Clear and cloudy skies. A distinction is made between the 'light of the sky', filtered and diffused through atmosphere and 'whiteness' reflected from objects in a landscape. Only in the medium of watercolour is the sky phenomena of shimmer and dancing light most nearly and freely interpreted, acting as a natural aid to sky portrayal.

Watercolour is the ideal medium to represent overcast skies and vaporous cloud formations for each in common contain moisture. Constantly drifting and reforming cloud not requiring exact interpretation allows for good technical control in brush handling. The 'wet into wet' technique is best suited as a means to express the insubstantial form of clear skies, a few clouds and generally misty effects by pre-wetting the surface of the paper all over or most of it by either sponging or clean water brushing.

Control the upper edges of clouds, rounding them off with a damp brush where they appear on dry paper to prevent a cutout look. Soft-edged clouds can also be achieved by carefully blotting them out with kitchen paper towel rather than tissue.

Notice that clouds appear to grow smaller as they recede into the distance, obeying the laws of perspective. Note also the direction of light where shadows are cast. A slightly darker colour or tone on the underside of a cloud will immediately form a soft-edged shadow on damp paper. If you feel the need to pencil cloud guidelines, do so very lightly otherwise let them form where they will without retouching on suitably chosen areas. Generally skies should be loosely painted. Mis-shapen ugly pieces on the edges of clouds should be omitted. Unwelcome cast shadows may spoil the ethereal overall quality of the painting.

SKY REPRESENTATION

Cloudy sky formations are perfect subjects for learning how to control complicated washes where the brush is required to be used in vertical and/or diagonal directions. Ideally the brush strokes should be laid along side each other in whatever direction, just touching rather than indiscriminately overpainting previously painted wet areas.

Become accustomed to drying times of different consistancy paint mixtures on damp or dry papers.

Watercolouring generally can only be learned by trial and error. Herein rests the truth. It is not a secret.

HEAVY CLOUD STUDY

Try something similar for yourself with a land or sea foreground as background. Clouds are continually drifting. Determine well beforehand where the cloud formations are to be shown. Accuracy is neither required nor is it possible.

A WORKABLE PROCEDURE FOLLOWS

1. Pre mix your colours first
2. Define lightly where the horizon meets the cloudy sky and apply a narrow strip of rubber masking fluid below this line.
3. Allow to dry
4. On a slightly sloping board, apply a very weak flat wash of Raw Sienna all over the sky area. If or when the brush skips the white paper, leave it to dry untouched. You are advised not to go back in to a wet wash at any time.
5. Apply a very pale wash of ultramarine blue all over the sky except in the central light area. Work quickly. No need for exactness and create chattered edges. Before this wash is dry, with a clean damp brush create lost and found edges.
6. Use a deeper toned ultramarine blue with a little burnt Sienna (which granulates), for the heavier clouds. Add more Sienna for the heaviest cloud formations. Maintain lost and found edges. Use your own judgement and imagination. The colours nominated are different from the ones shown.
7. When bone dry, peel off the masking fluid with a fingertip. Take care not to tear the paper surface. Practice sky studies on a regular basis.

Rain clouds with broken feathery edges are easy to portray. Tilt the board steeply and on wet paper add a suitable mixture of light or dark greyish paint high up on the paper allowing it to run down to give vaporous effects resembling rain. Then lay the board flat to dry out undisturbed and a delight to witness. Only observation and experience teaches the length of time needed on the steeply sloping board to prevent the running paint from going completely out of control. Always have a paper tissue at hand and if and when the mix does overrun, gently mop up the excess paint. Do not re-touch blemishes or in anyway rework a colour wash. Any unevenness will be seen to disperse on the textured paper surface as the paint dries. Falling rain may well veil or obliterate unessential or difficult parts of the picture to great advantage. Amateurs are inclined to paint skies as a deep blue impenetrable backdrop on which are suspended the appearance of cotton wool buds or stony grey balls. Rather aim to portray the scintillation and dazzle of a clear sky seen when looking into the insubstantial depths of space, at once indeterminate yet vibrant, leaving the white paper soft-edged against the surrounding area.

Ideal for a rainy sky effect

Lay on a wash of a strong colour at the top on very damp paper and steeply

tilt the board to control the direction and flow

Begin by practising non-complex skies, using graduated washes of Blue and Grey and adding a touch of red in each. Brighten the mood with Raw Sienna or a Yellow in pale tones. Pre-wet the surface of the paper and loosely lay on these colours and space them out over the sky area, in some cases all over the sheet. Make no attempt to form clouds. Allow the edges to mingle freely. The flow and merging of pale tonal colours captures an impression of fleeting light in fast changing weather.

