Have you ever wondered what makes a good watercolor painting? What rules of thumb should you follow when creating your artwork? In this article, we will go through the four pillars to consider when evaluating a painting and the eight golden rules of watercolor painting. Whether you are a beginner or an advanced painter, these fundamentals are still crucial.
Alvaro Castagnet, one of the world’s most highly respected watercolor artists, explained in his book Alvaro Castagnet’s Watercolour Masterclass the four pillars that make a good watercolor painting.
Shapes
Shapes or compositions refer to the relationship between different parts of a painting and how they are placed in a painting to tell the whole story. Using different shapes and placing them in different orders can change the meaning of the image.
To get the composition right, Alvaro suggested thinking in terms of shapes rather than details. Try to divide the shapes into three types: small, medium, and large. You should only have one large shape as the focal point of a painting.
Value
No matter how good the composition and the colors of your painting are, if the value is inconsistent or incorrect, the artwork will not look right to the audience.
Value in painting and designing refers to light and shadows, and how they appear in a painting or a design. For example, a white shirt under sunlight will look brighter than the same shirt in the shadow.
Colors
Colors and the way you use them can create a mood for your artwork. For example, a winter painting usually comprises cold colors such as blue and dark brown, and neutral colors such as grey, black, and white. A painting with bright warm colors creates a feeling of joyfulness, happiness, and passion.
There are different color schemes such as monochromatic colors, complementary colors, color shades, etc. Using the colors in the right way can make your painting more attractive. It’s also very helpful when you mix watercolor paints.
Edges
Many beginners tend to use all hard edges for every figure as if everything is important and needs to be obvious to the audience. This habit backfires because when everything is important, nothing is the most important.
Some new painters might overuse soft edges with the wet-on-wet technique, which makes their paintings blurry and out of focus.
Not all edges in your artwork need to be sharp. Instead, combining soft edges and hard edges makes your painting more dynamic and rhythmic.
When you have a good composition, you get the value right, use the right combination of colors, and control edges well, your artwork will look right to the audience, tell a good story, and more importantly, trigger the right feeling you want them to feel.
What are the Golden Rules of Watercolor Painting?
So how can we apply the four pillars in watercolor painting? Below are the eight golden rules of watercolor painting you should consider.
Rule Number 1: Know the Characteristics of Watercolor Paints
Knowing your medium before using it. Watercolor paints are different from oil paints, acrylic paints, pastels, and also gouache. Therefore, the way you use watercolor paints is also different from using the other materials.
Here are some characteristics of watercolor paints:
- Watercolor paints are transparent. It means that you can see the pigments of previous layers in a painting. The new layer cannot cover completely the old layer.
- Watercolors are activated by water. Water plays the role of the environment for pigments to flow and bleed into each other. The amount of water on the paper, in your brush, or the moist paint, will affect how the colors blend. Adding too much or too little water is a common mistake many beginners make.
- Dry watercolors can be reactivated with water. This means that you can fix your painting by reactivating the pigments on the surface of the paper with water. However, you cannot completely remove the pigments that are deep inside the paper’s fibers.
- The colors lighten after the paper is dry. This happens because some pigments sink into deeper layers of the paper, leaving less pigments on the paper’s surface.
Now we already know the ‘personality’ of watercolor paints. We will need to adjust the way we use watercolor in painting. Read on for the seven golden rules of watercolor painting.
Rule Number 2: Plan your Painting in Layers
A painting will have different objects and the composition of them. There are also highlights, shadows, soft edges, hard edges, colors, and how they interact with each other. Before you start painting, plan what you need to paint first and what should be painted later.
In addition, because watercolor is transparent, you will need to paint many layers to get the color saturation you want.
It depends on the reference that you use to paint. Sometimes, you may need to paint the background first before the main figures, but other times you need to start with the figures first. Having a good plan helps you save time and avoid unexpected mistakes in watercolor painting.
Rule Number 3: Work from Light to Dark
Because watercolor paints are transparent, lighter colors such as white and lemon yellow, cannot cover darker colors such as brown and dark blue. This is the reason why you should work from light to dark.
