Techniques To Create Stunning Water-colour Birthday Cards

By Author: Mark Adams
Total Articles: 7
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Often we find that artists will apply their watercolour methods to birthday cards and this commentary gives all the information desired to getting started to paint in watercolour.

Getting Started:
To begin painting in watercolour, you require 3 simple objects;
· Some good beginners’ materials
· A subject to paint
· A basic method

Equipment Needed:
A beginners palette of water colours may consist of the subsequent colours:
· Lemon Yellow Hue
· Cadmium Yellow Pale Hue
· Cadmium Red Hue
· Permanent Rose
· Alizarin Crimson Hue
· Ultramarine
· Intense Blue
· Viridian Hue
· Raw Umber
· Yellow Ochre
· Burnt Sienna
· Chinese White

Additional Supplies:
· 4 main brushes
· Paper
· Pencil & Rubber
· Board or Hard Surface
· Roll of Masking tape
· Water pot or container
· Flat Plastic Palette/Tray
· Reasonable size board for your birthday cards

What to paint - Finding a subject:
...
... Many artists find it difficult to be influenced by the regular everyday things. Yet, real artists can turn the very normal object into something special by purely viewing it creatively. It may be a landscape, a structure, an inside scene such as a lounge, or still life such as vases or bottles. If you feel truly positive you may want to attempt a portrait (of the individual you’re sending the birthday card to), botanical painting or maybe even an abstract. Your painting doesn’t have to be accurate or perfect, remember art is in the sense of the artist not the critic.

Painting a Watercolour Landscape:
Landscapes are believed to be the best for novices and the subsequent fundamental technique can be applied. 4 general principles apply while colouring a landscape.
Your View - As an artist you're looking to invent a visual portrayal of your selected scene, it's not a clone but an illusion of what you're painting. Bear in mind, it is how you see it and paint it that makes it a unique piece of art for your birthday cards and even canvas.
Aerial Perspective - Take time to have a look at the landscape you want to paint and you will see 4 aspects emerge. Firstly the items in the distance will appear smaller. Second, the far items won't be as detailed. Third, colours become less vivid the further away they are. Fourthly, as objects fade their tones become paler and less contrasted.
Composition - Use your pencil to draw an outline of the landscape. Ensure you set out a horizon, middle and foreground within your landscape. Normally, this follows as the horizon being the backdrop of the painting with the horizon line being about one 3rd from the bottom of the page. Nearly all novices begin drawing the horizon half way down the page - however our eye line only sees 30-40% of the “surface matter” in any given scene and the remainder is sky.
After you have created the basic out line of your landscaping, you are now ready to apply the colour into your picture.
Selecting a paint tray of colours:
The normal practice is to sustain a broad paint tray of around twelve paints and add to it for certain necessities. For example, you may find that several birthday cards are aspired to be vivid in colour and therefore you may want to include some brighter contrasts to your painting.
After you have obtained the initial paint tray, the subsequent thing is to decide on a suitable board.

Which board?
Watercolour board is mould made board and could be acid free giving it an extensive life with no deterioration. The board is pre-sized making it possible for the artist to sponge and erase (if necessary) without causing any damage.

Basic Technique:

Squeeze a small quantity from your watercolour tubes or dab a wet brush into your watercolour pan - usually begin with 3 primary colours - a red, blue and yellow.
Use a round brush and begin placing some blue on the sky, while dabbing the colour with a damp handkerchief to generate cloud shapes by opening out the paint.
After that, work onto the distant horizon line using muted colours (i.e. thinned blue, greys and yellows mixed with water) then onto the onto the middle ground part using more blues and greens ahead of moving onto the forefront using yellowy-greens and stronger, more vibrant colours - not thinned with a lot of water. Note: For those colouring a medium sized birthday card, you may want to downgrade the range of the outline before starting to paint.
As soon as you have developed those colours you could then build up a sequence of layers to suit your style. If you are really adventurous, you might wish to try the wet-into-wet method. This is where the colours combine while they are still wet. It produces scenic, delicate tones for your birthday cards and is exceptional for moody, atmospheric paintings in order to brighten up the designs for the people having the birthday.
An extra system, is creating a water colour wash, which offers numerous special effects like, graduation, granulation and flecked. Avoiding being overly technical, a wash is in reality where one colour varies as a result of the water content mixed with the pure colour. Such effect is created by beginning at the top of a dry piece of board. Paint a band of darkened colour (ultramarine blue), before adding more water to the brushes and create a second band underneath the first. Continue doing this until you have a graded wash i.e. the colour goes from darkened to light and in some cases transparent. Whilst painting birthday cards, you don’t need to be concerned over adding the words 'happy birthday', as the message can be positioned on the inner side the greeting card with the front showing your creative abilities.

Some Finishing Suggestions

DON’T - fiddle around with the painting; once the birthday card is complete, do not add extra touches thinking you will improve it.
DON’T - Let your palette become overly wet.
The colour should be allowed to dry in between stages of application except for when you are using the wet-into-wet method. Maybe use a hairdryer to improve the drying time.
Regularly refer to the subject you are painting and to your work of art.
Begin painting from the top of the card.
Always cleanse your materials with cleaning soap and water.
Paint loose; do not get hung up on exactness. Remember that it’s a painting and not a photocopy.