Woodlands Watercolor
“Woodlands” is my experimental watercolor forest.
Soft and cool, the blue greens harmonise with prussian blue in the shadow depths. Hints of lilac, lime and mint filter through the canopy. Creating a lovely Woodland retreat.
Woodlands watercolor, debiriley.art
The original image was done plein air while hiking, in a small notepad.
I felt that the watercolor foundation was just a little too flat.
‘snippet detail of the original’
The “snippet” shown, I’ve cropped to highlight its assets. It doesn’t look too awful here, but the background was pretty bad. Very very dull and flat. I do like the tree here.
It lacked sufficient depth.
It needed life and a lot more Texture.
watercolor and oil pastel
I chose to use oil pastels to create some rough textures over the watercolor foundation.
I was trying to be careful not to overwhelm and cover up my beautiful whispers of lilac, mint, dove greys in the forest woodland.
I liked those!
Woodland foliage, watercolor
I really do love the textural effects the oil pastels gave.
These pastels may not have been the perfect choice for this. I’d like to have softened and blended them a lot more.
I could have chose soft pastels which are so easy to blend and soften; but, no. I went for the Challenge.
- I enjoyed the physical act of painting and creating.
- I always paint…. because I like to see what the colors will do.
- And I always learn something new. Every time I create. Whether the painting is a flat out dud, or a super star.
Thats my real goal: learn something new today!
For More Trees and great Tree Techniques –
Watercolours: Red Dragon Maple Trees