However, this doesn’t mean you should paint the light colors in all parts of your painting before painting dark colors. Colors are relative to each other (this will be explained further in the rule “Understand Color and Light”), so sometimes you might need to paint some parts with dark colors first to make the other parts stand out. For example, in the painting below, I painted the background with dark green first to contrast with the highlights of the main figure.
The rule “work from light to dark” applies to the same part of the painting. For instance, if you paint an apple, you should paint the light red and yellow colors near the highlights for the whole apple on the first layer, then build shadows and shapes for the apple with darker shades of red and yellow in the next layers.
Rule Number 4: Timing is the Key
When working with watercolor and layers, timing plays an important role because the paper and paints dry up over time. Different watercolor techniques need different timing to work with.
For example, you can only lift colors when the paper is semi-dry. If the paper and the paint are still wet, the technique will not work.
Another example is the negative painting technique. You need to wait for the previous layer to dry completely before painting the next layer.
Rule Number 5: Understand Color and Light
Understanding color and light is crucial in painting, especially realistic painting. This is not only necessary for watercolor painting but any other type of painting. It helps you know what colors you should use and why, how colors change in different light conditions, and how to make your painting more interesting. In addition, knowing the color theory and color schemes makes mixing colors much easier.
Here are some points when it comes to color and light that I think all artists should know:
- Colors and light work together. In different light conditions, colors and their values will change. For example, a sunset landscape will have red and violet as the dominant colors, so the trees, houses, and people will have some shades of red and violet.
- Colors are relative to each other. A red object looks more vibrant when it’s put next to a green object than a grey object. Thinking of complementary colors when mixing the colors or when deciding which colors to use can help your artwork be more vibrant and attractive.
- There are different types of light such as direct light, reflected light, overcast light, neon light, etc. Knowing different light sources helps you understand the reference and decide on the right colors to use in your painting.
Color and light are so important in painting. If you want to learn deeply about this subject, I highly recommend the book Color and Light: A Guide for the Realistic Painters by James Gurney.
Rule Number 6: Get the Value Right
As mentioned earlier, value is one of the four pillars of a painting. Getting the value right helps the audience understand the picture better and makes your artwork more consistent. Correct value can also bring more depth to a painting.
The artist Alvaro Castagnet has some tips for achieving value accuracy as below:
- Work on the middle and darker values one at a time. Use the white of the paper as highlights.
- Place the strongest value contrast nearest to the focal point of a painting.
- 3 tips for working with dark values: always connect the darks to add cohesiveness to a painting, paint dark values with two washes of complementary colors to create interest and richer colors, and avoid murky dark mixes by painting quickly and allowing color bias.
Rule Number 7: Control Soft Edges and Hard Edges
The key to controlling soft edges and hard edges is to know when to use which edges and what techniques help you achieve them.
To know when to use soft edges and hard edges, the easiest way is to follow closely your reference. In addition, determine the focal point for your painting when you plan your painting process. Figures in the focal point should have sharper edges. Objects in the background or out of focus can be painted loosely and should have soft edges.
Understanding anatomy when painting portraits and the texture of the figures can also help you know when to use soft and hard edges.
When it comes to watercolor techniques, use the wet-in-wet painting technique to achieve soft edges and the wet-on-dry technique to get hard edges. Soft edges and hard edges can be achieved by other techniques too. Read my blog post about different watercolor techniques to know what effects you can get from each technique.
Rule Number 8: Invest in High-Quality Watercolor Supplies
Watercolor supplies such as watercolor paper, paints, and brushes can contribute to the quality of your painting and your painting experience. Some techniques don’t work on low-quality paper.
Below are three short tips for selecting the right watercolor supplies:
- Use 100% cotton paper, acid-free, 300 gsm or higher weight
- Use artist’s quality watercolor paints for more vibrant colors
- Equip yourself with different brushes for different effects, and try to find brushes that have natural hair in the bristles
Check out more details and guidelines for watercolor supplies.
Conclusion
Art is a free space for creativity but there are fundamentals that any painter should know. The four pillars of a painting and the eight golden rules of watercolor painting are guidelines for beginners to become better artists.
If you find this knowledge should be shared with anyone who is getting started with watercolor painting, feel free to share this post with them. Subscribe to my newsletter for more tips and painting lessons via email.
Thank you for this, it’s a good review and excellent learning tool!
Thank you, Sally!