Sunday, October 5, 2014

The unforgiving medium: My first watercolour


I finally tried the Derwent Inktense watercolor pencils  on this painting of an Italian cafe. Not too bad for a first attempt, right? I loved the cafe, and the interiors, and the flowers, and the orange bike (I got restless to finish the painting towards the end, and you can see the impact on the background wall. Oh well, that will teach me to be more patient in the future.)


The cafe (Watercolour)

Watercolor can be a difficult medium. It doesn't forgive mistakes very easily, unlike graphite/charcoal where you can erase or like acrylics where you can paint over. These pencils were easier than the watercolour tubes I tried before, since they give a better control over the painting. On the negative side, Inktense pencils are permanent. Once you mix them with water and let it dry, it is permanent and can't be undone with water. Another thing about the Inktense pencils is that they are really intense and brighten up any painting. Might not have been the best choice of medium for this particular painting given the light shades it required. I am sure it is possible to use the Inktense pencils for a more subtle color palette too, but I will need to work on that. 

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