Watercolor/Tempera painting student examples

Student example #1

During this project, I had actually struggled quite a bit. I had originally wanted to do yellow as my background monochromatic colour. When I saw that instead of a dark yellow, adding black turned yellow to more of a grey, I wanted to change colours. I decided to use yellow-orange as my main colour which I would change the value of throughout the piece by mixing yellow and orange. However, Mr. Lawrence informed me that using two colours wasn't the point of the project since the background was a monochromatic blend. I then decided that it would be best to use orange as my colour so I painted over the already painted yellow-orange squares underneath since the poster paints were opaque.

The orange turned into a brown when I added black to it so I decided to mainly use the white to change the value of the orange and make multiple tints of it. I wanted to add multiple points of darker values of the orange that connected in a lighter area which is why I made three points of browns that blended into a lighter orange which met in the middle. I wanted to do this to give interest, make the center of the painting where the seal was brighter to draw attention, and because I didn't like how blending from dark to light throughout the entire piece once looked. The darker areas are the top two corners and the middle of the bottom which forms a triangle.

The original seal stencil didn't have the separation between the two fins in the tail so I searched up images of a sea lion and used them as a reference to draw the fins. I kept the angular shape of the original stencil because I thought it would go well with the squared background. As for the inside of the seal, I wanted to use the techniques to make it almost look like the sea since they are sea creatures. I started from the top of the head and pointed towards the tail without going to multiple spots at the same time since I wanted to make the entire seal a blend of different hues of blue, also heavily using bleeding in the process. Most of the painting was wet on dry, except for the dark patch of the tail that was the dry brush. The first technique I used was rock salt on the neck, however, it didn't come out how I wanted. I tried using it again on the bottom part of the left fin but it still didn't lift the paint how I wanted. Other than that, I really liked using the other techniques, such as the water blooms on the back of the seal and the plastic wrap on the fin which I wish had used more than once because they added to the sea look. I also used masking fluid which you can see on the bottom by making circles and I used a graduated wash on the right fin. I wanted to make it kind of hectic looking so I used many other techniques as well. I used lifting out on the lower part of the tail, wet on dry (the darker lines on the chest) and feathering. I didn't like how the feathering looked because it clashed with the flowy feel of the rest of the painting so after it feathered, I used my brush to mix the paint around so it came out more swayed and blurry. It is one of my favorite parts of the painting, it is under the face on the left side.

Overall, I like how the painting turned out and I like that the background is a lighter, warmer colour and that the main component is darker because you have a clear point of interest.

Techniques:

Graduated Wash

Bleeding

Wet on Wet

Dry Brush

Wet on Dry

Lifting Out

Water Blooms

Masking with Masking Fluid

Rock Salt

Plastic Wrap Texture

Student Example #2

Watercolor/Tempera Painting

For the first project of the painting unit, we were asked to choose the silhouette of an image, create a background using the transition of light to dark using tints, tones, and shades with tempera paint, and finally painting the image using at least 6 different watercolor techniques with a complementary color used in the background.

Step 1: Choose image

For the first step, we were asked to choose an image to trace onto paper for our final project. We were given many options and I chose a simple leaf. After choosing the leaf, I traced it onto tracing paper and then transferring that to the final paper I used to paint my project. My next step would be to choose the colors I want to use.

Choosing the right colors that compliment each other was a very important part of this project. Since I chose a leaf for my image, I decided I wanted to paint it green. The color that compliments green is red, however, I am not very fond of this combination so I saw what a split complementary color scheme would look like. In the image above, you can see that purple contrasts well with green and yellow which are the colors that I decided to use. Purple for the background and greens/yellows for the image.

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Step 2- Painting Background

Since I chose purple as the color for the background, I had to vary the tone, tints, and shades. You can see the contrast in light and dark values of the purple. To make the color lighter I added white, this is called a tint. To make the color darker I added a bit of black, this is called a shade. I wanted more vibrant colors in the background which is why I didn't add grey to the color, which is called a tone. A challenge I had while painting the background was choosing where to put the colors on each block because I also wanted the background to look cohesive. In the end, I used relatively lighter tints on the outside and towards the middle I painting darker shades.

Step 3- Watercolour Techniques

We were taught 15 different watercolor techniques so we can use at least 6 to use in our painting.

The photo on the left shows all the 15 techniques. The 6 I chose to use, graduated wash, lifting out, rock salt, splattering, plastic wrap texture, and bleeding. 

Previous to this project, I had painted in watercolor but I was not aware of all the different techniques you can create with watercolor paint. The most challenging technique for me was the Water Blooms one (9th from left to right). My favorite technique is the rock salt one because it gives the color almost like a starburst/mini firework effect which I really like. I used the 6 techniques to create my final project for the watercolor part of this painting.

Final-

In conclusion, I am very pleased with how my final project turned out. I really like the contrast between the purple and green/yellow. During this project, I learned many different techniques with Tempera paint and watercolor paint as well. After taking off the tape strips, I did a little touching up and filled in the gaps of the leaf for an enhanced contrast between the leaf and the background. I like how the leaf looks very blended out but you can still tell how I used different watercolor techniques. Finally, this project taught me many skills that I will be able to apply on future art projects!