[Lesson 2] Getting Prepared to Use Watercolors

You are ready and eager to get started with watercolors, but are you prepared?

Well, now I know you’re ready and keen to get started with watercolors, and today I want to you to become prepared. For that, I’ll talk about two kinds of preparation: the first is your mindset, and the second is prepping your materials. And on the next lesson you’ll see a third way, which is the first steps using watercolors (getting familiar with your tools and materials).

Today, I have for you a tool-kit (in case you haven’t downloaded it yet), several videos, and some printables!

I’m so excited for this lesson, so let’s jump in!

GET PREPARED, BY PREPPING YOUR MINDSET

Prepping your mindset before learning watercolors is as important as gathering your materials and doing some preliminary exercises. It allows you to approach learning in a way in which you’re actually learning and improving instead of pushing, demanding, and getting frustrated.

In the last lesson I mentioned:

Watercolors have a free spirit within, and they are for you if you want to explore and find your own free spirit through your work.

And during this weekend, while I was playing with my 2-year-old nephew Matias with paintings of different colors, and showing him how to mix them to create new colors, I realized that:

You should approach learning watercolors like a little toddler.

Actually, you should approach learning any skill this way, and also working with your new skill once you learn it like a little toddler.

1 | With FLOW

Matias was absorbed with this new activity, he was amazed at what he could do, and he was flowing creating shapes while asking me do you like to paint? – I loved watching him and playing with him – and I LOOOOOVE him so MUCH! 😛

The same way, learn and create with watercolors flowing with them and flowing with the process.

2 | With EXPLORATION

Toddlers want to explore with E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G, they don’t consider if they’ll create a mess, or if things won’t turn out well.

They explore and take risks.

Matias was exploring with new shapes, different moves, and new color combinations alike. And he was smiling ALL the time!

Explore, take risks, and leave worry for another moment 😉

3 | With WILLINGNESS

A toddler’s willingness to learn is REAL. They want to learn, and they are immersed in doing exactly that. They don’t stop to judge their work, they don’t care if it’s good enough or perfect enough. They’re willing to learn, and they enjoy every single second!

When you’re learning something, you’re learning, you can’t demand yourself to be perfect.

So, be willing to learn and stop being worrying and judging 🙂

4 | With LOVE

I was planning to stop on point three, but something that stuck to me was how proud Matias was about his work, and how much he loved his little paintings.

He was so super proud and happy showing his work to everyone coming. Smiling, laughing, and loving what he created – it was so delightful to see because sometimes we creatives become so heavy (and sometimes disrespectful) with our own work.

You must learn to LOVE your work no matter how it looks, no matter how unperfect it seems, and no matter how many more experienced artists there are in the world. Your work is precious and valid because it’s part of you, and it’s a reflection of your own growth.

So, will you get the toddler’s mindset while you learn and create with watercolors?

GET PREPARED, BY PREPPING YOUR MATERIALS

1 | Gathering your materials

Now let’s talk about gathering your materials! Remember when you enrolled in a new course, and the teacher gave you a huge list of the things you had to buy? Well, for that, I have a video for you!

1. Basic Tools
2. Coloring Tools
3. Optional Tools

I have a tool-kit for you to make it easy to gather your materials. I explain all the tools and materials I use to create my fashion illustrations (not only with watercolors), and there’s a checklist that you can use to purchase what you need 🙂

You can download it in the button below, on in the index with the rest of printables.

DOWNLOAD THE TOOL-KIT HERE!

2 | Prepping your materials

Once you gather all your tools and materials, you need to make it easy for you to work with watercolors. So, make sure you pick a place you love where you can work and leave your tools when you’re not working.

Before starting to work with watercolors I have a workflow kind of thing, a set of steps that HAVE to happen or I won’t be able to do anything:

1. Clear and clean my desk. This is super important for me because I tend to be messy, so if I leave the materials and things I used in a previous project I could spill out something unintentionally.
2. Gather my materials, and put them on my clean desk. Might be a freak, but I like to arrange them by type – brushes with brushes, watercolors with watercolors, pencils with pencils…
3. Stretch my paper. I like to use loose sheets, so I have to stretch my paper before putting watercolors on it. I rather stretching several sheets at once than one by one as I complete the illustrations because when it’s time to work I can focus solely on creating. So, if I feel in the zone I can continue with the next illustration, and so on.

And to help you to stretch your paper, I also have a video! There’re different ways to stretch the paper, and if you’re using blocks you may not need to stretch anything (with Arches blocks you don’t have to), but I wanted to show you an easy and not-that-messy way to stretch your paper with masking tape.

For a long time, I used craft tape to stretch the paper, but is quite messy and sometimes damaged my final illustration, so I gave the technique I’ll show you a try, and I loved it 🙂

Alright, that’s it for today! Long lesson, right?!

Check out the box below, and do today’s assignment 🙂

LOTS of LOVE!

LESSON 3