Watercolor and Acrylic Experiment

[Charlie Eve Ryan]

I'm trying to do some more watercolor to prepare for @Lee-White's class this summer. I wanted to practice trees and flowers. This is watercolor and acrylic. It went too dark and I'm not sure what else to do with it, but it sure was fun to create. Any suggestions appreciated.

[Suzy Heitz]

@Charlie-Eve-Ryan I've been experimenting too! Can't wait for the class.

[Charlie Eve Ryan]

@Suzy-Heitz awesome!

[Charlie Eve Ryan]

A friend suggested I crop the tree piece to pull back on some of the darkness. What do you think?

Here are some watercolor flowers too.

[Sarah LuAnn]

Ooh, I like those flowers a lot. Very nice.

The cropped piece does feel less heavy, the black sky was pretty foreboding before.

[Charlie Eve Ryan]

Thanks Sarah...flowers are the one thing that have a tendency to pan out when I do watercolor.

@Sarah-LuAnn I really love how Lee contrasts dark darks against white and a splash of saturated color but it is super tricky plus I'm trying to take a more mixed media approach to watercolor. People are especially hard to pull off too but it is nice to play with real paint at times!!

[Charlie Eve Ryan]

Last one for today...Into the dark..it looks like there is a little girl sitting among the dark clouds. #watercolor

[bdyanne]

@Charlie-Eve-Ryan I love this one! nice work!

[Lee White]

These are great and should be loose and fun. In order to really practice though, try sketching out a few values in pencil before you paint. Then try to hold those values when you actually paint. It's good practice because there is a goal in mind. You will see that this is easier said than done. You will learn a lot more this way than if you are just doing a painting without a plan.

kinda like these:

[Charlie Eve Ryan]

@Lee-White Really great tip and examples, Lee. I will definitely do the pencil sketches and try not to tense up too much with the pencil. Thank you!!!
I am finding these watercolor pieces to be really super helpful because it forces me to draw landscapes since I am unsure of how to create people in watercolor. When I work digitally my work is so character driven and I am really hoping with practice I can somehow merge the two. I just have no idea at this point what that will actually look like.

This watercolor piece is called yellow fields. I tried to stay loose while doing a bit more planning this time.

[MOO]

@Charlie-Eve-Ryan Yes, that looks good. I really like the flowers

[Charlie Eve Ryan]

@Marsha-Kay-Ottum-Owen and @bdyanne thanks so much!!