Christmas Trees with Lights at Night
A watercolor postcard of lighted Christmas trees at night on a snowy slope.
Technical How-to
How (and When) to Stretch Your Watercolor Paper
once you start painting quarter-sheet or larger, or getting the paper really saturated, stretching your paper makes your life sooooo much easier! This video shows my preferred method, stretching on the same stretcher bars used for canvas, and an alternate method for those who have difficulty operating a staple gun.
Three Ways to Transfer Drawings to Watercolor Paper
Three methods for transferring a drawing to watercolor paper: using self-made graphite transfer, graphite transfer paper and clear acetate.
Dealing with Mold on a Watercolor Palette
A simple method for eliminating and controlling mold on your watercolor palette.
It’s Not All About Hue – Imposters and Chameleons
Color-mixing is often discussed as if the only consideration is getting “the right color”, but watercolor pigments each have their own physical and chemical properties. This video presents some activities to help you develop a more sophisticated understanding of color-mixing so you become better at choosing and mixing pigments to create the artistic effects—including perceived color—you desire.
Live Demo 8 Nov 2020—Mastering “Negative Thinking”
Negative painting requires us to find shapes that are “not things”. Our brains resist! In this demo, I’ll show you a few strategies you can use to help yourself make that mental shift!
How I Use Autodesk Sketchbook to Plan Paintings or Changes to Paintings
Sketchbook Pro is a great tool for quickly planning changes to a painting in progress, and it’s free. This video introduces the small set of features I use in my planning process, so you can get started quickly without having to go through a lot of features you don’t need.
Reserving and Recovering Light Values: Strategies to Consider
Getting light color values in watercolor works a little differently than in other mediums, since watercolor is transparent. In watercolor, we rely on the white color of the paper to give us our lighter values, meaning that a watercolorist’s main options are reserving or recovering whites. This article lists some of the strategies you can use to reserve and recover whites and light values.
Simple Ways To Show Your Worktable in Zoom
Are you wondering how I can see your work and give you feedback in Zoom? I’ve been doing watercolor coaching via Zoom for almost two years now—I’ve got a system! Here’s a short video to show you how it works.
Using Colorways
Even if you do as I do and have a “(home)base palette” of 8 or 9 colors, there are times when you want to bring in other colors for a particular painting or series. Here’s how I do it to make sure I still have color harmony.
May 2019: Tips and Tricks for Florals
Some tips for creating bold, lively florals in watercolor.
What is Creative Energy Journaling?
So many of us are over-busy, stressed and fully occupied with just getting a few more things crossed off our to-do lists. Deep down, we know we need a way to keep our thinking creative and flexible. We need a way to recharge and get back in touch with our dreams. But we get stuck on the “not enough time/space/skill” stumbling blocks. Creative Energy Journaling is a collection of the activities and practices I use and share with my students to keep my creative energy flowing even when life is biting me in the butt!