in-studio

Watercolors: A Friend for Life (It’s Calling You)

instructor: rex beanland

  • Paint

    • In general, the colours you will already have on your palette will be fine as long as you have a selection of various blues, reds and yellows.  You are strongly encouraged to have tube colours. Pans or cakes will work but it is much more difficult to get rich darks with these. 

      • Just for your information my palette consists of: Cadmium Yellow, Gamboge, Azo Orange, Scarlet Lake, Alizarin Crimson, Cerulean Blue,Cobalt Blue, Ultramarine Blue, Burnt Sienna, Sap Green, Mineral Violet by Holbein, Chinese White, Neutral Tint

  • Brushes

    • A large round brush #12

    • A smaller round such as #6 or #8

    • A large Squirrel Mop brush or Hake Brush 1” flat

    • A Squirrel Mop brush or Hake Brush ½” flat

  • Palette

  • Paper 

    • (* Please Note:  People who want to learn watercolour are always encouraged to have good quality (ie professional) paper, paint and brushes.  In my experience the most important of these is paper so I encourage you to buy single sheets of a professional quality paper. This can be cut to whatever size is appropriate.  Blocks of watercolour paper are also great.  Personally, I use Arches but there are many professional quality papers (Winsor & Newton, Fabriano, Saunders Waterford). The important thing is to avoid student quality paper because you will end up very frustrated.)

  • Board

    • A board or hard surface to tape the paper to (such as a piece of plywood, paneling or Masonite) Also please note that almost always you will want the board to be tilted. So having something to put under the board is very useful.

  • Water container 

  • Paper towels 

  • Masking Tape

  • Spray bottle

  • Toothbrush or a scrubber brush (for removing paint) 

  • Xacto knife

  • Also pencil, eraser, ruler

If you are trying watercolour for the first time, I would still stress the benefits of using professional watercolour paper.  For the brushes the best are the real animal hair varieties but they are incredibly expensive.  There are a number of economical synthetic brushes that mimic the characteristics of real hair brushes.  If you would like any suggestions let me know. But the staff at any good art store will be able to guide you.

For the paints you can buy the small (5ml) tubes of professional paint which are much cheaper or there is a brand of student quality paints that are OK. That brand is Cotman.

These colours are what I would consider to be a good basic palette: Burnt Sienna, Cerulean Blue, Azo Orange, Pyrrol Red or Scarlet Lake, Alizarin Crimson, Ultramarine Blue, Mineral Violet by Holbein, Sap Green, Chinese White

For your yellow any of: Cadmium Yellow, Quinacridone Gold, Winsor Yellow are good.

Just for your interest, I use mostly M. Graham watercolours because they are professional quality and they are quite a bit cheaper than most other brands.  They also stay moist longer.  The one exception is Mineral Violet - Graham’s version is pretty weak.  The Holbein version is a lovely dramatic purple.