In response to Snowy Meadow, Carol Schiff rightly pointed out the challenge of switching betweeen painting oils and acrylics, where one goes from dark to light, and painting watercolor, where the process is reversed. In watercolor, the lights must be preserved right from the beginning since there is no good way to add them afterwards.
I started Snow-laden Trio by making a loose pencil sketch. Then I used masking fluid to block out the snow both on the trees and the ground, as well as the tall leafless tree trunks. The next step was to apply the sky using a graded wash of pthalo blue. Towards the ground burnt sienna was added to the blue along with lots of water to get a weak grey wash for the foreground.
Once the wash was dry, the evergreens were laid in using a strong blue-green mix. After the trees were dry the masking fluid was peeled off, then the grasses and shading were added to the foreground. On stepping back, the hard edge between the bottom of the trees and the foreground did not seem quite right, so I softened it out with a wet brush.
Snow-laden Trio, Watercolor on 140lb paper, 9"x12", $35 (unframed)
You did it again, neat painting! Thanks for the mention on your blog.
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