I’ve written a few blog tutorials below to help you get started in watercolour and drawing. I hope you give them a try and find them useful. Please let me know if there are any subjects you’d like me to write about.
For videos, please see my YouTube channel, Kristin Rawcliffe Art
Watercolour tutorials
Planning a watercolour painting
When you're planning a painting in watercolour (rather than a study or a practice piece), it's really important to work out how you will tackle it. You need to think about highlights, light and dark, texture and detail and what order you're going to paint them, as...
Watercolour papers
Finding the right watercolour paper to use can be tricky. They vary widely, and the paper you use affects the marks that you make far more than the type of canvas you use affects oil or acrylic paint. How to use watercolour paper In general, water will make your paper...
Watercolour masking techniques
Masking is any technique that will help you preserve the white of the paper when you're painting with watercolour. There are various ways to mask your painting including: Wax Masking tape Paper Masking fluid Wax Wax resists water, meaning that you can paint over wax...
Watercolour brush marks and mark-making
When you're painting, you should use the shape and size of your brushes to help you make the marks you need for your subject. The right brush will help you paint confident grass blades or strong tree trunks. Before you start, take a little while to see what kind of...
Wet-on-dry watercolour exercises
Wet-on-dry painting with watercolour refers to painting on dry paper, whether it has paint on it (dry paint!) or not. Whereas painting wet-on-wet will give you soft edges and gradients of colour, paint marks on dry paper will have crisp edges and you can use the...
Watercolour wet on wet exercises
Using watercolour 'wet on wet' just means painting onto wet paper, whether the paper is wet with water or wet with paint. It is perfect for creating creating smooth transitions and gradients of colour, as well as for soft lines. It is important to work out how much...
How to choose and mix colours for your watercolour painting
Choosing your colour palette You don't need to buy a huge set of colours when you choose your paints. However many you have in your set, it's worth trying some practical colour theory so you can explore the range of colours available form the ones you have. Whether or...
Starting out with watercolour
I love watercolour, but it's been an on-off relationship. I love the effects it gives, fresh, artless, glowing, but I had no idea of the amount of work it takes to be able to predict how the water behaves. It's definitely the water that's the trickiest part of...
Drawing tutorials
Starting out with drawing – good materials to use
I often get asked what art materials to buy, particularly by people starting out drawing and painting. The answer to a certain extent is that you get what you pay for, and although this doesn't mean you have to pay for the best of everything there are some cheap buys...
Using tone in your drawings and paintings
What is tone? Tone is the relative scale of light to dark values in an image. It is vital to creating depth and solidity in a drawing or painting. When you are choosing a reference picture, it’s best to choose one with lighting that shows the contrast between light...
Improving your accuracy when drawing
Drawing by eye demands a lot of looking and concentrating to make sure you are actually drawing what you see and not what you think you see. Really, the top tip is look, look and look again! Drawing by eye is an important skill to master as how well you see your...