MIXING GREENS
I prefer to mix my own greens to provide continuity in a painting. I am including some youtube sites that might be helpful to you. Steve Mitchell's Mind of Watercolor can always be counted on to provide some good tips.
But a lot of people prefer to use prepared greens, and that's OK as long as you don't overdo it. One suggestion is to pick a basic green (like Hookers, sap, rich green gold, etc) then pick one blue and one yellow to change the temperature and darkness of the green; and one red to neutralize it when needed. EX: If I choose Hookers green as my base, I might choose French ultramarine to cool it off; Azo yellow to get more yellow greens; and alizarin to neutralize it, especially the shadowed areas.
You can check what you can do with what is in your palette before making big changes. To see more on that, see this youtube with Susan Crouch:
And if you want to learn what your own paints will do, this one shows how to make a chart
that shows different mixtures. I particularly like how she does it. (In Liquid Color)
MORE ON PAINTING WHITES
I used this photo from Paintmyphoto as a reference. The photographer was Inkflo (Angie).
I changed it to a black and white. This helps me to see values and shadows more clearly.
Since the roses are a creamy white, I wet the flower, and dropped quin coral into the centers. Then I put a pale glaze of raw sienna, just to cut the whiteness of the paper and tone it a bit. If the paper is already a creamy color, you don't have to tone it.
After the initial wash is dry, begin separating the petals wet into wet. Alternate petals so that you reduce the risk of painting into a wet area. Prepare a puddle of a slightly neutralized blue for the shadow areas. Have a bit of coral, pink, or green on hand to add to it.
Wet the petal completely to a shiny-but-not-puddly stage. Apply the color into the deepest shadow area, and allow it to spread onto the petal, leaving some of the white to show. While wet, you can drop in a bit of another color. EX: If I started with a blue toned mix, I can drop in a little pink or green.
At this point I am trying to work from my black and white reference so that I am more influenced by the shape and values of the shadows instead of trying to copy color at the same time.
Nearly done with the shadows on my roses.
There are three differences between doing whites this way and the way we did it with the arum lily. First, in this process, I do make a grayed color (or neutralized color), but it is not GRAY. The color is clean and apparent from the very beginning. then other color is dropped into it while wet. I will glaze later, but over this purer color rather than the gray.
The second difference will be obvious in the next blog.In the first we didn't paint a background to bring out the whites. This one will have a background that will bring out the whites.
The third difference will be that we are going to do some negative painting in the background and leaves. So tune in next time....
PS: For those who are worried that their colors might not match exactly, remember: a reference is YOUR GUIDE, NOT YOUR GOD. Make it the way you want it to be.
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