Watercolor Paper Doll: Painting a Wardrobe

In my part of the world, we are getting a taste of spring and I love it! It's a little dark in the mornings, but warm, and the kids are back into their routine of walking to school instead of me dropping them off in the cold and snow and general winter misery. We had a proper New England winter this year! 

I'm continuing to paint my little paper doll. I drew out a mod-ish wardrobe and traced it onto the same paper as the doll using a slim light table (that I may have permanently borrowed from my youngest son...)!

 

Trace lightly! I'm heavy handed and press way too hard on my pencils, brushes, etc. I used a bit of low tack washi tape just to hold the pages in place. 

Once the images are traced onto the paper, I start painting. Because color matching can be tricky, I paint all of one color at a time. I paint all of the blue or all of the skin tone or whatever. It takes a little bit of planning but it makes for more consistent colors throughout. 

 

My messy desktop! Here's the base colors for everything. At this point, I could leave the white of the paper for the white of the design. I didn't. And I should have....

 I decided to paint all of the white parts with gouache. I don't have a lot of experience with gouache. I know it's water-based and compatible with watercolors but that's about it. What I discovered is that it had an almost tacky texture which made layering watercolor for shading a bit tough. It could be the set I used or it could be a property of gouache paints that I just don't understand. 

 And this is all of the outfits with gouache white, watercolor base, and watercolor shadows. To create the shadows, I just let the watercolor paint on my palette dry a bit so it was thicker and darker, then I painted in where the shadows fall. The lights and darks in this set aren't really strong. I've been a bit timid with this set because it's been SO LONG since I painted on paper.

The final step is to outline everything in colored pencil. I like a strong line in my work. Initially I wanted to draw all of this in black ink but that didn't work out the way I wanted. Lining in colored pencil has been a bit of a compromise.

 On the left, an unlined outfit. On the right, the lines. It just makes for a more finished and polished image. And easier to cut out! 

I learned a few things while painting this page. First, DRAW LARGER. That cute tiny drawing is impossible to see. Draw or paint large and then reduce digitally. Second, I have a bad setup for traditional art, even though it's great for digital art! My huge monitor gets in the way, my light is in a bad spot, and it was just tricky. Third, I have a fluorescent light - I need to rethink that. Either a new light or a new bulb because it's harsh to work under. Fourth, better materials! My paper is great, most of my paints are pretty good, but my brushes are kind of terrible. I really only use two or three sizes of brush and it would be better to have three higher quality brushes rather than 6 terrible ones. And finally, practice with the materials. I used several different paints and pencils that weren't always totally compatible.

Next week, I'll edit all of this in Photoshop!