Simple Beginner-Friendly Watercolors | An Easy Watercolor Leaves Technique, in Fun, Shimmery Colors

Hello everyone, I am playing today. I don't know why I was really in the mood to do some of these purple and gold colored leaves. So I'm going to play with that today. But the other thing I wanted to do is just a really light background. So let's actually do this. I am going to, I am going to spray the background to get it all wet, like that. And then let's use a large brush and just get that background wet. This is, by the way, let's see, what paper is this? Oh, this is Fabriano, which I really don't use often. It's too expensive and I wasn't that impressed with it for how expensive it was. I probably wouldn't buy it again. I just didn't see that big of a difference. It's 140 pound cold press though. Okay. And then I'm going to go in and this is just my cat's tongue and let's add in, let me grab a little bit of purple here. So I've got some purpley, it's got even some blue mixed in there. And just going to, I'm tilting my paper by the way, and just, I've wanted a very faint background. I used to paint this way a lot years ago, adding in backgrounds and then going over it with my actual painting. So just really light. Let's add in just a tiny bit of fallish color. So I think I'll just use the tiniest bit of that Payne's gray and just add a little of that in just for some interest in the background. And again, I'm tilting my paper so it runs downwards and using a light wash. I don't want it too dark. Okay. That's quite enough, I think. number one, it lightens up. Number two, the paper kind of flattens out. What I do want to do though is go in with some of that purple and just, there we go, just a few little splatters here and there like that, just for some interest. Okay. Now I have to shoot that again. It's rather cold here, cool here today. So I'm going to just give it another shot. Okay. There we go. So kind of an interesting fun, but it's not going to be too distracting. It's going, not going to take away from our actual elements that we're going to put in here. So now what I think I'll do is just kind of draw in some, just for some reference. So I'm going to have a stem coming from the outside, maybe a leaf here, something like that. Maybe a smaller leaf there. I just want a general placement. I don't want to get too nitpicky here. Maybe some little leaves here like that. So I'm just drawing for some placement here. I might add some bigger leaves there. So that'll be kind of a focal point to, depending on my colors I use like that. Maybe a couple little sprouts with berries coming out here and there. I think it's kind of fun. So let's kind of go with that. Maybe I've got one giant leaf coming out there. So I'd rather like that. Yeah, let's go with that. Okay. So what I'm going to use, you could use a variety of brushes and we all have our favorites. I think I'll go ahead and use my eight round. This is from my set, but I will link the Princeton down below for you. And I really wanted to play with that purple. So I've got my Mai Ling Paul Rubens palette here. I already kind of misted it. I'm going to add some of that. And that color you guys is really, really saturating. So be a little careful with that. I don't want it to overtake too much. And I'm just going to use the tip of my brush. I'm going to wet this leaf point press. And what's really pretty about this is that wash we did underneath is going to show through just beautifully. Now, I just took a damp brush. I rinsed it off, took a damp brush, and I lifted a tiny bit. I'm going to go into that, pick up a little bit of this red violet. Ooh, look at that. And just tap in here and there just for some interest. As that sits there, it'll continue to spread really beautifully. And I don't want to rinse all that lovely color out of there. So at this point, you could take a credit card or whatever you want. If you have my subscription box, you're going to get one of these in one of your boxes and scratch in some little veins like that. Maybe I'll just barely tap in. I feel like I want a tiny bit of darker color. Look at that. So pretty. And I don't even mind those blooms. I really don't. If you don't like them, just do what I just did and kind of tap in with that. Now, I really wanted to try our yellow ochre. Let me spin this around over to my yellow ochre. I even think the yellow sienna would be gorgeous. But let's start with our yellow ochre here. And I've got about 50 water, 50 pigment. Tap off. And let's do a yellow leaf here. Point, press, point, press. And I'm just really doing easy leaves here, just little C curves. Tap in. With a little darker values, let that spread and we're going to go in there and just I might add a tiny bit more of that. Yeah. Oh, isn't that so pretty? I love it on this background too. This is where watercolors are just so pretty, you guys, because it's going to show through a little bit of that purple. There we go. And then I want to use my little scratcher here again. And we'll come back to those. Yeah, I like that a lot. The gold metallic would be really pretty on here. Let's do another gold one over here. So point, press, light value, point, press. And that beautiful purple underneath is showing through. Add a tiny bit of dots here and there. Let those blend out by themselves. I'm just touching them in and let them go. There we go. I feel like I want even a little bit more right in that corner like that. And then just let it go. Again, if you want a teeny bit more blend and in organic flowers and leaves, I think it's perfectly fine to have some of those blooms, what they call blooms, which is where the water creates like this here. I think that's perfectly fine. Let's do a, I'm going to make this one purple. So let's go ahead and do that one. Into my purple, point, press, a light value, meaning I've got about 50 water, 50 pigment. And you can always test out your values, meaning the darkness and lightness of a color. So this is 80% pigment, 20 water. This is about 50-50. This is about 80% water, 20% pigment. And you want all three for interest. So I'm just going to tap in there with a darker value of that same color like that, and then let it blend on its own. And it will really blend beautifully. See how pretty those two colors are? Rinse my brush. Let's do another, let's add just a bit more of the yellow ochre and do