Inspiration * Ideas * Instructions

for you ©

Painting Skin Tones in Watercolor by Beatriz Uribe

The contents of this publication may not be reproduced in whole or in part without the express permission of the copyright holder.

Jim Black , creator and owner of Watercolor For Me

And Jim’s Watercolor Gallery

Copyright 2014

The sky is the environmental background for your painting, and as such does much to create the desired “mood”.

Above and below is shown just the tops of some paintings that I painted. Why don’t you study these and YOU decide the mood , I was trying to convey.

PAPER: Half sheet - 140 lb. cold press Archers. PAINT: Cad. Red, Winsor Yellow, Ultra Marine Blue, Burnt Sienna. Brushes 1”flat and #14 round.

Masking was removed, leaving a very hard edge around the circumference. A small bristle brush was used working around the edges to give a foggy look.

What happened? The paint had began to dry and it no longer glistened, then along you or I came, with a wet brush (paint or water) touched the almost dry surface.

Quick warm up painting before you start painting one. Just to get you loose and relaxed .

I wet the paper top to bottom. Without mixing any colors together, just touched the paper with weak colors, not using the brush to move the paint. They just flowed in the water…….. where ever.

Paper is dry , masking fluid for the sun/moon. Let this dry. Now wet the paper again. Your choice of colors , again let the colors flow together. If they do not, tilt the board back and forth and spray water if necessary.

Here I have deliberately made a blossom /backrun.

Paper was still damp. The "rule is" do not attempt to remove or even paint when the paper is damp So you wait or dry with hair dryer. Now it is dry, take a brush and slowly wet and blot the ugly tide mark. You will find the surplus color on the edge can be blotted up. The blossoms cannot be seen. Exceptions to the rule are if you wish to create , groups of foliage, blossoms very often look natural. Why don’t you try right now to form some blossoms. I will wait here while you get a piece of scrape paper. Now paint a rectangle green and yellow , watch real closely for the glisten to disappear, there it goes. Now, with the point of the brush, drop a dark green. Do not do anything else. I waited for your example to show up. I never did see it so I did one for you. Wait a minute Jim, I see more then blossoms. Go to the head of the class for noticing. Yes, I did add a few ideas while I was waiting for you. Look at the image, on the far left, there are three marks made with a pen knife where the paint was almost dry. Once I pushed the paint out of the way it could not float back into the mark. The bottom part, was still wet and it left a dark mark where the paint went back into the mark. On the right it looks like a tree, the paper was still wet , so when the pen knife made a mark the paint flowed into the mark. In the center ,there are a few blossoms, but most of the activity was caused by dropping table salt into the paint . The timing is very important for good results ,not too wet or not too dry. This is something you must practice, to get the hang of it.

Liquid runs on to the surface of the paper PUSHING THE ALMOST DRY PAINT AWAY, FORMING A TIDE MARK.

Finished warmup

Skies do not normally take long to paint. You should not hang around and poke and prod with the brush. Now is not the time to get your hair fixed. Get the paint down and get OUT. You want to put more paint down? Okay, this is what you do. Dry the paper. No, do not start painting yet. I see half of you with still damp paper. Dry the paper.. Place the back of the hand (not the front) on the paper and if it feels cool, it is not dry. Now you can re-wet the paper using a very feather light touch with a soft brush.

To make the paint flow and mingle freely on the wet surface, try tilting the board only to get things moving. But this is not the time to do some physical exercises. But tilting in too many directions will blend everything together and lead to MUD.

I am sure you had the paint ready before you re-wet the paper.

Using ultramarine blue & burnt sienna with a large round well loaded brush, apply to the wet surface ( the two paints have NOT been mixed together). You will be using 80% blue and 20% sienna. Paint in diagonal movements in the blotches leaving some white paper. Try to put the sienna at the bottom of the blotch.

Until you can do this technique, only use the blue or the other color might cause you to have blossoms. More darker blue to the top, weaker blue towards the horizon. To create depth, the clouds will get smaller in size as they approach the horizon.

Wet on damp surface

Dry paper - - create irregular shapes by using the

side of a large flat brush. Hold the brush almost parallel to the paper. You are going to wind up with a lot of hard edges. Have a damp round brush to break up some of those edges. ONLY a few edges please.

