As I’m gearing up for a Live Version of my Watercolour course in the New Year I thought it would be fun to get an up-to-date list of common challenges that people face when sketching with watercolour.
Here are a few things I regularly hear from participants in my SketchingNow courses
- “I’m afraid to ruin my ink drawing by adding paint”
- “I don’t know how to control the water in my washes”
- “My watercolour sketches look flat, lifeless and overworked”
- “I don’t know how to mix the colours I want and always end up with muddy mixes”
- “I can’t decide on what colours to put in my palette”
The Watercolour course was designed to address these struggles!
But I would love to hear from you:
What are the biggest challenges you face when sketching with watercolour?
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19 Comments
The paint not drying because it’s too cold during northern Scotland winter! And once it froze, then melted in the car on the way home into a muddled mess
Use vodka instead of water.
Achieving a subtle enough wash to indicate clouds with several colours and creating realistic chunky stratocumulus and cumulus cloud bodies.
Unwanted runs.
Achieving spontaneity. Avoiding an overworked look. Combining watercolor and ink.
I experience this too – wanting to ‘get it right’ rather than letting the paint create the image.
Making shadows look realistic!
I never feel like I have enough room to mix paints on my palette. How do you lay out your mixing trays to make the most efficient use of your space?
Needing to work in a completely different way when sketching outdoors, it doesn’t dry, and I have to be able to pack it away pretty swiftly in order to move on (I sketch when out hiking). I have had some very interesting freeze drying effects though, a different kind of granulation.
Two topics I’d love more instruction on:
Skies continue to challenge! Soft edges and layered colors in clouds is so hard. I tend to either over-saturate the blues and not leave enough white, or my skies look washed out and too pale.
Water: moving, still, with shadows, etc. I also have trouble with shorelines, making them look natural not too abrupt and cartoon-like.
Avoiding gaudy colours, mixing realistic hues!
Committing to shapes.
I find getting realistic shadows to anchor things properly very difficult. Skies too I find hard. And generally simplifying scenes by omitting details. I am greatly looking forward to the course and the Live Version sessions!
Getting soft edges when I want them and knowing when it’s dry enough for another layer.
Correctly assessing the value once the color is dry. Once dry, many of my sketches look all light or all mid-tone.
I’m still at the very beginning of using colour and I find the particular combination of pigment, water and brush for different purposes e.g. wet-in-wet really hard. And learning not to fiddle: it always makes things worse.
Shadows and sunlight, the stark desert light, and how to keep the details but still have it look like a bright sunny hot day without the shadows being too dark. Or maybe they just need to be dark? I’m challenged by the desert light.
I really really struggle to avoid hard edges. I use less water, and the color is too light. I try to use less water and more pigment, and then run out of paint for that area & need to mix again. It’s a *goldilocks* thing, except I can’t get to *just right*.
Challenge: choosing colors and specifically learning to push the colors.
The way you push the watercolors is super cool and stunning.
You add a touch of turquoise or chartreuse or garnet or sapphire; it totally reads and is such a joyful interpretation.
(For example, your post of October 2, 2023: A Collection of Domed Building Sketches.)
Your sketches sing!
I look forward to getting better at pushing the colors! Onward!
Thank you Liz!
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