HINTS AND TIPS

The Three T’s -Time Tools and developing Talent

• It’s wonderful having a collection of inspiring books and DVDs by successful watercolour artists but sometimes they make you wonder if you will ever be good enough. I suggest you put away those books and just do it. Paint, paint, paint. Time spent with the brush in your hand is what develops skills, knowledge, confidence and, above all, a style of your own.

• Without practice little progress can be achieved. You may come up with the occasional gem but it will be difficult to maintain a standard.

• I liken watercolour to learning the piano - if you want to be good you need to start with the scales (washes) and lots of practice. It will take time before you are able to play a concerto in front of an audience!

• People tell me all the time that they want to learn how to paint but don’t have time. My reply is always the same - give up some television or Facebook and reward yourself with painting time. It’s a time to relax, unwind and put all the pressures of everyday life to one side. Instead of putting pressure on yourself to come up with a great painting, practice a wash or foliage. Look around you .

. . paint an apple, your coffee cup or the cat. Just spend time with the brush in your hand - no book can tell you how to hold your brush to achieve different effects or how much pigment or water to use.

Tools

• Don’t waste time using poor quality paint or paper. In my opinion there is no point (ever) of practicing with anything other than quality materials. This on the other hand doesn’t mean that you have to buy squirrel hair brushes or spend a fortune. I have only ever used Taklon brushes. Try different types of 300gsm papers - some may suit your techniques better than others. I suggest cutting a ¼ sheet of paper into four. Each 1/16th of a sheet is big enough to practice washes or do small paintings that can be discarded without breaking the bank or cheaply framed if you come up with a masterpiece. The larger the watercolour the more skill is needed to pull it off.

• I use Daler Rowney paints. I find them to be good value, lightfast and wonderfully translucent, but any professional quality paint is fine. Don’t go out and buy lots of colours - in order to achieve colour harmony it is better to limit your palette. I see people come to a workshop or class with a basket full of colours they will never use.

• I always mix my own greens and mauves. One can achieve a great range by doing your own mixing and when applied to wet paper these colours have a glow about them that is impossible to achieve with a green from a tube.

• My palette usually consists of only seven colours. Rarely do I need anything else. When depth of colour is required layering is a much better option than applying the paint thickly. This method will give you the intensity you require without being grainy or opaque. If you want to mix an intense dark, the paint needs to be the consistency of Vegemite. The amount of water you add to your pigment is every bit as important as the paint you use and will vary a lot depending on whether you are mixing a wash or wanting something more intense. I like my mixing areas and my water to be clean before I start a painting so that there is no risk of my washes becoming “dirty”.

Brushes

• I use Taklon long bristled flat brushes but whether flat or round your brush needs to hold plenty of water. I have brushes in varying sizes. A Rigor brush is also a must for fine detail, particularly branches, boat rigging etc. Adjust your brush size to suit the painting . . . always use a large brush for washes and make sure you “load” your brush, not just dip the end of the brush in your wash. • Think about “floating” the wash delicately onto the paper and resist the temptation to touch it again until it is completely dry or the dreaded “cauliflower” will appear. If your wash is streaky or scratchy it was probably too dry. Experiment using wet and dry paper. I never stick or staple my paper down (so much easier!) and I always paint right to the edge of the paper to allow for a bit of juggling under the matt.

Any buckling can be resolved by spraying the back of the finished painting with a mist of water and weighting it down.

Palette

• In my opinion you need a palette with areas for premixed washes. My palette has eight mixing areas and eight areas for pure colour. I always put my colours in the same spot so that I know instinctively where each colour is. Make sure you are not mean when putting your paint out - there is nothing worse than running out at a crucial stage of a wash. I don’t use a big palette so that it is easy to manage when I paint Plein air.

Talent

• Don’t be concerned about whether you do or do not have talent. In my opinion everyone who wants to paint is armed with the most important factor – the desire! There are so many styles and ways to use the medium that with some direction from a teacher and some practice anything is possible.

• There are few truly “gifted people out there – success comes to those who don’t quit and who are prepared to put in some effort. Most of all enjoy what you are doing!