Beginner with Watercolor

[Liquidashes]

I've never tried coloring with watercolors and i want to try it out, I but i dont know what brand of media (brand of watercolors, paper, starter bushes, etc.) i need to get. I'm wondering what initial colors i should try to look for. Aaaaannnd if anyone wants to throw some tips and pointers at me on how to go about painting with watercolors, that'd be swell :)

I love CA <3 I've learned so much here.

[mocknot]

Winsor Newton makes good watercolors. They tend to be on the pricier side, but those little tubes will last you for years and years, so if you think this is something you might want to do for a while, I'd recommend them. As far as colors go, that's kind of up to you. Maybe start out with getting a couple of each of the primaries, adding a couple of browns later on. I'm a fan of mixing as many of my own colors as possible though.

[Liquidashes]

Alrighty thank you. I'm not worried TOO much about the price since, like you said, they'll probably last me a while.

[figure of frgt10]

yes, my uncle gave me some winsor newton paints from decades ago, and they are some of the richest paints in my pallette.
in my opinion, a good starter pallette would include:
a bright yellow
a dark crimson red
a pthalo blue, or similair color
a viridian hue.

[AdamDillabo]

some things i have been tought about water colors.
1) dont use white. thin the paint down and use the paper as white.( only exseption my teacher would allow is high lights after its all done)
2) mix the colors just as you would with acrlyics. many tend to just the paint straight from the tube.
3) work in layers and keep it light.
4) good luck lol water colors are hard.

[Liquidashes]

Alrighty, thank you :). I bet they will be a challenge to use, but i really want to try my hand at it. Thank you for all the comments, it is going to prove very useful. Appreciate it a lot :tihi:

[Fl3wk]

Buy some masking fluid! I forgot about this and couldnt start for weeks (short on cash). Oh yeah, i know its not IMPORTANT to have it, but its a utility I would prefer to have.

What it does is resists the paint that you are applying so that teh colour/paper undernieth is left in tacked. Also buy some OLD brushes, or CHEAP, for this does ruin brushes if you dont clean the fluid off of them striaght away.

Also just erase away the mask once you have finished.

I am starting with this paint and this is what I learned.

[Liquidashes]

Alrighty, will do. Thank you for the tip :)

[Sofia Alexandra]

If you need to paint something black or grey, don't use black or grey paints, as they tend to look flat. Especially black usually ends up looking like a hole in the painting. Violet and yellow makes a nice grey, and dark brown + dark blue gives you a kind of black that looks "alive". Experiment with mixing colours to get different shades and nuances, that way you can get a more realistic look to what you're painting.

Good luck. :)

[GoldSeven]

And something important with watercolour, as opposed to oils and also digital colouring - always work from light to dark. Start with light washes, then put darker ones on top of that.

Watercolour is a fast medium, you have to work fast or the paint dries, leaving water edges. So good planning, as well as speed, is vital. A good idea of what your finished piece will look like, with which light areas to start, what detail to add later. Thumbnails are extremely helpful. When you get more secure with the medium, you'll start pre-planning which techniques to use where in your pic without really becoming aware of it.

Use total white (paper-white) sparingly, only at the point of greatest interest. Use very light washes for light colours in the rest of the pic. Same goes for black. As Sofia said, avoid pure black at all costs. :)

Hope this helps a bit. :)

[AmishCommy]

here is my pallete (http://conceptart.org/forums/showpost.php?p=685845&postcount=104)

Don't use Phthalo anything. just a little bit will overpower all your other colors.

get some paper and colors and just play around with them and see what they can do.

[Liquidashes]

Wow, thank you all for the VERY helpful comments. I havent checked back on this thread in a while. I thought it was buried :D Again, thank you. This is really going to help me getting started. I just have to save up some money first tho, argh.

[GoldSeven]

The good thing about watercolour is that you basically pay just once. Buy one reasonably complete pallette, four brushes and some paper, and that'll last you for years. Not the paper, presumably, depending on how much you'll work with it. But the colours last ages. :)