Plein Air Postcard #4 Secret Beach Video Lecture - Master the Art of Watercolour

hi there Lindsay here the frugal crafter
I have another video in the planer plein
air postcard series for you today and
first thing I'm going to do is actually
sketch with paint a little bit because
there's a lot of different different
elements here that you don't want to
lose when you're painting so what I'm
going to do is I'm gonna take a little
bit of ultramarine blue and burnt sienna
maybe a little bit of yellow ochre and a
little more I'm just gonna grab a few
colors that are that I know I'm gonna
use and make kind of a neutral gray here
and I'm gonna sketch a horizon line
about 1/3 of the way down just very very
lightly okay so we got that and then I
am going to put in this little land area
here and sketch well that should be over
here a little bit more and sketch that
back and then I'm gonna have another
little land area there then we've got
this area here got the beachy area up
here we've got a little kind of little
island I just want to make sure that
I've room for everything because there's
I've got a lot going on here and I tried
purposely to fit as much as I could in
this this composition and because of
that it's kind of I got to make sure I
allow enough space or I'm gonna kind of
go off the rails and end up using up a
lot of mice a lot of my space okay you
could do this with a pencil you could
get a little more detailed with a pencil
if you want but I typically don't sketch
with a pencil when I am out painting so
I'm gonna grab a little ultramarine blue
and a little bit of this thicket I
didn't know what that blue is it's kind
of like a like a deep swirly and I guess
I don't know it's not as light as I
never saw this light is a cerulean but
it's not as intense as Othello and
that get some of that up here and I'm
just gonna painting around my clouds
actually because I didn't have a paper
towel I was working I don't think so I
was just kind of kind of making it up as
I went I'm just kind of trying to paint
around as much of much cause as I needed
and I'm gonna take a little bit of Rose
permanent Rose add that into my mix
there's so many colors in this kit I
have to be kind of careful and sometimes
I forget what colors I used I just
tapped into that sketchy gray that I
mean just so that I wouldn't be too
purple and I'm like just get a wet clean
brush just by squeezing out some water
and just spreading that out a little bit
so it's not too dark I don't want a
thunderstorm on my beautiful beach day
this is a beautiful secret Beach and I
found that my sister and brother-in-law
showed me and it was like 15 minutes
from where I grew up and fantastic Beach
oh my goodness loved it no I'm not gonna
tell anybody where it is either it's my
secret such a nice hood a little beach
beautiful so warm too not only cold
water all right now what I'm going to do
is there's some kind of landmass back
here it's actually the other side of the
pond I believe and I'm gonna do my blue
I'm just gonna make kind of a sketchy
gray but not quite so grab picking up
like just colors I know I'm gonna use in
the picture so it's kind of like a it's
kind of like that Viridian green plus
the blue that I've used plus you know
the gray that I've already made and I'm
going to put that in here
and to have it so you can see it around
some of the other landmasses and that
I'm gonna paint in feel like he needs to
a little bit of violet in there too so
I'm stripping that in there and then I
could start working on the water use I
can use the same color back there it's
okay if it if it wicks down in there I
feel like pretty much anything is okay
well you're playing there painting you
know you're catching the the mood and
the atmosphere of the place of your
painting and I wasn't gonna do these um
these paintings as tutorials cuz I it's
kind of something I do for fun I go with
my sketch you know whenever I have the
chance but so many people had asked me
to do them that that I said well and I
did one of them and people said it was
helpful and they really enjoy doing it I
think it's because the pressures off
it's obviously a simple a simple sketch
and I think people feel like they can do
it and sometimes you feel a little
overwhelmed if you see something else
and it doesn't look quite as simple now
first and I have recently started doing
this just as this year I never did it
before I've been using white I've been
mixing up my own kind of titanium buff
color with white yellow ochre and burnt
sienna and it's so funny because some
people that just a bore people using
white they're just like oh my gosh how
can you call yourself a water colorist
will by titanium buff and I'm like
you're pretty much just using white did
you realize that it's that's pretty much
white it's kind of crazy
but it does work really nice for sand
especially if you don't have a lot of
time upending the field it's a great way
just just to kind of pull in some sand
colors because it's a little more opaque
it's actually quite opaque so you can
you know get that fan back like as
you're waiting into water what I like to
do is kind of put it in like this and
then squeeze out a little water and just
kind of drag it out cuz I don't like to
