Properties of Watercolour Paints

Spinnaker Tower Portsmouth at Night

/ davidrpharmer / Leave a comment

This must be one of the trickiest commissions that I have ever accepted, and one which questions my wisdom. Firstly working out a colour for night black, and it won’t be black ,has not been easy. Black in large quantities I find tends to flatten the painting, unless it is a raven glossy black which works for many things but not sky imho. Then what colour to use for the illuminated tower itself, and there we have a certain choice of watercolours that have a luminous quality, but which one to use against which night sky that is the question.

This is the client’s photograph btw and is a very good one in terms of composition. So many aren’t and refreshingly I have little or nothing to change other than possibly including the moon, which i have agreed with the client. Perspective is intriguing which I like. All those lines going towards the vanishing point will be fun to work with

I have done various trials and have shared these with the client. For the night sky I looked first at a midnight blue colour, definitely steering away from black per se. To mix a midnight blue I am using indigo with a touch of Payne’s Grey, which is a blue black colour, and is useful. A lot of artists avoid Payne’s Grey but I find it useful at times. in fact that was the other contender for the night sky, as it is not quite black, as I say more of a blue black colour. So that was my submission for the sky. Now for the illuminated tower. The colour needs to be luminous which is not that easy with watercolour. I chose in the end pthalo blue and as an alternative, permanent rose both of which would work. I also glazed pthalo blue over rose just to see what would happen and again the result was workable

The client came back quite quickly. She preferred the indigo version of midnight blue and also the pthalo blue for the tower. I was relieved about that, as both were my preferred option, and in neither case did I lead her in anyway

So I know which direction I am going in, and will proceed with the painting. I will come back about that although probably not too soon

A Completed Commission

/ davidrpharmer / 7 Comments
The Final Version

This is the last commission of the year, and it is finished, I am pleased to say. I have had to keep in touch with the client, at every stage of the painting, which I don’t usually do, as it does make a lot of work . Having said that I have enjoyed this commission more than I thought, and maybe stage by stage consultation is not a bad idea, certainly after my last bad experience

However, they were nice people to deal with, and although they made a few changes here and there, basically they were onside.The painting was collected today and I am pleased to say that they were thrilled with the result

The subject of the painting was a Victorian cottage deep in the Surrey woods. Probably it had originally been an estate worker’s cottage, built around 1840 with a later addition.

I went to look at the cottage quite early one morning. The sun had risen. At this time of year, the shadows are long. The woods behind the house were brightly lit, most of the leaves had gone, and the light filtering through the branches gave them a translucent feel. To get that effect on paper needed thinking about. I used a colour that I don’t use often, quinacradone gold. It was perfect for the job and just gave the effect of sun-bathed trees that I was looking for

Most of the house was in shadow. I removed some as I wanted the effect of bright sun hitting the brickwork here and there. The combination of light and dark should be dramatic

When I was on site, the client brought their little dog, a Labrador bitch puppy. She was a beautiful colour, gold. Would I include her in the painting. I like to please, so I said yes, but I was anxious. I have painted dogs before but never done a dog portrait, especially one so tiny. She would be the size of a fingernail

I had taken some pictures. I have to say that for a lively puppy, she was very well behaved and posed beautifully. I picked one of the photographs and did a full sized drawing, which I was pleased with. I then reduced it in size to a thumbnail and put it in the sketch, and went on from there. When the time came to paint, I used the same gold as the trees in the background, and used more of the same for shadows on the dog. It worked better then I thought possible

Mostly straightforward otherwise, except that I could not get definition to stay in the cottage features. Overnight the colour would dry and disappear, which is not that unusual in watercolour. Eventually I reddened the brick colour with vermilion, which darkened the building and somehow improved the brick texture. Again something I have learned for another time

Commissions can certainly be testing, and very occasionally go awry, like my last unhappy experience, but they can also be broadening and make you attempt something you wouldn’t normally tackle. Will I start doing animal portraits? Hmm perhaps not, but animals in landscape are a possibility

Galloping Horses Partway

/ davidrpharmer / 2 Comments

Galloping Horses Partway

I have moved on a bit from last time

So far I am using two colours only, Cobalt Blue and Vermillion Hue which I spoke about before, which does make a very pleasant grey with a sort of glow about it. I don’t think that I have worked with two colours before, so this will be interesting

I have spattered heavily with masking fluid around the hooves of the lead horse. This is showing as blue as I am using the Frisk product, so this will be white when I remove and hopefully the removal won’t give me a problem. I will probably spatter with some dark paint as well.

I have started to detail the lead horse, if only to judge the tones between him and the others further back. The pink background seems to work well. I will just go on defining the shadows on the horses and see how we end up