Wet on Dry Wet into Wet

Wet brush with paint on damp paper.

Are you afraid to add incidental figures to your landscapes? Do they become stiff additions to those nice loose watercolors? The very first thing you need to do is be more relaxed, with a fun approach. You should start with an incident - just a blob of paint and then let it suggest a figure rather than having a preconceived idea of what that figure should be doing.

How to paint “INCIDENTAL FIGURES”

STEP #1 As the brush diagram suggest use the side, not the tip. Make the mark with one stroke. Do not worry about making it perfect. At this point you are sure what action the figure will be performing. Give it some bulk and angle the stroke a little to avoid the ram-rod straight stick figure.

STEP #2 Extend the legs longer than you feel they should be. Just taper them to a point, don't worry about the feet. You might consider overlapping the figures rather than have them standing isolated.

STEP #3 Paint head and arms, make the head larger than you think it should be, about 1/7th of the total height of the figure. Avoid placing it in the dead center of the torso. You place it wherever the existing marks suggest it should be placed. Decide if the figure coming towards you or going away. The head with a "comma" suggests a neck opening. If the figure gives the impression of going away, only a small indication of a head is necessary, since most could be hidden by the shoulders. When you paint the arms they do not have to be joined to the torso (try that idea). Experiment to see what happens and remember you don't need to show both arms.

STEP #4 Some darker values are used to add hair, some stripes on the clothing, and add whatever props complete the setting. Dream and have fun. NOTE: Feet simply disappear into the shadows underneath each figure.

The following figures are called Incidental Figures and therefore, are not painted with as much detail as the previous figures, and are very small figures always in the background, much smaller then shown here.

Here are some further ideas about Semi Photorealistic figures in Painting People in Watercolor. These people or figures will be a little more defined than the last section which was Incidental Figures. The two charming ladies are Semi Photorealistic Figures. With Incidental Figures we just "put down" a mark with the brush not thinking this figure will be doing this or that. Then, with the same thought, the lower body mark was "put down". Only then did you ask yourself what is this figure doing, are they coming or going, sometimes I personally feel that way, how about you? Now in this section a little

more planning is going to take place.

That being said, this is not about how to paint tight photorealistic portraits in watercolor. But this is about painting people that focus on a fresh impressionistic way of depicting a Semi Photorealistic figure. Consequently an intensive study of human anatomy will NOT be presented here in Semi Photorealistic Figures. Here are just some Basic Figure Proportions. Here are some adult figures.....Semi Photorealistic Figure. Let's use the head as our "measuring stick" so to speak. Compare the size of the head to all other parts of the body.

Just having fun

The average height of an Adult is between 7 and 8 heads top to bottom. The crotch generally falls half way between head and toe. The shoulders, on a male - are three heads wide. The shoulders on the fair sex - two heads wide. Arms hanging straight down the tips of the fingers will be just over half the body height. Here are some children.....Semi Photorealistic Figure. Age four years are about five heads high, legs about two heads. Age eight about six heads height, legs two and one half heads.

From the age of six onward the midpoint of their height is important. This mid point is almost at the hip line. This will help you to draw the figure if you know where the mid point should be. This keeps you from getting the torso too long and the legs too short, a very common error. Now, you will not do that, will you?

Here are a few more general guidelines and thoughts for adding the incidental figures in your landscapes. Avoid action figures such as runners and jumpers. The most successful additions are those figures who just walk, converse, or stoop to do something. Remember the alternative principle. Place the light figure in the dark doorway and the dark figure in the sunny spot. Relate the size of the figure to its surroundings, such as doors and windows. Generally, the color used on clothing is much brighter than other areas in the painting. Clothing does not have to be colored. Some folks wear white. Avoid rendering features unless you are doing an illustration or portrait.

This is something I see, not some of the time with students palettes, BUT ALL THE TIME. Too little paint in the palette well. Go ahead look at yours right now. I will wait right here. Could it have looked like earth that had not received water for a month or so. In some wells the paint had "holes" right in the middle with a strip of paint around the edges of the well. Others

may be a blob of paint the size of a garden pea.

Corner of a students paint well

You need to put a complete layer of paint filling the well from side to side. Watercolors will not go bad if you leave them to dry on the palette. The amount of paint you put out is an indicator of how serious you are about succeeding.

