Category: Watercolor

Working with Watercolor Paper Defects

I have been very pleased with the Bockingford paper from St. Cuthberts Mill. It is a good quality, non-cotton paper which gives quite good results and closely mimics the 100% cotton paper most watercolorists prefer. With this in mind, I bought a 9×12 block of their Millford cold press paper. This paper is supposed to closely resemble Whatman’s watercolor paper, long out of production, and highly recommended by painters such as Ted Kautzky.

Choosing to reconsider the composition of my previous painting “North Coast” and the island’s placement, I figured a good, wet wash would give me a good idea how the paper handles. I wet the sky first and then added blue.

Immediately I could see there was a serious problem with the paper’s sizing. You can see it as a dark blue streak with a straight edge about an inch into the paper. After that, the wash blends well. We have all seen skies with an odd straightness between sky and cloud, but this is not what I want to have in a painting. Given the price of paper, this is not good.

However, what can I do since this is a fact of this particular block of paper? I know I could take it into Photoshop to fix should I wish to print it out, but that is not the point here.

On to another painting, one with a sky that is varied. Again, I wet the sky area first. I laid in the yellowish color at the horizon – hard experience shows this to be a really good way to do such a sky. From there, I applied the bluish mix, dark at the top, drawing a very wet brush across the top of the paper and then into different parts of the sky, letting it blend a bit with the still-wet yellows. Here, I worked with the defect. But then! I saw on the left side of the paper, the same sizing issue appeared.

Sigh.

Well, working with thin washes, I painted on. Trees on the left help to hide the defect.

Despite these issues, I really do like the Millford paper. It has a nice texture. Water rests a bit longer on the surface than other papers, allowing bleeds and such to work well together. In the first painting, I lifted a bit of color out of the island, just to see what happened, and it held up well. Additionally, the glue around the edge of the block was light enough to allow for easy removal of the sheet without tearing the paper – I have had this issue with Arches blocks decades ago, and that has been a big turn off. The glue around the edges of the Arches paper was tough. Perhaps I shall revisit it . . .

Problems exist. Things are not perfect. Working with a problem successfully is satisfying. Knowing the problems with this particular block, I can find ways to make my paintings successful. One thing is to allow the composition of the painting to discard that area if necessary. There are other ways, too, but those can be worked on as a painting proceeds. What will be interesting is to see how far down the pad this problem exists.

And there we are – a Saturday afternoon’s painting, exploration, and play!

North Coast

Once more – should I put something in or take it out!?!? The original of this painting, along the northern coast of California, is originally painted with a small island offshore. Looking at it I didn’t like it – perhaps too close to the tree on the left overhanging the beach. Thanks to Photoshop, I removed it.

The above painting is the one that exists in the real world. The one below is the one edited with Photoshop’s “generative fill” – poof! No island.

Because I am feeling kind of spartan these days, sometimes I think I have too much in a painting. Maybe it goes along with limiting my palette of colors?

And my palette? A bit more expansive than the previous, but the subject matter seemed to need a bit. I used umbers, sienna, ochre, Indian yellow, phthalo blue, a touch of ultramarine, a bit of dioxazine purple, and Hooker’s green.

My technique was to use oodles of water as I wanted to see how well the Bockingford non-cotton paper would hold up. It did quite well! Every large area – sky, ocean, land above the cliff – was wet with clean water, and then painted with the colors. The sky had one wash, but the ocean had multiple wet washes. The land in foreground and distance had a big wash later accented with dry on wet.

I am also pleased with this painting, even with my thoughts about the island.

St. Cuthberts Mill, Bockingford 140# CP, 12×16.

And what are your thoughts – island or no island?

Winter Hill

I am working really hard to simplify my paintings. Winter scenes are perfect for this as I have to keep large swaths of paper white and untouched. Contours of the land are suggested by some blues and such for shadows. Additionally, I am trying to keep my brushwork fairly direct and using the brush’s qualities to dictate the result. A bit of a challenge!

This scan seems to be decent, too, as far as matching the painting’s colors.

I added some new colors to my palette for this painting. In addition to ultramarine blue, burnt sienna and Payne’s grey, I added some Winsor Newton brown madder and olive green, and McCracken black by Daniel Smith. I also used some white gouache for the snow on the right hand tree and in the viney-like things in the foreground along the fence. Altogether I am working toward getting comfortable with a limited palette. Winter lends itself well to this.

The wire fence was drawn in with colored pencil – a warm and cool grey.

St. Cuthberts Mill, Bockingford paper, 140# CP, watercolor.

A Bit Later

Now, a bit later, I wondered if that tree on the right was okay. I wondered if it was needed. I don’t think so. Here is the painting without the tree!

Thoughts?

Trees in Snow

This was an exceedingly hard painting to scan simply because of the very soft usage of blue in the foreground snow. While this scan does not represent the painting very well, the overall image is good enough unless I decided to really play with my scanner’s software. I am not so sure I want to do that.

There are a few “points” to this painting. Using a very limited palette was one point – colors here are ultramarine blue, burnt umber, burnt sienna. There is a touch of a few other colors here but nothing of any significance.

Another point is to keep as much of the paper as white as possible. I managed to do this, but the scan does not do justice to the pale blue of the foreground snow; to compensate for this I used a very light blue graduated filter overlay in my post production software.

And the final point was to work in layers – light to dark – for the trees. Yes, I used titanium white artist’s gouache for the snow on the branches.

St. Cuthberts Mill, Bockingford archival watercolor paper, 12×16, CP 140#.

Snowfall

Christmas Day! Nothing like a snowfall and the cold and the quiet of the woods for remembering the magic of the season. New and old traditions overlap, memories and hopes for the future all seem to be rolled into the end of the year and depth of winter. The stillness of the winter woods gives pause to our crazy lives. Holidays of any sort at this time of the year make us look backward as well as forward.

Here I worked from very light to dark. The colors I used for the greenish-blue sky were cobalt teal, a bit of ultramarine, and a touch of Hooker’s green, neutralized by a bit of alizarin. The leaves and autumnal foliage were various siennas and orange with a touch of Indian yellow. Trunks, from light to dark, were essentially ultramarine with burnt sienna and raw umber with a bit of Payne’s grey. Snow shadows were ultramarine and Payne’s grey. Finally, I watered down some titanium white gouache and tapped my brush across my forefinger to look like falling snow after applying a few lines and dots in white here and there.

This is another watercolor which pleases me. Perhaps I should stick to Arches Rough paper instead of my usual cold press . . . ?

Have a wonderful Christmas Day – or whatever it is you celebrate!

Watercolor, Arches Rough 140# paper, 10×14.