I'm going to go in with some SAP green
look at that is it just kind of mixes
and blooms and then I'm going to use
some of this lemon yellow and I'm really
just going to let it blend on the paper
let it do its thing and I'm going to
repeat that for the other petals so go
ahead and and you can wet the stems to
the stems are going to be a little bit
darker and by now I think the bots are
snow at the bottom is probably dry by
now if not it's going to bleed into
there but we'll just keep our paper
towel handy so we can dab it away if we
need to I like to a lot of cases I like
to wet the paper first and then I drip
in my color so if I'm doing just as
stems I'm going to use just a SAP green
maybe you're not a little bit of
ultramarine to it ah it's a stem there
too I forgot that one wet first and go
to marine hope that it's helpful to be
able to see my pallet there I think it
would be a little bit of ultramarine
with that the stems aren't as glowing
with color so I want them to be a little
more subdued so I will mix that a little
bit on my pallet and then I will go in
with a pure color on my blades of grass
there with the paint do its thing I
really like about water colors is the
pink kind has a mind of its own and does
what it wants to do it doesn't need too
much guidance from us sometimes just let
it do its thing okay I've got a lot of
paint in there so I'm going to do is on
a set my brush in there let's soak some
of that up otherwise I'm gonna have some
weird roughly blooms in there and I
don't really want that there so I get to
soak up some of that water okay now
these little um these little guys up
here that are kind of coming off of the
stems are brighter I'm going to paint
them in with the when I side it kinda
have to make up here because I didn't
really dredge it in I'm going to paint
them in with more of this thing
that's on my brush already then I will
just pick up some of the green and just
drop it in there and I'll do its thing
and it will be fabulous remember this is
the painting I'll photograph if you know
it's a little bit off that's fine and
then I'm going to use the collection is
very light I'm going to make it nice
light green and paint in the tips of
these stems and if they blow I'm going
to let them blend out you can let it dry
and then do that if you prefer I'm gonna
figure out that's one of those oops my
kids are fighting upstairs well if you
heard that or not there must be some
great injustice going on
they have just woken up a few minutes
ago vacation week so they are hopefully
not gonna come down have me have me do
dispute resolution to land on my video
oh I don't know I do it's the wrong
color green won't wipe that up
just put some mold or something in there
that's alright i sat green there water
it down a bit and I'm going to add a
little bit of marine and I'm going to
paint the areas right above the snow
drop it's got some it's a much darker
right there where it connects so I got
ultramarine and SAP green there got too
much water my brush though I need a
little bit darker unless you say
I'm just going to be careful they don't
let too much that one blood out but I
kind of like that so I'm going to leave
it but if you want you can wait a bit
and I'm going to take a little bit of
that color and add it to the tips of
these stamens inside here and then I'm
going to pick up some of the lemon and
SAP green mix and I'm just going to
blend it up with that and then I'm going
to wipe my brush off and just kind of
pull that wet paint up over the gray and
that probably should be darkened up a
little bit so I'll use a little bit more
of my ultramarine blue and Indian red
mix just kind of add a little shadow in
there while I'm at it
oh right now I gotta flip this round
yeah I look at it right-side up because
you know it's nice to know what it
actually looks like okay I am going to
fill in this right here the rest of that
word frame aren't we yes and if you ever
have a hard time seeing what I'm doing
look at the bottom of your YouTube
player there's a little spot where you
can click to make it fullscreen and that
can be quite helpful to see the details
what I'm going to do now we got about
four minutes left before my camera is
done so what I'm going to do is I'm
going to pause this I'm going to draw
this with a heat gun and we're going to
erase the pencil marks and see what we
have so hold on just one second I've
dried my paper you know your papers dry
when it's you know you need to touch it
and it's cool and it's not cool to the
touch and I just have a plain white
eraser you can get these at the dollar
store the office supply store um
factious is a brand all different brands
make them you just want to even make
sure it's one of the white ones it does
give you a lot of erasers boogers but it
um it's very soft and it's not going to
damage your paper so when you go over to
paint you're not going to have um you're
not going to have spots where the paint
is takes unevenly because it because
it's a braise the raised a braised vapor
I think that's the right word alright so
I wiped off all the glue boogers my
eraser lines are pretty much gone got a
few more with you and now we're going to
go in and add some details to this okay
you see that no it's very soft looking
right now so we've got three minutes
left let me um let me go in with a
little more that gray we're going to use
a very light touch with our colors and
hopefully finish this in the next couple
of minutes so I've got my my number six
brush comes to a nice point I can go and
add any of their any little details that
I've erased
smooth out anything that I think needs
it I mean so you could also even add a
little bit of yellow to the petals if
you want to brighten them up a little
bit any warm spots you can add some
yellow to the blossom to the leaves
you're just very you're adding very
little color at this point and keep your
tissue handy in case you add too much I
can blot it out remember you can still
go in there and lift up some of the
other colors if you need to um I think
of snowdrops as being a very cool flower
but if I do want to go and I can add
just a little touch of lemon to warm it
and that's a cool up pretty cool yellow
so if you want to go in there and kind
of add a little highlight on the flower
you can do that with just a little bit
of lemon remember stick to the same
colors don't be tempted to go into other
colors I know it's pretty good put some
pinks in there I would really recommend
against it maybe you just use a little
bit that Indian red if you want to have
a cooler I mean a warmer look to it that
way you don't end up um adding in those
weird colors are going to make it look
amateurish I'm just gonna add a little
bit more yellowy green to my little la
leaves here and really that's about all
I want to do to this I'm gonna flip it
over really quick add a little bit of a
definition to the snow here maybe add
some shadows right underneath the
flowers and put my initials in here
and really that's about it of course you
can refine your drawing a little bit
more with the tip of your brush and some
gray go ahead and do that if you want to
if you liked this video please give me a
thumbs up and subscribe if you have a
request or a question um
you can leave it underneath the video in
the comment section look at that we can
add a little bit more um dark to define
petals if we want to just really look at
what you're painting find an image
online draw it from life see what the
colors actually are in what you're
painting and really your eyes won't
steer you wrong if you do what really
what you see thank you so much for
watching until next time
happy crafting