Poppy

 The weather has been glorious here in Devon, for a few weeks now. We have made the most of it, walking our local lanes and marvelling at the garden.

The roses seem especially glorious this year, and I heard on the radio this morning, that it has nothing to do with my gardening skills but it's to do with the cold winter we had.

We have also enjoyed a Saturday evening walk to our local pub, by a lovely stream

 

 

 

a lovely flat meander to Yeoford.

 

I am not painting roses this week though, it is the vibrant poppies that have caught my artistic attention

So what better way to unwind, than to paint a poppy, especially one that is blooming just outside the studio ( or was) 

Keep those photos you take as reference, they do help

Next I sketch it out

and spray the paper with my spray bottle.

Then I drop reds and yellows around the poppy. This is fun, remember they dry much lighter than they look at first.

Leave that to dry completely.

Now you can start on the flower, I paint the first 'layer' if you like in the palest yellow

Leave some of the paper untouched so the white of the paper can be your lightest light.

I mix some red into the yellow to create the next tone. 

and begin to create the veins on the petals very subtlety, this is all wet in wet.

Now I add a stronger yellow, I am layering the colour and judging how much to use. It all takes practice and some days it works better than others .

You see now I am working with delicious colours, look how that red ( scarlet) blends into that yellow. Oh I do love watercolour.....

Keep going, preserving your whites and letting the yellow shine through.

And don't be afraid to go very dark. Look at a poppy the bottom is dark, almost black. Now I never use black , so this is a very dark purple made up of cadmium red and cobalt blue.

Leave that to dry

and paint the other petals in a similar way.

I also like to add dome indigo to the background as this highlights the lights of the poppy .

Move your paper around so the paint flows in the direction you want it to.

Finally I painted the stem and this tricky , painting juggling tones and colour is done. Happy days, have a go you never know what will happen with watercolour .

Have a go I love to have such bright colours dripping off my brush x