Note also that I eliminated some of
the foliage in the right half of the middle
ground. There are more tall trees in the
photograph, but at best they replicate
some of the other shapes we already
have, whilst adding visual confusion
that wouldn’t help our painting. Instead
I allowed more of the distant hill to be
visible, which provides more depth for
the composition.
In Sketch B(below right) I concentrated
on establishing the tones that we’ll aim
to replicate in watercolour next month.
The idea here was to increase distinction
between the forms, enhance the depth –
with the palest tones generally towards
the background – and to introduce
spring sunlight. Taking inspiration from
the photograph, I decided to have the
leftmost part of the middle ground
treeline under cloud shadow and the
right half in the light. The middle tree is
half and half. The sun is coming from the
right and this allows us to cast a strong
shadow from the foreground tree over
the area to its left. The tree’s left side is
therefore shaded and its right side is
catching the sunlight. The composition
now has better counterchange, providing
extra depth, definition and visual interest.The colours
Many artists don’t feel the need to
colour-match from life, which is also
my own view. The new growth of spring
can appear very lime-coloured to my eye
and whilst adequate in small amounts,
this doesn’t especially appeal to me. To
achieve colour variety and unity in your
paintings, I recommend mixing your
greens from whatever colours you have
on your palette, which will also be used
elsewhere in your painting. A limited
palette of eight or fewer colours for a
whole picture is usually more than
enough. Achieving correct tone is so
important and, if we’re not careful,
colour can distract us from this.
Straight-from-the-tube greens can be
very vivid – which, of course, you may
like – but you needn’t use any of them.
Here are some ideas for mixing your
greens using blues, yellows and other
colours, and I’ll be using these for the
watercolour in part two of this project
next month.
Mixes 1(right) shows combinations of
Winsor blue and Indian red mixed with
raw sienna. Winsor blue and Indian red
gives an almost identical colour to
Payne’s grey. You could use Payne’s grey,
but the mix allows us to increase the
warmth or coolness of the green by
adding more red or blue. The top row
shows a more diluted mix of the bottom
row. The blue and red were combined to
create a cool, blue-tinted grey; raw sienna
was then added. Each column has a mix
of the cool grey with some raw sienna,
with the left more grey and the right more
raw sienna. This range of greens is quite
muted, and I will use it for the trees in
the middle ground of the composition.
In the foreground I will use cadmium
yellow in place of raw sienna for abrighter green. This can be seen in
Mixes 2(above right).
Finally, there are other colours to notice,
particularly in the first half of spring.
The plum or red-brown of leaf buds, last
year’s remnant catkins and dead trees,
the white blossom on bushes and wild
ground flowers, such as cow parsley
(which can also take on other colours
in the shade), dark conifers and more.
We’ll look at putting it all together for our
watercolour in part two next month. In
the meantime, please don’t forget to send
your finished image to [email protected]
for inclusion on the painting project area
of LP’s website at http://www.painters-
online.co.uk. LPhttp://www.painters-online.co.uk JUNE 2017 21
tCompositional sketch A tCompositional sketch BJemBowden
Jem offers one-to-one tuition,
demonstrations, workshops, weekly
classes, and teaching on residential
painting holidays. Next painting
holiday is Wye Valley in Watercolour
(9-14 July with Alpha Painting Holidays
http://www.alphapainting holidays.co.uk).
For more details, blog and galleries
of his work visit http://www.jembowden
watercolour.co.uk, email jembowden
[email protected] or call him
on 0117 9711735.Mixes 1Top row shows diluted mix
of bottom colours from Winsor blue,
Indian red and raw sienna.Mixes 2 Cadmium yellow replaces
raw sienna in the mix.ttMIXING GREENS
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