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This Is How I Fell in Love with Watercolor · The Wandering Wolf Podcast

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  SPEAKER_00: This is the audio version of this week's written post.
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  SPEAKER_00: Enjoy!
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  SPEAKER_00: Hello everyone!
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  SPEAKER_00: I have always wanted to learn watercolor painting.
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  SPEAKER_00: When I watched other people do it,
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  SPEAKER_00: it always looked so calm and relaxing and honestly so beautiful.
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  SPEAKER_00: But when I actually tried it myself,
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  SPEAKER_00: I realized pretty fast that it wasn't as easy as it looked.
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  SPEAKER_00: I started out with watercolor paints in tubes.
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  SPEAKER_00: That felt like the right way to begin.
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  SPEAKER_00: But I quickly noticed that it wasn't really my thing.
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  SPEAKER_00: Mixing colors was hard for me.
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  SPEAKER_00: Getting the right tones, the right feeling, it just stressed me out.
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  SPEAKER_00: I'm very much the kind of girl who wants every color already there,
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  SPEAKER_00: ready to use,
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  SPEAKER_00: so I don't have to mix at all.
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  SPEAKER_00: So instead I bought watercolor pencils, especially from Faber Castell.
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  I started small with a set of 24,
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  just to play around and see how it felt.
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  SPEAKER_00: Then I found another brand, Mosh Shaper with a huge set of 120 pencils.
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  SPEAKER_00: Same numbers as Faber-Castell big set, but way cheaper.
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  SPEAKER_00: I think the brand was Castle Arts or something like that.
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  SPEAKER_00: But it didn't take long before I noticed the difference.
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  SPEAKER_00: The pigment just wasn't as good compared to Faber-Castell.
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  SPEAKER_00: It felt weaker, flatter somehow.
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  SPEAKER_00: It did not always activate.
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  SPEAKER_00: In the end, I bought the full Faber-Costell set anyway.
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  SPEAKER_00: And honestly, I'm glad I did.
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  I have been using them a lot more now and I learn new little
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  tricks almost every day.
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  SPEAKER_00: Early on I also bought Aaron Blais watercolour course.
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  SPEAKER_00: I really wanted to learn properly and I love his teaching.
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  I have all his animal courses now,
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  big cats,
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  wolves,
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  birds of prey,
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  all of them.
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  SPEAKER_00: He's such a great teacher.
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  I watched most of the watercolor course and in the beginning I
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  did try to copy what
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  SPEAKER_00: he was doing.
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  SPEAKER_00: But it didn't really work back then.
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  SPEAKER_00: I just didn't know enough yet.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe I should try it again now.
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  SPEAKER_00: I also had this really bad habit.
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  SPEAKER_00: If something didn't look perfect, exactly like I mentioned earlier,
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  SPEAKER_00: imagined it in my head, I hated it.
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  SPEAKER_00: I hated the drawing, hated the painting, but I have worked on that a lot.
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  SPEAKER_00: I have slowly learned to let it go.
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  My paintings don't have to be perfect,
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  I actually want them to be imperfect.
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  SPEAKER_00: I want the watercolor to behave like watercolor to do its own thing.
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  SPEAKER_00: There's another reason why I like watercolor pencils so much.
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  SPEAKER_00: First I have 120 colors so I don't need to mix.
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  Second I can use them like normal colored pencils and then add
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  water to activate the pigment.
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  Or I can wet the brush and touch the pencil lead directly to
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  get the color that way.
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  SPEAKER_00: The last one mentioned,
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  it kind of turns into watercolor paint similar to what you get
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  from tubes,
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  SPEAKER_00: just in a different form.
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  SPEAKER_00: late last year after reading the art of kellogg's loops i found even more
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  inspiration to do watercolor paintings it's such a beautiful
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  book i really
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  recommend it in it he explained how he ended up doing his first
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  gallery show i
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  SPEAKER_00: never really been interested in showing my art in a gallery
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  I've been to a few,
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  watched others,
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  but I never felt the urge to do it myself.