The above corner was a little better

IT’S OK TO LET YOUR PAINT DRY IN THE PALLETTE I squeeze an entire tube of paint into each well of my palette. Expensive way ? No, the cheapest way. If you put paint in the well the size of a green pea it will not take long to be a hard green pea making it very hard to work with. If the paint dries when the surface is fairly level, I just re-wet it with a damp sponge or mist of water on the paint. Here are some of the advantages of letting your paint dry in the palette. You can tilt your palette when travelling without worrying about the paint. It saves a lot of paint over time. When I did squeeze fresh color with every painting, I had a tendency to dip my brush into the fresh paint and pick up two much paint. Ultimately, I wiped the excess paint off on a tissue wasting a lot of paint.

You most probably been told or read about putting out fresh paint for every painting. If you follow these instructions for sure you are going to wind up with a big blob of color on the end of the brush.

Dry vs Wet

YOUR CHOICE I have learned the importance of good quality paper by observing students struggling against papers characteristics. Normally the biggest characteristic being cheap unworkable paper. Hearing OH! I only brought the cheap stuff to practice on. BIG MISTAKE What do you think of the idea of saving a few dollars by supplying a professional baseball team with cheap, tennis balls for practice?

GOT THE MESSAGE Not every painting you do will be a masterpiece, but when something good "happens" will you be on a good piece of paper or will it turn yellow like old newspaper. You must not skimp on paper. Go ahead skimp on paint, brushes, but paper NO.

SURFACES Rough surface is on one end of the scale Hot Pressed on the other. Cold Press in between those two. Perhaps the most popular surface is Cold Press.

Cold Press if the best all around surface, permits you to create textural effects and yet renders detail as well. The texture isn't overly pronounced

You may also layer washes (glazes) without much fear of lifting previous ones. Because it's surface is forgiving and somewhat predictable allowing for better control, Cold Press maybe the best choice for the beginning painter. Followed by Rough and when you want some excitement -- Hot Press

For the adventurous there is Hot Press Illustration Board (like painting on glass). I remember spending two weeks with Michael ATKINSON, a master of Hot Press Paper. Two of his requirements were experienced painters only and bring 10 Hot-Pressed Crescent Boards.

Illustration board like painting on glass. Best to work flat, vertical out of the question. Heaviest ply you can find might not be a bad idea Crescent #115 is about 3/8" thick.

Size 30" x 40", think at that time each board was around $10.00. He explained it would be difficult "at first", expect to ruin 2 or 3 boards the first day - I did

HOT PRESS AND ILLUSTRATION BOARD Hot Press surface is also not very forgiving. The surface could be described like a starched shirt. When laying down successive washes it can be frustrating, as some times previously dried washes could lift. Painting decisively and directly seem to work the best. The ability of Hot Press paper and illustration board surface is the ability to lift colors, but lifting must only be used for effects and not for re-painting. Think about our starched shirt for a minute, soak it, dry it, shiny non absorbent surface is gone. The same is true for the "once used paper surface" a reworked area looks dull and obvious to the eye.

WET PAINTING/or DRY You can wet the board and paint or paint on a dry surface

If you work wet you need to have a direct response to the work and paper and a willingness to let the paint do it's own thing.

Parts of the surface will dry fast, other sections will remain wet. You sometimes must expect blooms

As soon as you start the painting process, you have no time to chat, it moves fast, so thinking on your feet is absolutely a requirement. DRY PAINTING Dry painting on the board is great for detail work.

THIS IS A MUST --- Protect the edges of the board at all times from water. The paper is attached permanently to a cardboard backing of sorts.

You can imagine wet cardboard.

An interesting characteristic of Illustration Board is the ability you have to lift non-staining washes from the board almost to the white of paper. Keep in mind this is a difficult surface to master,

wait a while if you recently started to paint in

watercolor .

READ ON Hot press surfaces offer the delicacy and transparency of watercolor, they allow the widest range of textures from the fine veil of morning mist to a rough bark on a tree. Different techniques will be called for, I can hear you now - more stuff to learn. Yes more "fun" stuff, the rewards of using the Hot Press surface make it worth while. PAINTS Nothing different, but be aware which are stainers

WET IN WET WASH This technique works very well on Hot Press surfaces, since the color lies on the surface of a non absorbent surface. You can really have a good time manipulating the paint as it floats about the surface (not too much pushing and prodding). Colors will be more intense, they do not soak into the paper. Good for depicting fog, mist, great for cloudy dramatic skies, distant tree's avoiding a hard edge tree line.