have this underneath 2-mile will glaze
some water over it just to make it look
a little bit more you know just because
you can you can glaze on top of it I
like it to look kind of like you're
wading into the water and you've got
those depths of of sand and water going
over the sand but I wouldn't paint this
whole area here with it we
there I will just kind of squeeze out
some excess for my brush and then I
would just kind of wash it out a little
bit so that it kind of tones the paper a
little bit just so there's not like a
harsh start and stop area there all
right so now I want a nice bright area
over here and that's well let's let that
dry for a second let's go over here for
a minute I'm gonna do lemon yellow I'm
gonna do a little this Viridian ish
color there and I am going to I want to
cool that off a little bit so I'm gonna
pick up some of this blue that we used
for the water I don't want this super
bright back here and this is just an
island kind of in the middle of the pond
and same over here we've got this I'm
gonna put this I had a little roll of
masking tape I'm just gonna tap that
underneath there there you can still see
that all right I think I'll tip it up
from time to time but that keeps the
glare off and it helps me see my paper a
little bit better typically I'm sitting
with this on my lap so this is on my lap
and this is kind of in front of me and
it's very convenient but when I'm
working flat on the table it's difficult
to to paint like this and I'll grab a
little bit sienna and some of that
Viridian green look at mix a nice dark
umber almost and I can I find that these
are very inexpensive pace but I still
find I can do some complex mixes with it
and not have it too muddy but you do
have to kind of consider that you know
the more the more colors mixed together
the more chance you're gonna have mud
especially if you're using student grade
paints but tell you the truth I really
haven't had any trouble with this I know
I need trouble the cop man some people
are all like Oh Commons are terrible I
like cotton watercolors and I recommend
them because you know what you're
getting in the tube you're getting what
you pay for you're getting the pigments
you say they're using and and I don't
have any problem with it I know it's not
is they're not as sexy as some of the
new watercolors that are coming out that
are pretty cheap and have no information
on them but but I like them I think that
ones are new it's a trusted company so
so I like them I like this too you
really can't beat this for the money
this is the whoops I'm gonna rinse my
brush just because I haven't used that
green I don't really want to pull in a
new Green get the lemon I think is
really this whole kit you've got you've
got the
paintbrush it comes with it you have 24
colors I've been using this for years
and I use it a lot and I've barely made
a dent I mean some of the colors you can
see the little divots but you really
can't beat it I mean for that price and
it's easy to find it's pretty easy to
find set you can get a big box store and
get it online everybody seems to have it
okay I'm gonna let that dry up a bit I'm
gonna come down here and I'm gonna add a
little lemon yellow to that wash I just
made and I want this nice springy yellow
green in here this is like the marshy
area where start stuff is really growing
and very very lively colors I'm just
dragging some of that those colors up
making my little making my little uh
grasses and if I had my credit card
scraper at the beach that time I would
have scraped some up but I didn't have
it so I don't want to do that now
because it's not gonna look like that
mainly I'm gonna do too much on this
right now with it being wet unless I
want the only thing I'm doing here is
stuff that I want to blend now I did
have some rocks over here so I'm gonna
take my burnt sienna and my ultramarine
blue mix a I'm not sure if that's
actually Bernstein I think it's probably
a light red because it makes it very
purply purply Brown so you know that's
that's the thing I mean you know exactly
sure what's in these colors but some
people get way too fussy about about so
I mean come on Speights cheap it works
good I'm not gonna get to do you fussed
about it brown in there uh okay I'll let
that dry before you do any details on
that I'll just do a little bit of
shoreline over there
and okay no what can I work on right
over here is dry so I think I'll do
these foreground flowers I'm gonna do
yellow ocher and I'm gonna do some of
this Viridian and let's see what I get
here that's really dark I'll do a couple
strands of that and now I want to do
some brighter so I'm gonna do some lemon
yellow
don't worry I'll wipe that off and do a
few grasses of this and this can give
you the scale and make it look very
three-dimensional because you get
something close to the bottom of the
paper that's tall and it gives you that
that scale now you can do cattails there
if you don't like these purple flowers
but I really like these purple flowers
so I'm gonna do them and I'm gonna mix
up the rose and the ultramarine to get
that color and just tap on a few of
these gonna have a little more blue in
there I suppose then I'm also gonna have
some of this over here I'm sometimes
I'll tap it and let it blend out gonna
