Watercolor cattails beginner tutorial Video Lecture | Master the Art of Watercolour Painting (English) - Art & Craft

hi there Lindsay here the frugal crafter
and as you can see I'm gonna be doing
another painting tutorial for you and I
just wanted to show you my full
watercolor palette this is what I
generally will use when I'm painting and
I just want to show you this because
most of my tutorials I do with my little
travel kit and I have my paints eraser
rainbow order and the paint's I use are
by M Graham and company artist paints
they are usually a little more
affordable than Windsor Newton and other
brands and they work just as well but
any sort of artists brand watercolor
paints you will find work very well
alright so what we're gonna do is begin
with a little watercolor card like this
I just clipped mine on my board with
some binder clips you can tape it down
whatever you want I didn't want a white
edge on this so I'm just clipping it
down and we're gonna paint cattails
today and every morning I go when I walk
my dog and I notice all these um lovely
cattails and I'm using a pencil I'm just
going to sketch on some oblong rounded
rounded oblong shapes here I think I'll
put a three hopefully you can see that I
wonder I'm too darks I don't want my um
my lines to really show and they're
starting to go by I've noticed and I
thought you know I really have to
remember to uh to paint these with you
guys before they go by and I put a few
blades of grasses they have the grasses
with them if you want to have them
taller go ahead and turn your paper the
other way
I'm just doing a greeting card here and
I do want to background so now that I've
got my sketch on all we're doing is
lines and ovals straight lines and ovals
nothing fancy here then what we're gonna
do is just wet our paper that over the
way I don't want to cause a shadow when
I just tip this up here I'm afraid my
water buckets gonna cause a shadow um I
want to have kind of a rough edge so I
am just not wetting all the way to the
edge just kind of leaving a rough border
and I'm going to use
ultramarine blue and the colors we're
using today are all sedimentary colors
they all come from minerals ultramarine
blue comes from the mineral lapis lazuli
or they do have they do a lot of times
now use a synthetic version I'm going to
use some burnt sienna mix I'm gonna mix
it with the blue just kind of make kind
of a grey see how that really graze it
up it's very pretty and I want to use a
little yellow ochre to give it a little
warmth these are all colors were going
to be painting with and what I do here
when I'm just gonna show you my palette
one more time um I pick up the color in
this case yellow McCants yellow girll we
turned around this way the yellow ochre
and then I just bring it out in my
palette and kind of make sure there's no
clumps and bumps before I bring it to my
paper I just I'm establishing a light
source here and I want to add a little
bit of SAP green well at it because I
know that that is the color I'm gonna
want in the painting so I'm just going
to put that in there
you'll notice I'm these are really
watered down and you'll notice when you
use the artists paint as opposed to the
student paints I was using before and
the tutorials that they're they're a lot
more vivid so you do just have to adjust
for that a little bit just by adding
more water now I've got a puddle here so
if I leave that alone I'm gonna have a
blossom in my background I don't really
want that in this background so what I'm
doing is taking a dry brush and setting
it down in the puddle and that is going
to soak up any of the extra water so
that that doesn't happen
that's called a called a bloom when it
does happen and sometimes it's really on
effect you want and other times it isn't
so what I'm going to do now is dry this
and we'll be back and start painting our
cattails
a way to tell if your painting is dry or
not is to touch it with a side of your
hand just very gently you don't want to
disturb the paint if it feels cool to
the touch then it's not dry yet if it
feels room-temperature then it's dry I
wanted to show you what a bloom looks
like now if you look right here this
cluster of blue there that is what a
bloom looks like in this case there was
some area an area in the middle dried
first and then the area around it was
wet giving us that ruffled edge usually
it's the opposite you'll have the you'll
have a puddle in the middle that causes
the bloom that to me looks a little bit
like clouds so I'm not going to worry
about it
now our light is over here so that tells
us when we paint our cat
this is the direction our light is
coming from so to paint our first
cattail we're going to use a round brush
anything between a 5 and a 10 you
probably can do it it's a really not
specific here and we're just going to
wet the oval only and you can kind of
tip it to the light and see if it's
shiny and then you know it's wet and
we're going to drip in some colors
pretty strongly and I'm gonna start with
burnt sienna don't you lie I love the
way it looks when it spreads now I'm
going to do a mix of burnt sienna and
ultramarine blue and I mix it on my
palette so um then when I added and I
don't have to do anything to it once
it's in look how dark that is that is
going to the area of the cat tail that
is away from the light now these colors
are sedimentary they settle on the top
of the paper and they give you more of a
matte appearance as opposed to the more
brighter colors that sink into the paper
that gives you more of a vibrant alright
now I want to add a highlight so I'm
going to use yellow ochre right up here
in the corner and along that side does
