Painting 33

Ref 1117.- Watercolor pencil as underpainting

Watercolor pencils, look same as regular colored pencils, and can be used the same way, the magic happens when wáter be added, causing them to behave like watercolor paint.
This will be the result after start with watercolor pencils

Reference is a picture taken from the web
Materials needed are indicated through the easy following steps

Paper is Stardream silver colored paper of 105 lbs, is not precisely made for watercolor but Works pretty good due it´s resistance and some of it´s properties
I sketched the figure regarding my photograph reference

1st Step.- Color your drawing by layering colors, and then paint over the área with a brush and plain wáter (most common way to paint with watercolor pencils)
Tip 1.- I recommend you brush the ligther áreas first as you don´t want to brush darker áreas of the painting
That will be my underpainting sketching to work from now on,  just with round brushes
Tip 2.- Some edge dark lines are made with graphite pencil for undergoing work reference  as eyes, ears, ornaments,- contourn

Consider colors will look different after wáter is added ( so it´s generally a good idea to make a chart on a piece of same paper to see how colors looks after wet
Step 2.- In this particular case I not just added wáter but watercolor as apply the brush to reinforce in a darker tone the red color so I used cad red deep hue from Winsor & Newton and to make orange tonalities I added a dab of lemon yellow hue mainly where the ligth suppose to hit in the hat

 

Eyes are main context so take care and define it as much as posible, I did use cerulean blue and once is dry added White  quite diluted to conform ligth reflections integrating color with absorbent paper as color is applied to fade values

Around the eyes and darker spots are made with Payne´s grey, fading away with burn umber blending with color pencil underneath, giving us the hair appearance we need for, while is still wet with a plastic card make ligther lines to suggest some long hairs as you can see through the following picture

 



Once dry we can work with more details and definitions, I like this type of paper because I can work the White color in a more easy way making also a good contrast with silver color paper, For White I prefer to use permanent White - gouache which is opaque and quite shiny so I added in accordance its hair radial distribution  (for the mouth I did use skin color, wich now will be partially covered for the White color accordingly

Tip 3.- Gouache color can be reactived with a Little bit of wáter addition and then pull color with my plastic card to conform long cat whiskers, and do not worry if you make a mistake because once again is dry you can add red color as negative technique To make the hairs thinner and delineated

 

 

"Christmas Season"

Bonus painting; Watercolors pencils also can be used on top of a watercolor painting to add design and fine details