Watercolor painting by
Ada Mai
Ada Mai's watercolor learning experience:
I am enjoying my water color class. I have studied lot of painting skills from the class. When I can use those skill to paint , I feel proud of my job. I treat my painting as my baby because I spend time and put my heart to create it.
1:30pm Today, I try to use real setting instead of picture reference as my model. Because this project needs to use two group of color to create a painting, I chose yellow and green. I went to super market to pick the best pumpkin, lemons and cucumbers, and then I need to think about my setting. A perfect setting is need s best lighting, so I put them at my kitchen table. Look, that is not bad.
2:00pm After I finished my setting, I need to draw my first draft. My professor Chen taught us in the class that when we draw, we should put attention to the line, not thing. I keep my eyes on the line and just follow the line to draw. 40 minutes later, I finished my first draft. It seems I spend too much time on the drawing, so need to improve my drawing skill.
3:00pm I start to add color on paper. I add yellow first because I have yellow and the color is actually looks like lemon’s color. I use yellow and litter bit red to mix orange to put on the pumpkin meat. I just put the orange on the outside because inside has darker color tone and the pumpkin seeds ard difficult to draw, so I leave it to last. I need to mix darker green to match pumpkin and cucumber’s skin color. I use more blue and less yellow to mix darker green. I add darker green on pumpkin and cucumber, leave some blank spot as highlight area. Pumpkin’s color is more darker, so I put more blue in it to make darker tone, and then I use lifting-off technique to create pumpkin and cucumber’s surface pattern.
4:30pm The color job almost finish, and then need to add shadow to create the 3D view. This time I use photo reference to observe shadow. I found out the shadow is more clear in the picture, so use photo reference help me catch the best shadow. When I add shadow on my paper, the whole painting is come up. It looks better than before. As my professor mention, shadow is very important.
5:30pm Finally, my painting is almost done. I only said almost because I still need to correct it. I know professor will have something to say, and then request me to work on it.
I like water color more than before and I really enjoy it.
