Riverscape Watercolor Painting Process

Hello everyone and welcome, my name is Noelle and I'll be painting a river and sky focused watercolor painting. If you ever wonder what products I'm using, all of my supplies are listed in the description below. So, I began this process by cutting my paper into a 6 by 8 inch piece of paper and taped it down. Here, I'm applying clean water where the sky is going to be and go straight in with pigment, mostly Prussian blue, and allow it to flow, painting around to the areas I want the clouds to be. By doing this, my clouds are going to look cute and puffy without creating harsh lines when it dries. I went in several times while the paper was still wet, adding and lifting paint so it looks natural, like my reference photo. The sky is often lighter on the horizon due to haze, so I kept that in mind as well. As the sky was drying, I worked on the river by layering a somewhat flat wash that will represent the lightest areas of the water reflections. You'll see me swatch some green paint and right after that, I paint the hills in the background with a completely different color mix. The most distant hills are going to appear bluish, like the atmosphere, and lighter in value. As the hills get closer to the viewer, they will appear darker and greener. By expressing this, I am establishing depth in my painting. Uh, yeah, and then I dropped my brush, luckily it wasn't a big deal and it was a quick fix. Once the first layers of the hills dried, I painted the shadows carefully, making the edges soft so the hill looks somewhat roundy. The process of painting the trees in the foreground began with a bit of Mijello's Greenish Yellow, which is a lovely color to use as a base since it will make the trees overall look brighter. Also I wasn't sure how dark to make it and after one layer of green, I realized it should be more saturated and then I added more olive green and sap green on top because it isn't called greenery for no reason. So my next step is a bit tough to explain but I'll do my best. I took my size 4 round silver black velvet brush, dipped it into a darker green color mix, wiped off the excess paint onto a paper towel so that the bristles of the brush can separate easily, and stippled areas of the trees that are in the shadows. Again, the brush should be dry enough to allow the bristles to separate a bit since this permits the fine, distant leaf texture that I'm looking for. I wouldn't recommend using a natural hair brush like me since that can damage it, so don't do what I do and use a synthetic brush, they should work just fine. So moving on to the river, I pre-wet an area with clean water and while that was still wet, I dropped some green on it to create a reflection of the trees onto the water. This doesn't need to be perfect, it just needs to roughly resemble the trees above it like a silhouette. I really like this part since it really felt like it pulled the piece together and also I think the wet on wet technique is generally fun to play around with on paper. Here's the satisfying tape peel and I hope you enjoyed watching this video and if you did, consider giving me a thumbs up or subscribing to my channel. If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, feel free to let me know. You can find me on my social media linked below, I am most active on my Instagram account. To find out what art supplies I use and or recommend, you can visit my Amazon storefront linked below. I'll receive a small commission from the items purchased following those links. Thanks so much for watching and make it a great day!