LIFTING OUT Pigment can be lifted out to white paper (non stainers).

A wet brush, paint with water only, and blot.

You're done.

You can paint either way or both ( like I do). Doesn't matter which way, I will teach you both in the coming days. This is my thinking - paint tight (realism) for a few paintings, then paint loose, letting your hair down, so to speak you can paint either way or both ( like I do). Take the viewer away from realism and make your paintings more "artistic" rather than "photographic". Do what only an artist can do, showcase objects as both light against dark and dark against light. A variety of colors, blending into each other, forming interesting "brush work shapes", rather than just filling in areas with solid colors. I am going to illustrate a very "loose" painting with lots of color.

Lessons learnt after a three-day struggle: Do not touch the painting surface. Greasy fingers will prevent paint from adhering. Better still, give the paper a good soapy wash before starting. Use only one-quarter the water you normally use to dilute paint for regular watercolor paper. What you knew about laying graded washes does not apply here. It's a different world. Ditto for lost edges. Some colors are more prone to beading on the surface than others. Do not use an eraser to erase pencil lines. The paint will stop adhering whenever the eraser went. Really dark passages need paint almost as thick as paint right out of the tube. Paint takes a loooong time to dry. The pluses: You can scrub your paint back to the white of the paper. Beautiful bright colors as no pigment sinks into the paper

This a student’s painting. With no help from me. I have never painted on this surface.

Another surface that I like very much is watercolor canvas, it has a lot of advantages.

This was sent in by one of my advanced students , Juan. Thought this may save you some time if you ever want to paint on "Yupo" synthetic paper( it is a sheet of plastic) some artists paint on it all the time. I would miss glazing one color over the other, or creating soft edges, and all the other stuff I have learned to do. Juan mentioned applying the paint right out of the tube, (thick stuff) was wondering what happens to the paint if you bend the sheet where the thick paint lies.

For once we can say that color is not as important when you paint the color of the skin. And I will illustrate my point of view in tonal values. I will try a little drawing with a single color, sepia ink for example.

Starting with the mixture of water with some drops of ink going gradually adding more ink to achieve color.

by

BEATRIZ URIBE Madrid Spain

The ink will dilute in water the same way that watercolor paint colors do. This is an exercise that can be done to accentuate the dark areas (shadows) and freeing the light areas of the face. We add layers of color, let dry and repeat in the darker areas. With the watercolor, we will use a small amount of Windsor green and Rose Lake which will mix well and get the same effect as the ink in the following faces.

We will try to do the same but with only one green (Windsor Green), following the example. It can be a bit strange, but it makes sense. And then add a Rose Lake to give warmth. And it becomes more pleasing to the eye.

I start covering the whole face with a very light yellow, leaving white areas where more light gets. And I'm adding two colors, one after the other and let dry in every step. Finally, I get the face with volume and shape. And also control over watering.

I used two or three colors in each of the faces. To work in this exercise helps you to learn restraint when choosing the colors in a painting. I sometimes tend to paint with many different colors and I finally found out that it subtracts freshness and balance to the painting. For this reason, it is good to first choose colors well, not many, and try not to add more colors that often are achieved naturally in the resulting mixtures. These faces can be a bit "weird" or too "flashy" but this exercise helps to prevent too many paints or overworking.

Here we can clearly see the effect so different when mixing these two colors. This grayish color is the result of mixing these two colors directly in the palette. When instead, I do it layer upon layer, like on the left cheek, the resulting color on the paper is completely different.

You can notice some parts of the face have become a grayish color as the eyebrows, the line that runs from the nose on both sides to the mouth. This color is derived from the mixture of Winsor green and Rose Lake.

In watercolor, it is difficult to control the water, and with it the color. It is easy to make mistakes if you do not control the water well. And that lesson is learned by doing.

I constantly make slight mistakes. But all is not lost. There are some wonderful brushes that help you remove stains that may appear on the paper and then dry the area with a napkin. The Winsor Green is a very staining color, so it is sometimes difficult to remove. Depending on the color you want to remove you might have better or worse results. In this case, it works well.