this one here. Point, press, open up that belly. There we go. Tap in. Very pretty. Some of that. There we go. Oh, we didn't scratch in our veins here. And you can even lift here if you want. So I wet my brush, tap it off on a paper towel. So they call it a thirsty brush. And we could lift some off. We could add some in, just tapping into my paint. I tend to do that up near the stem area. And we'll do another maybe gold leaf here. Point, press, point, press. And because this is so transparent, this beautiful medium, we get this beautiful purpley shade coming through underneath, which I love. That is what just fascinates me about watercolors, is its ability to be transparent and luminescent enough that it shows through underneath. Really pretty. I love that. A little bit more just up near the top. And actually what we could even do now, so I'm going to use, you could use your eight. Oh, I might not have it here. My little two. Oh, yes I do. That's a two. I will link, this is my brush from my subscription box, but I'll link a Princeton for you. And I'm going to go in with a dark, dark chocolatey brown. So my Van Dyke brown. Let's go and add some of that in here. Almost a black. I'll even can add a touch of Payne's gray in there just to darken it a bit. Yeah, I want that chocolatey brown. And I can come off here and go into that. You don't need too much water because you're already going into wet. So pretty. There we go. I could even tap in a little on this one because it's wet still. I just love that. And anytime it's not quite blending enough, mine is, but I'm going to show you, you can wet your brush and just tap in a bit. Dampen it. There we go. Maybe outline in that dark brown. Oh, look at these beautiful colors together. Okay. Let's do another purple here. So going into my purple, point press. Oh, now that was kind of cool. That purple had a touch of the gold in there. So it's got a mix of the two colors, which I think is fantastic. I don't even think I'm going to touch that much. There we go. Oh, we didn't do veins in that one. Or that one. And you don't have to do them in every single one, but I kind of like doing that. I'm going to take my smaller brush, which again, you don't have to use that smaller brush. You can use your eight, but just use a very light touch. Hold your brush straight up and down. So you're only getting that beautiful little tip. And let's touch in. Pretty eight. Oh, this is so pretty. I just love how the paint mixes in there. Ooh, love that. If I want that to blend a little, I can just tap in some water. Really like that. Let's add even intentionally a touch more of that gold. Ooh, yeah. We could even put purple in those, you guys. I didn't even think to do that. I like that they all kind of share the same colors. Look how pretty. And then I think this one I'm going to do in. I feel like I have a lot of purple on this side, so I'm going to make this that same gold, but I'm going to put in some more of that purple. So I've got my eight. Let's go into our yellow ochre. Be careful because yellow ochre's quite strong. And I want to just a touch of that purple. Ooh, see that? I love how it mixes there. And that leaf is going to look like it's in the background because it's got a lighter value. And that's what I really want to impress with you guys. Those lighter values are going to recede more. We could put in just a touch of that pink, or not pink, that orangey touch of that purple, the lightest little amount. And there you go. What a pretty leaf. Let's scratch in. I love this color combination. And then with that dark branch color, you could start adding in some little branches here and there. Ooh, so there's a happy accident maybe. We'll see as that goes. That might look like it's shadowed a bit. I'm just adding in some stems, put a little yellow leaf over there. Maybe we could tap in a little dot of purple because I'm kind of liking that purple in some of these. And I'm not even going to scratch in in that one. I think I'll bring some purples over here. So here's a leaf, maybe one here, point, press, come down, maybe a more gold color here, press, vary the shapes of your leaves. And now we'll draw that wonderful little branch. There we go. Just tap in. Tap in. And look how pretty this is. Oh my gosh, this would be so pretty with that MAB gold. I gotta grab that. Hold on. Let's see. Where is my MAB gold? I might not have it here. Let's see. Golden series. Yay. There we go. And I like the brilliant gold. I mean, I like all the colors here, but I really like the brilliant gold. I use them all. Using the side of my brush. And look at that. I'll show you in a second. Maybe this one. There we go. Maybe some little berries. That might be pretty. Just for some interest and be careful where you put those because their eye is going to follow wherever that is. Okay. One last leaf I think coming out over here, maybe in that gold, point, press, point, press. And I intentionally did that with a light value because I wanted it to look like it was in the background. We could have even added more. Now watch this, you guys, I'm going to do this just to show you. So let's grab a dark value of our purple and let's really pop this out. So I've got a dark value, meaning about 80% pigment, 20% water. And let's darken that up just like that. Even more. Point, press. I really want to get, so I'm just going to keep glazing over. I really want it to be dark because I want you to see how when the darker something is, the more it's going to pop out on your painting. And let's even add in some of that. So hopefully you can see that where there's a dark value, it's really going to stand out. Yeah. I kind of like that. So there you go, you guys. I hope you play with these, play with that background. It's so much fun. And I just think it's a really pretty color combination. We've got that MAB in there and we can still scratch in here. Just for some interest, you could use your little tiny brush to add in some veining to a few leaves, just for some interest. But look at that beautiful bloom right there. Isn't that pretty? This would be a really pretty card, I think. If you're good at calligraphy, pick up a little bit of that. All right. There you go. Happy painting, everybody. And I will see you soon. I'm here to remind you, you are an artist. Just play, have fun, color what you're drawn to. And I will see you soon.