Common watercolor mistakes beginners make

If you’re learning to paint in watercolor and your paintings aren’t looking as realistic as you’d hoped.

It’s probably for one of these five reasons.

Hi, it’s Anna Mason.

In this episode of Nature Studio TV.

I’m gonna run through the five mistakes most commonly made by beginners to watercolor who are seeking realism in their paintings, stepping outside of our comfort zone to learn something new can feel vulnerable.

And if our results don’t meet our expectations, it can be tempting to assume we won’t be good at this.

But if your watercolor paintings aren’t looking as realistic as you’d like just yet, it’s most likely for one of these five reasons, the water color supplies you’re using, make a huge difference to the results you’re able to achieve.

So if you’re using poor quality supplies, you’re at a disadvantage before you even begin painting, you can find a link on this page to the supplies I recommend and why.

But the most important one to tell you about is paint, not all watercolor paints are equal and the types marked as professional or artist grade are the ones you want.

They’re slightly more expensive than student grade.

Water colors, but they contain more pigment and less opaque to bulk them out.

So they can be brighter richer and more transparent.

This makes them so much better to paint with because you can work in layers, meaning you can produce colors and textures that aren’t possible with opaque paints.

So check your paints now and if you see the word student on them upgrade as soon as you can, the foundation of a realistic painting is an accurate outline drawing.

When you’re learning, it’s best to make your drawing by tracing either from a photo or from a traceable outline which has been made for you.

If you’re wondering whether it’s OK to trace the answer is yes.

The old masters use drawing aids and so do modern day professional artists including me.

So don’t be afraid to get out the tracing paper.

You’re aiming for a faint outline, which you can just about see if your pencil lines are too heavy or dark, they might end up showing through the paint which can take away from the realism.

So go over any dark lines with an eraser before you start painting because you won’t be able to rub them out once you’ve painted over them.

So you’ve made your drawing and you’ve got your paints and reference photo in front of you.

That’s great.

But now what, how do you know what order to work in?

Do you have a plan or do you just go for it?

And guess or worse, feel so overwhelmed that you don’t even put brush to paper.

That’s why it’s really helpful to learn with quality instruction that teaches you a clear method that you can follow the stages.

I work in usually go in the order of lightest tones, then darkest tones, then mid tones and then adjustments to bring everything together.

You can learn my watercolor method for free by taking some full length video classes where I show you every stage and explain why we’re doing what we’re doing.

You can then use this process in your independent paintings.

You can also fast track your artistic development by working on the hundreds more video tutorials available with Nature Studio membership.

Working your way through different tutorials helps you to grow your own library of skills and techniques that you can use for painting all manner of subjects.

Then you’ll never stare at a painting and not know what to do next.

If the colors in your painting aren’t looking vibrant enough and you’re using quality supplies, it’s likely that you’re not letting the paint fully dry between layers to achieve realism.

You need to be in control of what’s happening on your paper, which means it needs to be fully dry before you paint on it.

Otherwise the tiny particles of pigment in the paint that you’re applying will travel through the moisture and end up further away than you intended.

So before you paint a new layer gently touch the paper to check it’s dry.

If you’re using % cotton paper, then it’ll dry far more quickly.

But if you find yourself needing to wait, you can use a hairdryer to speed up drying or you could do what I do and take a strategic tea break and come back to your painting with fresh eyes afterwards.

This is the mistake I see.

Most often beginners to realistic watercolor, often place too much focus on the way their finished painting looks and overlook what really matters.

Learning a successful painting process that you can use time.

And again, even if you’re accomplished in other mediums and crafts, you might not love your first watercolor paintings, but you can learn the techniques incredibly quickly.

So research and the experience of thousands of my students has shown that with the right materials and just  hours of structured practice, skill acquisition is possible to a much higher standard than you might expect.

Oh And most of my paintings go through an ugly duckling stage sometimes until near the end.

So even worse than fixating on your end result is fixating on how your in progress painting is looking.

Knowing the process that you’re following can stop you from doing this because you’ll know that there are still more steps to follow.

So key to developing your artistic skills and producing realistic paintings that fill you with joy is to adopt a growth mindset.

Know that every painting is helping you to grow new skills and experience and reframe your focus to recognize those gains doing this will also take the pressure off so that you can relax and enjoy the act of painting itself.

If you approach watercolor, painting with patience, a growth mindset and quality supplies, you’ll see your results improve more quickly than you might expect.

And you’ll get lots more enjoyment from the learning process.

For more help and support and for a set of free full length classes where you can learn a reliable watercolor method.

Visit Nature studio.com, becoming highly skilled in watercolor painting can happen much more quickly than you might expect when you take a tried and tested approach.

So stick with it and keep going because I know that you can become the artist you’ve always wanted to be.

Thanks so much for watching and I’ll see you soon.