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  SPEAKER_00: But after reading that book, something shifted.
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  SPEAKER_00: Now I kind of want to.
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  SPEAKER_00: I can imagine my watercolor painting hanging there.
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  SPEAKER_00: One day, maybe.
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  SPEAKER_00: Before the new year even started, I also began a daily sketching habit.
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  SPEAKER_00: Daily watercolor sketching.
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  SPEAKER_00: I got inspired to use this small square sketchbook I already had.
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  SPEAKER_00: I had used it before with ink, mostly for landscapes.
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  Then I saw another YouTuber using the same kind of sketchbook
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  for small watercolor sketches.
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  SPEAKER_00: This sketchbook isn't really meant for watercolor,
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  SPEAKER_00: but if you don't use too much water,
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  SPEAKER_00: it works perfectly.
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  SPEAKER_00: And watercolor pencils, you don't need much water at all.
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  SPEAKER_00: So I completely fell in love with this little sketchbook.
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  SPEAKER_00: I try to paint every day, not...
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  SPEAKER_00: Every day, but almost every day.
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  SPEAKER_00: And I'm loving it.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's small.
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  SPEAKER_00: For some reason, I really enjoy working small.
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  SPEAKER_00: When I go big, it just feels weird to me.
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  SPEAKER_00: I do have other watercolor sketchbooks too, like Henny Mule in A5 size.
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  I use those when I want to do something a bit bigger,
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  a bit more finished,
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  not just sketchy.
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  SPEAKER_00: Technically you do need good paper for watercolor.
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  Bad paper will crumble and rub when water hits it,
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  but sometimes that part of the charm.
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  I know that 100% cotton sketchbush are supposed to be the best,
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  but I don't own any yet.
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  SPEAKER_00: They are a bit expensive to my taste.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe one day.
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  SPEAKER_00: A few years ago I filled my first watercolor sketchbook completely.
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  And when I compare those early pages to what I'm doing now,
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  I can really see the improvement.
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  SPEAKER_00: That makes me genuinely happy.
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  SPEAKER_00: I do a lot of animals and landscapes more than anything else.
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  SPEAKER_00: And again, I try to keep them imperfect.
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  SPEAKER_00: I don't want my art to be perfect.
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  SPEAKER_00: I want people to see the mistakes, but in a way that it still works.
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  SPEAKER_00: Lately I have been doing much more traditional work than digital.
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  I still want to find a way to have a similar style in both
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  traditional and digital,
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  SPEAKER_00: but I struggle with that.
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  SPEAKER_00: I use Rebel 7 Pro,
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  SPEAKER_00: which is supposed to be amazing for watercolor,
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  SPEAKER_00: but it behaves very different from traditional watercolor.
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  SPEAKER_00: It just feels weird sometimes.
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  SPEAKER_00: Especially the way I use watercolor.
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  I don't know if I should try to force one style across both or
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  just accept that my
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  SPEAKER_00: traditional work and my digital work can be different.
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  SPEAKER_00: Maybe that's okay.
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  SPEAKER_00: Right now I've been sketching much more with graphite,
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  SPEAKER_00: pencil and watercolors than digital this year.
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  I've done some digital work,
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  but I don't really feel that pull toward it right now.
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  And I think that's because I'm stuck trying to find that stupid
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  style in both worlds.
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  SPEAKER_00: And yeah.
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  SPEAKER_00: That's kind of stupid.
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  SPEAKER_00: But overall, I like this little journey I'm on.
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  SPEAKER_00: And I hope you enjoy following it too.
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  SPEAKER_00: Looking at my old artworks and then the new ones I share here.
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  SPEAKER_00: I will talk more about my daily watercolor sketching in the future.
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  SPEAKER_00: Until then, have a nice day.
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  SPEAKER_00: Bye.
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  SPEAKER_00: One more thing.
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  I usually share my artworks and sketches in the written version
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  of this audio podcast.