Watercolor bat - color question
-
The colors and composition on the final are wonderful. Look back at your original, and then this one again; the improvement is astounding. Your hard work has definitely paid off. Love it!
-
@demotlj What a very clever idea!
-
@debra-garcia Thanks for your compliments. I am still frustrated that I wasn't able to get the blues as dark as I wanted in watercolor (I was using mostly ultramarine) without making them too gray. I had to resort to Procreate to darken them while retaining some vibrancy. Color mixing is definitely a challenge for me as a newcomer to watercolors.
-
Oh! You nailed it!
Evelyn reads so well against her background - those blues of the ground and sky are so rich! And her warm colors really make her pop.
A disgression - I think sometimes with watercolor we try and make the paint do something that it just can't do - it's not acrylic or oil, and it just can't accomplish the same vibrancy that those mediums can produce. It's got a mind of its own - but we do get a softer story with it, and that beautiful gradation of color when we do wet in wet. What kind of watercolor do you use?
I agree with what was said - the improvement is night and day and I'm so glad you decided to retackle this subject - the choice to change up the composition was perfect.
How does the piece look if you flip it horizontally? I feel like I heard that an image is stronger if it reads left to right for western markets. What if Evelyn flew right and everyone else flew left? -
@kaitlinmakes I’m using Windsor Newton pan and Daniel Smith tube paints, mostly Ultramarine, Burnt Sienna, and Burnt Umber.
I agree with you about the left to right thing but the problem is that it is actually a fact that bats all turn left going out of a cave. I read it on a “strange animal facts” site (that I hope is trustworthy) and that sparked the idea for me. I actually tried to figure out how to flip it so Evelyn would be heading to the right both physically from the cave and on the page as well but then I couldn’t show her face or the cave opening without some really clever compositional camera angles that my brain couldn’t manage.
-
@demotlj
Oooo - I just got some Daniel smith too - they're pretty yummy.
Thank you for sharing that little bit of natural behavior with usIt's frustrating when animal behavior doesn't comform to visual storytelling
dinosaur illustrators have it easy(ish)
-
Looking great! Your bat definitely stands out from the background.
-
This looks great, I actually love the subtle blues in the background, it makes your character pop out more because the colours aren't too vibrant in the background. Maybe you could add a little tongue in the bats mouth?
-
If you are getting tired of it, why not take a small break from it? I think the colours that you have used are wonderfully simple and the bat just flies of the page (
) i think it would be a shame to ditch the watercolours because you are getting a bit stir-crazy over it
-
agree, the end result is so much stronger and the colors are lovely. Good job Demotlj! You inspire me to get back to my crocodiles