be careful there's a lot of yellow over
there that could be very muddy just get
the impression of it anyway and now over
here I'm ready to work cuz it's getting
dry starting to dry over there so see
you know it tends to clean self-cleaning
palette tends to clean its itself as you
kind of go through your painting I found
out this week that my oven wasn't
self-cleaning like my palate is it was
so dirty it caught on fire it was awful
I want to preheat it to cook something
and something it's spelled in there and
it caught on fire
you thank goodness for YouTube look to
fly a YouTube video how to clean it so I
self-cleaning one so I had to put baking
soda in there and it was really gross
Oh second I thought I could take all
this crud and make carbon black
watercolor mix it with some carbon some
gum arabic but like I don't even use
black watercolor I don't need to add
that to the world but I just clean when
my wandering mind so I don't like to
clean okay
all right so now I can tell that my
values in the water need some work so I
need to get a little bit darker let's
see how that color it's already in my
palette does we had a little bit of that
I still need a little bit more intensive
color I'm gonna go with the ultramarine
blue and I'm gonna take some of that
Viridian and that's getting there that's
a little bit better oh yeah and then if
I happen to Greg get into some of those
colors and it makes it kind of dragged
into the water that's alright because
you would have some reflections in
between the ripples in the water might
when I took my daughter out kayaking and
we were painting the other day and she
was getting very frustrated with her
kayak moving or things not being perfect
and I said honey you know what it's not
gonna be perfect you're you're painting
moving things no trees are moving the
lights changing from a moving object
it's not going to be perfect you have to
accept that and and find the fun in it
you know I know what it's like to be
that age and want everything to be
perfect I remember that in fact a lot of
adults don't draw better than ten year
olds because they kind of stop trying
once they became self-aware of how their
paintings look their drawings look they
become self-aware and they say well
that's not how it really looks and then
they become frustrated and they stop
trying and I don't want that to happen
to my kids I don't want that to happen
to anybody I want you to keep trying cuz
you can be really good at it and you can
overcome the challenges I'm just gonna
dry this real quick
and we'll just see what we need for
finishing touches okay I'm gonna grab
some of that that violet that I had my
my palette I'm gonna grab it with some
of the brown that I made something
greyish Brown a little bit more burnt
sienna in there that's a lot more
basically we want to make something
that's kind of its kind of like wet
sandy color and I want to add some of
that in and around here I like how that
looked in my painting and then I'm gonna
take some of that do a little bit more
over here and I'm gonna flick it on with
a toothbrush I didn't have a toothbrush
with me I kind of sprayed that my brush
across and then just kind of did it with
that but really I think the next time I
have an oil painting brush that loses
its head sometimes he's come loose I'm
gonna save the end and just the brush
I'm gonna stick that might took my
trouble painting bags I really like I
haven't like the looks of that I'm just
gonna flush out these rocks a little bit
and I'm gonna go back in and I don't
clean my brush that much when I'm
working out about because I find that
that cross-pollination of colors that
dirty brush painting give makes
everything look a little bit more
realistic and I like that whoops I
didn't mean to do that
that's all right did not mean to put
that big brown streak in there but
that's okay and I would take a little
bit of brown labor it's just too wet get
a little bit of there we go just want to
kind of a pea green kind of color
brownish green throw in some weeds a
brighter color here
I don't know what you call the
difference between mud and earthtones
but I think you call it earth tones if
it's on purpose and you call it mud if
it's not a purpose but even though I
mean I do see that my colors are much
fresher my pings I do on location are
always fresh I always look better to me
because I'm there and the moment I'm
capturing everything and experiencing it
as I paint so it always seems to be a
little bit of a letdown painting it in
the studio because I go you know because
you don't buy amazing purple because you
don't have I did it again because you
don't have that you're not kind of
pulling from the experience of painting
out in the world so again I hope you
will get out and about and paint out if
you can I know it's not possible for
everybody but you know if you can paint
on location it is so nice there I think
that finishes it up for us today I hope
you enjoyed this and if not we'll give
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crafty friends that would like to learn
how to paint I love teaching and I hope
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for watching please me a thumbs up and
subscribe until next time happy crafting