Once I got the tone of the entire face, I focus on details such as the mouth, eyes, and the flare in the iris. This time I need a color really dark, so I add Paynes gray. With a brush No. 4 or No. 6 I paint dark between teeth and eye detail. I, then, remove the masking fluid and give a

slight tone to the teeth that normally are not so white.

This time, with this other face, I did the same exercise but using two completely different colors. Probably if we had mixed the colors of these two men "so expressive" (Yellow, Rose Lake, Burnt Sienna, Windsor Green and Prussian Blue) we would have get more natural tones. Sometimes the skin color gives greenish, bluish, in summers become more golden orange. And depending on the object that is closed to the skin acquires its color. Great variation in skin colors. With this exercise, we realize that even colors as opposed to the nature of our skin color, can work.

I masked out where the white areas will be. The three "color shapers" used in oil painting are my tools for frisket. I just wipe the rubber end with tissue when the frisket has been applied. No more messing, trying to clean a brush that was used to apply frisket.

Darks went in first, why? I did not want any other area to be darker. Just paint in a few darks colors and let them blend on the paper.

Loaded a brush #12 and struck it against a wooden pencil, producing dots. These dots will go everywhere, so mask off the area you don't want the paint dots to land on.

You should be able to see the handmade stencil. Needed is a water sprayer ,that ONLY puts out dots of water NOT a MIST . You must hold the sprayer fairly close to the dots. Some of the dots MUST remain as dots. If you use a mist sprayer ,all the dots will join . What a mess!

Here are two trees painted by throwing on dots. Paint in limbs and twigs while the dots are still wet. Just practice applying the dots and spraying them, over the years I have found if students would do small areas and learn how to paint trees ,rocks, flowers, backgrounds, the sea , etc.... they make better progress, than just starting on a large painting .Yes, I know, you want to paint a wonderful large painting to show Grandma. BUT DO NOT DO IT.

You should have been able to see the handmade stencil. It was just a thick piece of cardboard (a cheap file folder cut out to the shape of the foliage).

Painted area under the foliage on the left side, just above the rocks that received a "darker" burnt sienna with a touch of red. Dropped in some green paint - bottom left, didn't like it, while wet dropped in red. In went the river, cobalt blue, must match the sky color. The water is colorless, the sky provides the color. Removed the frisket on the top of the rocks - bottom left, now a little light shows on their tops. Wiped out area of foliage with damp brush, just above rocks. Then, I quit painting, realistic - hardly, colorful, you bet. Used all three primary colors, Red, Yellow and Blue..

The sky was painted in by "only" dampening the area of the sky, working the water around the trees, now just touch the blue into the wet area, it will not go into the foliage. Paint in the yellow trees’, or color of your choice. I certainly did not want green. Remember, frisket is in place (center between trees) so you will not develop a green sky.

The Finished Painting

Jim Black was born in London, England where he studied commercial art and engineering at the Northern Polytechnic School in London. Working as a design engineer, Jim traveled widely and diversified his work. He and his family moved to the United States where he sought out Masters of Watercolor Medium - notability, Michael Atkinson, Darryl Trott, Tom Lynch and Nita Engle, studying with them in workshops.

For several years, Jim lived in Southern Mexico where he taught at the Art Institute in San Miguel de Allende. Then, five years later, Jim had an opportunity to teach in the U.S.A. where he held on-going classes and workshops year round until he retired in 2010. Jim started a website, www.jims-watercolor-gallery.com in 2007, which he and his family put together. Jim has become a great success, both as a professional watercolorist and watercolor instructor, but it's helping others improve their watercolor painting skills that he finds most rewarding. Jim has earned a reputation as a First Class Artist and Instructor. Many of his students have gone on to become world famous watercolorist in their own right - including Beatrice Uribe, who was one of Jim's students from 2002 to 2004 and now has many of her paintings hanging in Galleries all over the world. She is known as one of the best watercolor artists specializing in painting people in watercolor and credits Jim with much of her success.

Jim's Watercolor Gallery

The contents of this publication may not be reproduced in whole or in part without the express permission of the copyright holder.

Jim Black , creator and owner of Watercolor For Me

And Jim’s Watercolor Gallery

Copyright 2014