Watercolor Tutorial from Tiffanny Varga

watercolor demo

This watercolor tutorial is a 2-part video demo from Tiffanny Varga, who has a whimsical, illustrative style.  Tiffanny shares a lot of great tips for shading, color perspective and correcting errors.

Time Lapse Watercolor Painting by Tiffanny Varga

"Heidi" ~ Watercolor speed-painting by Tiffanny Varga

This video may not a step-by-step tutorial like many others in my blog, but it is a pleasure to watch this wonderful, whimsical art come to life!

Watercolor artist Tiffanny Varga writes: "I did this painting to try to win the Tomie

Bill Alexander Demonstrates Painting a Seascape

Oil Painting Demonstration

Bill Alexander is the original "happy painter" and television celebrity.  In the following 3-part  video from his Magic of Oil Painting television show, Bill demonstrates the painting of a seascape using his wet-on-wet technique.

How to Paint a White Barn

Watercolor demo

Follow along with artist Chuck McLachlan as he demonstrates how to paint a white barn on a spring day using watercolors in this informative free art lesson! Using Lukas 1862 Watercolors, Chuck will build layers of color to create the scene right in front of your eyes, and tell you a story along the way!  This video is a great learning experience for artists of all ages!

Watercolor for Beginners | Rosebud Demo

Watercolor Demo

In the following series of 5 videos, Nancy Couick demonstrates painting a rosebud with detailed instructions for the beginning watercolorist!  Couick says:  "The beauty of watercolors is that it's transparent. The light goes through your paint, reflects off the surface of the paper and gives this gorgeous translucent glow unlike any other medium.... there are a lot of techniques to learn and you need to learn the rules before you know how to break them..... it is difficult to paint loosely in watercolors when you first start."  but she goes through all the steps to help you get started with this simple rosebud.

How to Paint Apples in a Basket

Watercolor demo

This watercolor demonstration by Henry W. Dixon includes instructions for using computer to scan a photo and enlarge it to transfer a drawing.   Dixon explains how to section an image into separate files for printing on standard paper sizes.  A useful tip for printing out any large drawing or photo.

Part 2 of this article is step-by-step instructions for painting the above watercolor "Apples in a Barrel".  This demonstrations is an excerpt from the book Paint Amazing Watercolors from Photographs by Henry Dixon.

Hints and Tips for Painting Skies

Painting clouds with acrylics

In this article by artist Rosemary Hale, she offers many tips and hints for painting skies and realistic clouds using acrylic paints.   Hale writes:  "... a sky’s mood and atmosphere will influence the colours and tones of the landscape below, and this should be taken into account when planning a picture......It is important to give a sky the vaporous, atmospheric character that clouds possess and it is the edge of a cloud that most puts this across. An unbroken hard edge against the sky colour will look like a cartoon, whereas a soft edged cloud immediately becomes more vaporous and believable."

How to Stretch Watercolor Paper

Unless you're using heavy weight paper, most watercolor paper tends to buckle as you add watercolor washes to it.   To prevent this, many people prefer to stretch the paper in advance.   Properly stretched paper will lie flat as you paint on it.

In this video demo from Bob Davies, he shows us how to use traditional materials to stretch watercolor paper (backing board, brown tape & pins) plus a brief explanation of commercial paper stretchers.