Watercolor Portaits

Watercolor can be your best friend or your worst enemy. If you try to make watercolor do what you want, it never will. However if you learn to flow with watercolor you receive surprising and beautiful results. In this workshop we will be exploring this relationship with the medium through blind-contour self portraits. You will learn what makes a not only believable, but a super luscious, color-rich skin tone using only layers of red, blue and yellow, giving you a greater understanding of "transparent layer" color mixing.

Supply List:

• Watercolor Brushes:
  (look for the softest feeling brushes you can find)
  • Round, size 8 (suggested size).
  • 1in or larger Flat.
  • Round, size 1 or 2 (optional).
  • OR I highly recommend a size 4 or 6 squirrel hair quill brush in place of all three of the previous brushes. If you do buy a squirrel hair make sure it is the "quill" variety and around the $30 range. There are cheaper squirrel hair brushes out there ($3-8) but they are much poorer quality. Please do not feel obligated to buy one unless you are serious about continuing with the medium, but they are well worth the extra money.
  
  
  
• Watercolors:
  • The difference between the cheap brands vs. the expensive brands is the amount of pigment in the paint. Cotman watercolors are among the cheapest and work well, if you want paints with as much vibrancy as possible Winsor Newton, Daniel Smith and pretty much any brand in the higher price range are great. Must be tube watercolors, do not get cake or pan watercolors.
  • Pick one Red, one Blue and one Yellow. (my palette contains one in each category but it is not necessary)
  • Warm Reds: Alizarim Crimson, Rose Madder Genuine, Quinadrone Red (recommended).
  • Cool Reds: Cadmium Red Hue (its cheaper than real cadmium red) (recommended), Flame Red.
  • Warm Blues: Ultramarine (recommended), Prussian, Cobalt.
  • Cool Blues: Cerulean (recommended), Pthalo.
  • Warm Yellows: Cadmium Yellow hue (recommended)
  • Cool Yellow: Aureolin Yellow, Lemon Yellow.



• Watercolor Palette
  • Highly recommend the largest one you can find (the small 8in rounds are much too tiny).
  • This is a good example but it isn't required.
  
  
  
• Watercolor Paper:
  • Highly recommend 1 pad of Arches hot press (recommended) or cold press atleast 9" x 12" glued on all sides. This eliminates warping and the need to use heavy weight watercolor paper.
  • If you prefer get sheets of watercolor paper atleast 140 1bs, perferably 300 lb
  
  
  
• Pencil