that's a light source side just kind of
tapping it in here and there remember
it's going to dry a little bit lighter
not as much as like a not as much
lighter is like a um a color like a rose
madder or a really vibrant transparent
color these will dry a little bit darker
and want to do this for every one of
these cattails so we're just gonna let
them I'm gonna let both of these right
at the same time because I know I can
get them painted before they dry
see how quickly you can work once you
get the hang of it and my dark I mixed
up enough when I was at it so that I
wouldn't have to stop and remix you'll
get to you'll be really good at gauging
that how much to mix up at a time the
more you paint that way you won't have
wasted paint you won't have wasted time
so you know that's why I recommend that
that people start out with a student
grade paint unless they're you know
unless they can afford it and they have
no problem in that respect and doesn't
bother them to use up the good stuff
because by the time you are done with
that first set of students paints you're
gonna really have a handle on how to use
the paint how much to mix up all that
stuff and then when you get going with
the good stuff you're going to be you
didn't make it some fabulous paintings
you're going to notice a huge
improvement so that's that's my advice
my advice for in with kids I like I'm
starting with the student grade stuff
just because it doesn't have the toxic
it you really doesn't have the toxic
chemicals that are in some of the
artists grade paints so that's um that's
why I really urge you if you're buying
your supplies from kids you make sure
that there are no toxic chemicals like
cadmium lead usually it's not LED Bloods
usually in white and you typically don't
use white when your water coloring but
cobalt that sort of thing all right so
I'm wetting the blades of grass you
could do one at a time you probably
ought to do one at a time if you're a
beginner but I'm just getting them all
wet in there and I'm gonna drop in SAP
green I just love it I never get enough
of just the way the paints just float
and fly when you put them on that wet
paper and you know you'd wouldn't even
have had to draw drew these in actually
they're gonna change now I want to make
it go up off the paper because I think I
need a little scale that to go right off
the edge I'm going this Miele loca
because I'm keeping with the same colors
I'm gonna put my highlight side in that
you know the grasses are in the cattails
especially this time you are not that
vibrant so we don't want to go in with
lemon yellow though just make a really
really bright green you can even bend
some of them over because they're
starting to they're starting to go by
and what I'm going to do here is I'm
just kind of clean my brush they're just
kind of wiped off the extra and I'm just
pulling a little that paint right into
the little tops of the cattails all
right we're going to dry this because
we're going to paint the the reeds the
cattails are attached to it and we'll be
back and we will finish it up a lot of
times when I'm painting I'll have
several paintings going at once so that
I can I can kind of skip around work on
one then take a break work on something
else I'm using a mixture of SAP green
and yellow ochre to just paint on this
dry that looks a little too grain for me
so I'm going in with just the yellow
ochre which is a little watery because
it's on my palette already and I'm just
kind of flushing it out a little bit I
don't want it too vivid I don't want the
reason the cattails to be as dark as the
grasses
I actually think around there you'll
notice that the sedimentary colors do
not flow quite as easily as the brighter
synthetic or organic pigments such as
pigments coming from plants or flowers
the ones coming from minerals tend to be
heavier and sit on top of the paper
alright I feel like I need something
bridging the gap between these these uh
grasses and cattails that are close to
us and the sky that's far away and I'm
going to take flat brush half inch flat
and I'm going to grab some of the colors
on my palette swirl them together so I
get kind of a brownish green and I'm
just gonna flick in some nondescript
grasses that are in the pond there with
them this is just because I don't feel I
feel that just as to is to start and I'm
going to do some splashing and pigment
because I like to splash on some color
and if you don't like that then you
don't have to do it that's not the best
brush board I want to juicier brush
especially in a picture like this it's
not that that difficult or exciting I
like to add some squash the color just
to give it a little bit of both
all right now I feel like the just a
little it's at the top of our our
cattails need a little bit of definition
so I'm gonna go with some burnt sienna
maybe just a little tap of ultramarine
blue and I'm just gonna kind of kiss
that in frame just going to give it a
little bit of a definition and it's got
so bright I can always plot it out but I
think it's going to dry a little bit
later and be good and then as far as
that all I need to do is write your
initials or your name or however you
like to sign your cards my cards I just
put my initials um with my paintings I
put my full name cards are just initials
and the date and there you have it
cattails very easy if you want to spruce
it up a little bit more you could paint
a dragonfly or stamp a dragonfly or
stamp a sudden mint or just call it a
day just go ahead is I want to thank you
so much for watching if you have any
questions please leave a comment and
I'll get back to you and thumbs up if
you like it subscribe and until next
time have you crafting