Sunday 31 January 2016

Watercolor for Cardmakers - Intermediate Techniques: Day 3

Hello!

Day 3 of Watercolor for Cardmakers: Intermediate Techniques was challenging! I haven't made any cards from my work yet, but I did create a postcard for my daughter from the scanned image of one of them.

I worked on two lessons at once.

Negative painting is about creating a background that brings your images to the front. I need a bit more practice on this one, but it was a really interesting process to play with.
I drew the heart outlines around a die because I had no heart outline stamps. Halfway through the process I lost my pencil lines, so I just used my imagination to keep the hearts in the picture. ;-)

Lifting is about lifting paint to leave highlights. One of the hardest things for me in watercolour is the inability to ADD highlights. As far as I can tell, you need to either leave the highlights from the beginning, or use lifting to remove some of the colour. VERY challenging for me, haha! For my first attempt I used Jane's Doodles Pretty Peonies stamp for the main flower. Again, I lost the stamped image partway through my painting, so I did my best without it. I really don't like the leaves and stems in this first effort, but as with all of these lessons, the more mistakes I make, the more I learn. I do like my freehand buds. :-)
For my second attempt, I drew my main rose (which looked so much better in pencil!). When I started lifting, I rounded the petals more than I wanted, but the lifting worked, so I can't complain. I'm getting there. Next time I want my ruffled petals AND lifting that works. I'm happier with the leaves and stems this time. I also made some mistakes that I successfully fixed, so I'm excited!
By this time I was running late with lessons, so I have paused in my day 3 practice so that I can move on. 

I printed the heart watercolour onto photo paper for my daughter. On glossy photo paper, it glows.
I'm running out of time for class homework. I'm back to work tomorrow (I had last week off to settle the kids into school), which means I'm back to night time crafting, which is rather difficult with my (getting old) eyes and limited time to allow watercolouring to dry. I hope to get some more done today, so that I just have fun practising to do this week.

Thanks for visiting!

Michelle
xxx


9 comments:

Barb said...

Love all these, Michelle! You're definitely "getting there" and then some! Beautiful work!

Betty said...

love that negative technique with the hearts - such a pretty card - almost would like to sign up for the class just to see how it's done!

Lynn said...

Absolute beauties Michelle!

Karen said...

I love the peony! I think it is beautiful. You are really improving your craft.

Unknown said...

These are beautiful! Well done!

SugarGem said...

Wow gorgeous watercoloring

Darnell said...

Michelle, get out! You rocked this class! Those blue and yellow hearts would sell like hotcakes as prints! It's extraordinary! I would hang that on my wall! And I think your florals are just as fabulous! I've heard that this class is really difficult from more than one person, but you've made it seem so interesting and educational! TFS! Hugs, Darnell

donna mikasa said...

Gorgeous results, Michelle! Watercoloring is so forgiving--your cards are all wonderful!

Cris G. said...

You were very prolific with these classes, great art work!