Common terms in Watercolour

Wash - may cover a large or small area, are the starting point for most watercolour paintings. Washes need not be completely flat - they are often graded in tone or contain more than one colour.

Washes can be flat, graded, variegated or random

Glaze - is the term used for a wash laid over other dry colours, and is a way of mixing colours on the surface, either the same colour or a different colour

Hard edge, painting wet on dry

Soft edge, painting wet on wet

Positive painting -painting an object

Negative painting - painting behind and around and object to show its shape

Engraving - marking the paper with a sharp implement to allow pigment to flow along the lines, or marking a semi dried wash to create white lines.

Sgraffito -scraping out using a sharp point or knife to scratch into dry paint

Lifting out - using a damp sponge on dry paint or a wet brush to loosen the pigment then immediately blot it. A tissue can be rolled or scrunched for different shapes when lifting out.

Texturing methods - salt spatter
- paint brush, tooth brush spatter
- cling wrap
- Wax resist
- Natural or synthetic sponges, especially useful for creating texture in folage.
- Many acrylic mediums can be placed on the support first, allowed to dry completely and then painted over with pigments for a huge variety of textures.

Line and wash - drawing with pencil, pen or ink and then washing in watercolour. An alternative is to wash in the colour and then selectively draw in line work for more detail.

Stippling - using the tip of the brush to paint small dots of varying tone and density.

Dry-brush - applying a dryish paint which only partially covers the paper, catching the 'tooth' as the brush is dragged across to produce a soft effect.

Backruns/dropping in - often occur by mistake or you can create them deliberately. If you apply more colour to a wash before it is completely dry, the new paint will bleed into the old, creating a blotch with a hard jagged edge.

Scumbling - Holding the brush on the side and making loose, circular movements

Colour terms - staining, transparent, opaqueness, granulating

Granulation - a textural effect achieved by using pigments that are chemically heavy or less refined.

Masking - using a rubberized liquid, applies to the surface and allowed to dry before the first wash is laid. It is used to reserve white areas.

Colour Theory

Colour is the element that best expresses the emotional aspect of a subject and the mood of the artist. Sir Isaac Newton discovered the prism or scale of colours in the 17th century. In the early 18th century the colour wheel came into being. It shows in a simple way the relationship between colours.

Watercolours consist of finely ground pigments mixed with gum arabic and glycerin and oxgall. As additives Gum arabic increases brilliance, gloss and transparency while Oxgall improves wetting and flow on paper.

Hue - is the name of the colour in its simplest form and best describe their position on the colour wheel.

Pigment - is the physical substance of the paint and describes the formula. Paints are often named for the mineral or chemical used to make them. Alizarin Crimson is not a hue but a specific formulation of a hue. Look on the tubes to find the composition codes for each pigment.

Intensity, purity or Chroma is the saturation of a hue. Colours at their purest are found on the colour wheel. You can lessen a colours purity (add water), or dull it (add its complementary) to made an unsaturated colour. Unsaturated colours such as browns, indigo, sepia, are not found on the colour wheel.

Saturated colours are powerful and should be reserved for the center of interest. The eyes tire of these quickly and too many vivid hues can cause confusion inn a work. Dulled hues are less attractive but tend to reduce tension. Too many dull colours are uninteresting unless countered by samples of pure colour.

Primary colours - 3 basic colours, red, blue and yellow from which all other colours are created.
Secondary colours - violet, orange and green created by combining two primaries.
Tertiary colours - created by combining a primary with an adjacent secondary, such as blue green or red violet.
Value or tone - the relative lightness or darkness of a colour.
Key - the value dominant in a painting, ranging from light to dark.

Warm colours - red violet to yellow green. Warm hues attract our attention, excite our emotions, and give a feeling of action.

Cool colours - blue violet to green. Cool hues are refreshing, relaxing and clean. Violets can be moody, but too much can be depressive or gloomy.

Almost any colour can be relatively warn or cool compared to another colour. Red violet will be warm next to blue violet but cool next to red orange. It is possible to have warm blues and cool reds.

Colours have warm and cool versions, red can be warm by adding orange or cool by adding violet or blue.

Colour Schemes

Monochromatic - Variations of one colour. Creates contrast through value differences.

Analogous colours - 3 or 4 neighbors on the colour wheel produce harmonious schemes. Mixtures result in warm and cool versions, bright clean colours. Contrast is achieved through value differences.

Complementary colour - opposite on the colour wheel. A limited palette of 2 complementary colours will give a contrast in hue as well as temperature. Further contrast is achieved with values. The darkest values will be made by mixing opposites.

Other variations of colour schemes include the following -
Complementary analogous
Triads
Secondary triads
Tertiary triads
Limited palette - this is using 2-5 colours only. The advantage of this is that you learn more about the nature of the pigments through mixing.

You save money by only purchasing a basic colour set.

You achieve unified results with colour harmony.

Remember to choose 1 colour to dominate (mother colour).

Glazing first or last over all or part of your painting has a unifying effect because it gives all existing colours something in common. Glazing must be done with a transparent colour.

Examples of 2 colour palettes using complementary colours -
French ultramarine / burnt sienna
Alizarin crimson / hooker's green
Winsor violet / new gamboge
Phthalo turquoise / cadmium scarlet

Examples of 3 colour palettes using a triad colour scheme -
Traditional palette, high key- cad red, lemon yellow or gamboge, ultra marine blue
Opaque palette, low key- Indian red, cerulean blue, yellow ochre
Blackened palette - indigo, Indian yellow, permanent rose
Delicate or high key palette, transparent - permanent rose, aureolin, cobalt blue
Weathered or unsaturated palette - indigo, raw sienna, burnt sienna

Transparent colours - light passes through a colour and bounces off the white paper. Traditional watercolour is painted with mostly transparent or semitransparent colours. Transparent colours make clean washes and clear glazes that lift off easily.

Opaque colours - do not allow light to pass through. Thinning makes them more transparent. Do not glaze with an opaque colour. Opaque colours include the cadmium range, and many unsaturated colours. They make muddy mixes and don't lift off easily.

Staining colours - don't lift off the paper, for example the phthalo range and prussian blue. They do have good intensity and make great darks(deep and clean).

Granulation - pigments separate when washed onto paper. Some blues granulate beautifully.

You can emphasise a colour by placing it next to a colour with opposite characteristics, such as opposite hue, value, temperature and purity.

To mix a secondary or tertiary colour that will have brilliance.

Choose 2 that are as close as possible to the colour you want to mix. The further away on the colour wheel colours are from the colour you want the duller the results will be.

To mix a violet from a red and blue -
Ultramarine blue + permanent rose = brilliant violet
Phthalo blue + cadmium red = muted violet

Setting up your palette.
Start with a warm and cool version of each primary colour
Lemon + aureolin or Indian yellow
Cad red or scarlet lake + perm Rose
Ultramarine blue + cobalt + winsor

Add some convenience colours
Greens - hookers green, sap green
Yellows - raw sienna, sepia, raw umber
Blues - cerulean, indigo
Violet - violet
Orange - Burnt sienna, Cad Orange, burnt umber

Happy painting!