Use of water colours:

Start with the wash technique

The first step a beginner needs to know when working with water-colour paints is the wash technique.

The principle of watercolour painting is very simple. All one needs to do is wet the brush with colour and water and spread it over the drawing paper.

Before painting with several colours, I recommend that you practise the simple techniques in wash ,with a single colour.

Once you discover the possibilities that this technique offers, it will be much easier to try out many more procedures that the medium offers .

For a beginner it will be more appropriate to start with one colour.

Applying the colour

Once the colour is put on to the palette, then take only a little water to the brush to lighten the colour. A colour tone is made to appear more transparent by adding water to it. Once the colour is mixed and the correct tone is obtained, you may apply the colour to your drawing. For example, in Figure 1 an onion is drawn on a dry background, so that the principle highlight can be shown at the same time.

The brightness is created with long drawn out brush strokes.

On Figure 2 you will notice how the colour is applied on the right side of the onion, keeping the brightness intact.

The Burnt siena colour applied must not be too watery so that it can maintain the correct tone and density. The brush strokes merge on their own. To obtain the correct texture the background should be kept dry. The painting of the onion shown on Fig. 3 is applied with a colour mixed with Burnt siena.

Long and thick brush strokes are applied to get the highlights to complete the drawing. Practise this technique until you become familiar to paint a correct picture.