Alternatively leave small gaps or channels between colours. All such applications will dry soft-edged. Wisp-like clouds may form as spontaneous 'accidental effects' on dry paper should they meet. Fade out the already weak toned colours to a little below the skyline (horizon) or continue to the bottom of the sheet for a warm or cool underglaze. Mop and damp dry the lower painted edge to prevent a breakline occurring.

A dark winter sky against a white snowline is easily interpreted by reversing the sheet of paper, top to bottom, painting the sky area from the horizon downwards to the top edge, then turn the board the right way up. There are no definite methods or rules to interpret skies.

Examine as many original watercolours and prints as possible. In the early stages of learning they can be helpful but do not attempt to make impossible exact copies. Use imagination. Take time and think out procedure carefully, then act decisively and fairly quickly. Provided weak intensity colours are used and a large brush loaded with runny paint, skies can be easily and readily portrayed. This may be said without fear of contradiction. From here on it rests with the individual to practice and make progress creating sky impressions.

They are a special subject requiring some understanding of the function and powers of 'pencil marks' that go to make a drawing. In this, time will be saved in the long run. With practice, the means of achieving reasonable representation of trees will become clear and sorted out. However, within the scope of this guide they will be dealt with superficially. Trees are interesting in all seasons whether in woodland mass or singly. The skeletal shapes are best seen silhouetted against a clear winter sky. Landscape painters must make themselves acquainted with tree structures, recognising one species from another, initially drawing rather than painting because by drawing, one arrives at clearer branch structures, clearly seen during the winter months. When a tree is drawn it must symbolise it to a certain extent, rather than drawing every leaf that appears in nature. Take special notice to observe tree trunks, boughs and twigs, they do not taper through their length but only where they divide in outward growth. Trees are recognised by their distinctive shapes and by the way they root into the ground. Much will depend on whether the subject is to be a tree study, the main item or a secondary factor in the painting. In the latter case, well-chosen bold strokes are sufficient. See them in broad aspect. Consider them in the context of linear and aerial perspective. Paint an impression of trees in distance, not what you think and know of trees. Estimate the relative tones of distant fields and background hills behind woodland. Paint the lightest tones and work towards the foreground. Broad shapes in tonal colour in tree portrayal are enough to give a convincing impression. Leave out a mass of detail. Draw and paint individual foreground trees from the ground upwards and through their distinctive shaped branches. Employ a rigger or a semi-dry brush for the outer edges of branches to represent twigs. A feathery effect rather than painting twigs individually.

Consider trees in light and shade. Compare the tones (or degrees of light and dark) with the ground rather than the sky, especially in sunlight. When they are painted use only 3 tones. Wash in the general masses of leaves. Simplify. Less detail.

Do not draw what you are unable to count, for example. individual leaves and grasses.

Greens range from yellow green to blue green. Use a fair amount of water in the mix for the first pale washes and less water as they near the foreground. Look for large clusters of foliage which comprise the whole, deepening the tones of the undersides. Capture their roundness. Each cluster has it own light and shade and each has the ability to cast its own shadows that may affect neighbouring foliage. Vary the tonal colours of the foliage in neighbouring trees and hedgerows, one beside another to act as a foil, enlivening a scene. Use different colours and different greens.

Bright or sour greens are as monotonous as a green wooden fence. In the summer, a rich foliage green can be produced by mixing Yellow or Gamboge and a little black. Leave gaps in the tree foliage, noting the anatomy of the branches as they follow through these gaps and the direction of light and shaded areas it produces. Generally trees do not have smooth outlines which give a cut-out appearance. 'Chatter' the edges of tree foliage

by breaking up their extreme outside edges to suggest leafiness. Clothed in masses of summer foliage, each tree specie has a characteristic form. The edges must be sought after and expressed, saw-like edges of the oak and the more lobate (round and flat, hanging or divided) edges of the horse chestnut and the walnut. Tree foliage that appears to be solid from the outside is in fact hollow in the interior. A subtle suggestion of foliage is made in distant trees, not crisp for that would appear to bring them nearer the foreground.

