Watercolour portraits tutorial for beginners - part 2
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 26 ส.ค. 2024
- In part 1 of this mini series, I said you wouldn't believe that starting your watercolour portrait in purple would work. I hope I proved it did! That tutorial was painting a black skin tone, so you might be wondering about a lighter tone and whether it still works. The answer is yes!
You can see part 1 here: • Watercolour portraits ... . My next film will tackle a pale European skin tone.
In this tutorial we have a great photo to work from with a dark background and a Middle Eastern skin tone. I will show how I use a gentle purple underpainting to give structure to the watercolour portrait and then by working in layers we can build fascinating and glowing skin tones. I am using a flat brush this time to reflect the wonderful angular cheek bones of our muse. The reference photo can be found on the community tab of this channel.
Usually I'm a big believer in shortcuts, so feel free to use a light box to transfer the outline and contours or trace it or project it, as you like. Drawing a likeness and painting a portrait are two different skill sets, so here we will concentrate on painting. Then we will work on our 'grisaille' - monochrome underpainting. We wil really concentrate on the tonal map of the face and I will show you how to start with large shapes and then move to smaller ones. Then build up warm and cool layers.
If you are looking for more in depth watercolour courses, from beginners through to advanced, then please take a look at www.lizchadertonstudio.co.uk. I am writing a book on watercolour portraits which will be published by The Crowood Press in 2023.
If you are looking for a friendly place to share your art and meet watercolourists from around the world, why not join my Facebook group here: groups/watercolourstudiowithlizchaderton
If you have enjoyed this film, please consider liking and subscribing. I do a watercolour tip, trick or technique each week and release it at 2pm on Sunday. So if you hit the notification bell you will be emailed when the next one is out.
This is day 9 of a 30 Faces in 30 Days challenge from Sktchy. If you love portraits and faces look at the Museum by Sktchy app (sadly not on Android), or go to www.sktchy.com. If you follow me on Facebook or Insta ( lizchadertonartist) you can see if I complete the challenge!
#lizchaderton #watercolourtips #watercolourportrait
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If I lived to be 300 years old, I would have never thought to use purple as a base for a portrait painting. Thanks for this valuable lesson.
You are so welcome! you could start with blue and use orange, I just think purple works so well
I agree with you regarding tracing and light boxes Liz. Sometimes a drawing that you want to achieve just will not happen freehand and then if you give up you lose the joy of applying the colour. Thanks for the tutorial.
That’s a lovely way of putting it. I don’t want people to lose the joy.
I know how to draw freehand but sometimes all that technical stuff gets in the way. I just wanna have fun with my art
That was so satisfying to watch. It’s bold but also somehow restrained. Thanks for your thoughts on tracing and light boxes - as someone new to painting it’s much more encouraging not to spend all that time creating a likeness and then be terrified to paint over it - a quick trace to get the proportions and major features makes the painting less “high wire “ and allows me to focus on building my painting skills. Thank you!
exactly! Getting a likeness can be hard and suck the joy out of painting. But it is great to work on your drawing skills too!
This is awesome. The addition of cadmium red is ingenious and this style of painting is something I can only dream of aspiring to. Your down to earth tutorial technique is so encouraging.
You can do it!
Thank you Liz, your teachings are so satisfying to watch and digestible.
I'm so glad!
absolutely stunning! really fascinating how you build layers of color and yet his skin comes out looking like it's glowing from within. I hope that make sense to you. From watching you do gold leaf it has sent me on a journey of discovery. I've made my own textured background and gold leafed it and that led me to discovering air dry clay. I love it! So far I've made flowers and ivy leaves to put on my paintings. My next piece I'm going to try my hand at a bird with the gold leafed textured background. Thank you so much for the tips and inspiration!😊🍁🍂🍁🍂🍁
What a lovely message. I'm delighted that I set the hare running for you!
Amazing! Learn so much from watching you paint and listening to your thought process as you go, thanks!
I'm so glad!
Liz..you’re amazing!
thank you so much!
Thank you for sharing your thought processes throughout this piece. 👍
My pleasure!
THANK YOU, LIZ! You're the BEST!! Now I need to get a big flat brush like yours! Although I don't have a few of your colours, I think I'll make do with what I have.
Always improvise the colours and you will come up with something wonderful. Flat brushes don't have to be great quality, so have fun.
This is amazing! It's inspiring to see how intuitively you paint. My favourite part is when you darken the background. Everything just comes together, and it clicked for me! It's late here in Canada, so I'm going to get a good night's sleep in and start painting in the morning. Thanks again for an excellent tutorial 😊
Thank you very much!
I really appreciate everything you said about the drawing vs copying debate. I am a half decent portrait painter but my anatomy drawing skills aren't what they should be so I choose to use a light box or graphite paper for accuracy and time. The artistic part comes in how you then interpret that photo/image and like you said in the 30 faces tutorial, the background choices etc. I wanted to watch this one as starting with a purple layer is how I learned how to paint portraits and specifically skin tones. Many thanks
Yes! You can trace twice and end up with two very different portraits. I think drawing skills are important but for speed a light box gets you going
Anybody who read Marvel Comics in the 1970s will be reminded of Gil "Sugar" Kane. He liked to draw panels from weird angles to show off his perspective skills and he did this for people as well as buildings. He's especially remembered for the number of "up the nose" shots of people's faces. There's a lot of Gil in this work.
Never read Marvel comics, but quite like a heavenward pose
Great tutorial! Learned a lot. Thank you so much liz
You are so welcome!
Seen the final result now. I think I'd have preferred your trademark spatter to those bits of cadmium red. And I wouldn't have used sepia in those dark places - it's opaque and blots out all the colours underneath. I might instead have tried to find a transparent dark by mixing burnt sienna or burnt umber with that Prussian blue. Easy to say all that from the peanut gallery though! Thanks for posting this video Liz.
interesting comments! I really like the cadmium red, So I’m chucking those peanuts back 😁
Loved this!
thank you!
Love it!
So glad!
Fantastic! Love the shadows in the eyes and just how you approached the whole thing as one, like how you go in and out of the background I always see them as separate but I’m learning so much here. You have to be a bit brave to go for it the way you do but that’s why your the teacher and I’m a student haha lol…..
it’s only a piece of paper, so you are allowed to be brave!
@@LizChadertonArt Haha yes your right….. :)
This is brilliant! Most unexpected, yet works so well. Thank you for sharing your thought process as you go along. Learnt a lot. BTW May I ask what kind of brush your “pointy” brush is please? Thanks again.
Glad it was helpful! I wish I could remember where I got it from. it keeps its point very nicely, but there are no markings on it and I can’t think where it came from. sorry
I’ve been wanting to paint a portrait on the gold watercolor ground. This seems like it might be the perfect option because he has so much gold in his face. If I go that route, will I also do use purple to bring in the shading? It seems as though that would be true. I am loving your portraits and so glad that you are sharing that with us here
I’ve not used the gold watercolour ground, so I would suggest testing the theory. The problem I anticipate is the layering. You know that the paint lifts very easily from the ground and getting clear layers is tricky, so though diox purple is super staining, you might need to consider adding Aquafix or similar
@@LizChadertonArt Thank you so much Liz for responding and for the information. I’ve learned so much from watching your videos and your responses to my random questions. I’ve really wanted to challenge myself to do some portraits but haven’t gotten to the point where I can make a daily commitment. I hadn’t actually found a good subject that truly inspired me but I think I’ve found one in the example that you used.
@@TaraSueSalusso Sometimes it is best to jump in and not wait for the perfect time! I am sure you will enjoy it