Watercolor Washes and Color Blending

So, if you wanted to do a watercolor wash and make a gradient or blend colors you would think you could just slap some water and some color on your paper.  That's what I would have thought.  But I have learned in my Watercolor Card making class at www.onlinecardclasses.com that is much more complicated.  The instructors all have different techniques to get similar results and some of the colors I've seen blended are just absolutely gorgeous.

I decided to give it a whirl.  I used two colors I had on hand. Winsor and Newton Rose Madder and Cobalt Blue.  They are in teensy weensy tubes and cost an arm and a leg but that's a whole 'nother story!  I decided that I would start with the red color and then add some blue to it to make a violet and then blend it out to blue.

I worked at it a few times and I know I have a lot more practice to do!  When you are working with watercolors it is important to make sure your water to  pigment ration among your colors is consistent.  That sounds easy enough. Not. For. Me.  HAHA! But I am rapidly learning what does NOT work and other than wasting a bit of paint and a bit of paper...well, I just chalk it up to practice will eventually make perfect something passable!

After my color wash had dried and I had my background I used some Altenew stamps and heat embossed them in white.  I added a few sequins and that was it.  I don't have access to all my playthings right now so I'm just trying to make do with what I have on hand.

All in all...are these cards that I've made from what I learned in the Watercolor class my favorite of all time? NO! They probably aren't even in the middle...but I will tell you that it has been so much fun and is so interesting...and I love playing around with brushes, water and pigments.  I really am learning a lot.  I just need to make the transition from brain to fingers!

Here is my card:

Who Would Have Thought?!

Who would have thought you could make a simple cornflower with just some simple strokes of a paintbrush??? Well, I certainly did not know but I learned this simple technique with the Online Watercolor Class - Intermediate that I am taking. Yana Smakula whose blog is HERE is just an awesome cardmaker and crafter! Anyway, she did an awesome video and tutorial on using a round brush, loading it with pigment and water and bringing it to the paper.

Voila(!) a cornflower!

It was so much fun....I did the blue cornflower...this is my first and only attempt but it would be fun to do it in some other colors....red would make a pretty carnation, wouldn't it?

I used some some green watercolor to make a wash and then cut out "hello" with a Lawn Fawn die.  I decided to cut it out in white, too, and then offset it a little and put it on a vellum band.

And that's it for today!

Loving Watercolors!

I am taking the Watercolor Class - Intermediate at Online Card Classes.  I am barely through Lesson 1 (ok, I'm NOT through Lesson 1 yet!) and have already learned so much.  It's a really great class and if you have any interest in increasing your watercolor skills then I certainly recommend it!

In the pre-class exercises we worked on color swatching, color mixing, and transparency vs. opacity in our paints.  Very interesting stuff there! In Lesson 1 we actually created a card where we applied our new found knowledge of creating color washes.  Interesting and fun stuff!

The instructor, Dawn created a really awesome card by tracing around a pear and dropping color onto it.  I didn't have anything like that and the supplies I had on hand were limited so I cut out a design with my Silhouette and traced around it.  Two little birdies.

Here's the first one I did with Kuretake Gansai colors:

The bird on the right got a little muddied as the colors mixed but it was fun to do anyway, and since I took this photo with my iPhone the colors may be a bit off.  I think they are more vibrant in real life.
I used a Lawn Fawn sentiment stamped in Hero Arts Cup o' Joe.

Then I did it again using Winsor and Newton tube paints.  Basic red, blue, and yellow that I mixed for a variety of colors.

I love the variations of the red, blues and purples.....a little yellow and red for an orangey beak and all the colors mixed for some variations in brown on the limb.  I stamped the sentiment with MFT's Things With Wings stamp set.

And voila (!)....they look like birds on a limb! LOL! Very fun to do and pretty easy...but of course, you'll never get exactly the same results twice. 

Off to Lesson 2 1b! 

Happy Crafting!