Trees need not be a difficult subject. Practice either by copying or drawing and painting them direct from nature. For simplicity, foliage can be shown directly, painting with the side of a round brush, the trunk and any bare branches with the point. Competence can only be gained by continuing to experiment and practice.

Still smooth waters reflect a glass mirror image exactly in line vertically but reversed below the objects appearing above and beyond the waterline. The sides of the subject will foreshorten in mirror image as the view above the water level is increased. There are complicated laws to establish reflected images but it is simpler to paint the viewed reflection as seen. Open water will take a slightly darker version of the sky colour. The apparent surface colour of the water to be represented will be further influenced by sand or mud in shallow water. A slight water disturbance will cause broken reflections that are best rendered by a semi-dry brush or sometimes scratched out with a sharp knife.

Streaks of light appearing on the water are mostly horizontal, occasionally vertical and these can be lifted out with a just damp brush or removed by dragging the reversed tip of a finger nail to form a streak reflection whilst the paint remains wet. Timing is important.

BOATS AND SHIPS.

The horizon line of a seascape is always the eye level of the observer. On a calm sea, if the ship is at a right angle (broadside) to the viewer, the vanishing points v.p.'s will be well beyond the picture limits. In the case of a ship at an angle to the viewer the v.p's will be well within the borders of the picture area. From whatever angle a boat is drawn, on shore or afloat, it is nearly always symmetrical about its centreline, from bow to stern. Balance about the centreline to give rightness to the drawing. A vessel rides in the sea, it does not sit upon it. The extreme top of the hull may be represented by a flattened figure 8 on its side. Visualise these bulky objects in skeletal wire form and build upon these skeletal forms. Boats and ships have anatomy and proportion. The keel of a boat is always straight when it is seen beached. (out of the water) and a mast is at right angles to it, unless damaged. Boats and ships are really beyond the scope of this guide.

Rough water, although not taking reflections, will generally reflect the colour of a sky expanse. The rules of colour harmony unify. Observe nature especially in regard to reflections for which particular rules need not apply. Make notes for future reference.

TREE REPRESENTATION: Use the side of a round brush low on the paper to indicate foliage. Dry brush, sparse mixture for winter bare branches. Full rich to portray summer leafage. Once again, study and practise for these effects.

Moving objects in water such as boats will cause particularly complex patterns of reflections. The easiest method is to select a suitable simplified pattern at the time inventing their reflections provided they appear convincing. Over-working will result in muddy colours..

Subjects composed predominantly of buildings require precisely stated outlines to enable colour washes to be laid on with ease and without involved guesswork. The first line should be the eye level, indicated lightly. Show just sufficient detail to give buildings a greater semblance of reality, achieved near the completion of the painting by the inclusion of extra shadows under the eaves and dark rectangles to suggest doors and windows. Weathered walls and roofs, suggesting a few bricks and tiles, not counting them is more important than an exact rendering of detail. Although it is possible to draw faint outlines with a little colour on the tip of a brush, it only works for simple subjects.

Generally, buildings and some manufactured goods such as boats and all regular-shaped inanimate objects on examination are seen to be built up on large structured block shapes. Cubes, spheres, cylinders and cones embrace them all. If, at a later date, you are able to draw these solid geometric shapes to include their shadow sides, then you will be capable of dealing with any architectural structures arising in landscape no matter what awkward shapes are involved. A building does not change its shape when the viewpoint is altered in relation to that building but it appears to change due to perspective foreshortening. It is the process whereby the artist expresses form or shape (there is a distinction) in such a manner as to convey a forward or backward direction of building structures upon a flat sheet of paper.

You cannot go wrong if you draw and paint what you see from observation and at your own discretion. Early morning and evening sun casts long unifying shadows. There are limits to the combinations of solid structural shapes in buildings and in drawing them will be found all the major difficulties encountered relevant to watercolour painting. Farm buildings in distance are a favourite subject and not too difficult to portray. If unsure leave them out of the picture.

Although geometric laws should be obeyed, make loose freehand drawings as soon as you are able so that they do not give an engineering or architectural impression of exactness. Aim for an easy, careful freedom of working. If you feel the need, it would be helpful to judge and approximate distances by using a grid viewfinder and matching the observed building to a grid-lined paper of the same proportions. For the time being, shelve and pass over this general information. Simplify and actually draw less than you see. Leave out as much as possible, not what you can squeeze in. Think about it. Nature's landscapes are not framed but it has to be shown on a limited two-dimensional sheet of paper, best seen as tones and planes. Minimal lines only that count.