What colour is YOUR rainbow? LB 25

09/08/2021 by UKMA 3 Comments

I am determined to get better at watercolours. I still struggle but at least the struggle feels like it is helping me get someplace. I decided to tackle one of the LB classes called What colour is your rainbow? and it is really all about playing with colours. One of the first things the teacher shows is a swatch thing she did with her watercolours. I had a goo but crikey – with 42 colours (leaving off the metallics) that would be over 800 combinations. I did make a start, with just one line along the left edge and every colour not from that line in the grid. It is no way all the combos, and I focused on the combos I thought would be worth doing – so four shades of yellow is a lot to swatch if two are very similar and the other two are at least close IYKWIM. And I didn’t bother with white or the colour + the colour. Duh.

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I did not have a compass to draw he rainbows so I had to wing it, after the first couple of arcs.

I have tried so many pencils, drawing as light a line as I can, but I still have no luck rubbing out the lines with any of the erasers, even ones suggested, or recommended by watercolour artists. I just must have too heavy a hand. While I liked the final rainbow

those pencil lines bugged me. I had recently gotten some manuscript ink (gold) so I added fine lined of that over the pencil marks. Liked it a lot!

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Slightly shaky but organic, so OK by me. I never aim for precise cause I could not achieve it. All it needed was the perfect quote:

and the shot to show the glistening gold:

I have done four classes now, and while most of them have been a bit of a challenge, I guess I am learning. So that has to be a good thing, right? My only complaint is that I am not focusing on the art than comes entirely from me. My idea. My execution. Because I own the classes I don’t HAVE to race thru them. I can take my time and dip in when I need inspiration. That sounds like a plan….