Watercolor Strides

Today was my third watercolor class. I am happy to report that I am making progress, in fact, I could probably paint those flowers from my previous post now. I won't though. My teacher is very particular about the order of what we paint. We can only use three colors; cobalt blue, lemon yellow and alizarin crimson (red). Any color variation or additional colors have to be mixed from those three colors. I'm not allowed to make a full pallet of paint colors just yet. I've done a blue study and green plants. Next up is a green study then some sort of red thing. I did sneak a little purple into my plants!

Blue Study

The blue study was one of the first things we did after learning how to add water to paint and use a brush (um... little more basic than I was expecting, but OK). I'm not overly impressed with my blue study but I'm more interested in moving on than perfecting this step. 

Ocean

The ocean/water study was more interesting. The only part I didn't like was I had no idea what we were doing until we were half way done. I wish the teacher had said something like, "these are going to be waves". It is strange to be following directions not knowing what you are intending to create. 

My Plants (fern, cilantro, rosemary)

The plants were much more fun than the other paintings. We had real plants to paint from. The intention of the assignment was to learn to mix greens. I spent forever on the fern thinking that it sucked up until I was just about finished and it started looking like a plant instead of a blob.

My teachers were telling me how to matte and frame my plant painting. I'm flattered they like it so much but I think I will hold off hanging things on my wall until I paint something really impressive.