Out on hikes of late, I haven't had time to paint on the spot. Instead, I take photos and create when I get back to my studio.
This little mushroom caught my eye as I hiked by its rotting stump high up on a wooded hilltop. I used gouache paint to make a nature journal entry from the reference photo.
Gouache paint is opaque when thick, and will cover right over your initial pencil drawing as mine did here.
Gouache's opacity allows you to paint light colors over darker backgrounds. I find this ability lets me create lots of exciting details. So much so, that I get carried away as I did in the version above, and the background distracts the eye from the focal point.
Too many details!
It's easy to fix this problem. I painted a thin wash over the background to tone down the highlights, and pop the mushroom forward.
If you try out gouache, you'll find the trickiest bit is getting the paint thickness just right for your application -- thin washes apply like watercolor, and will cover a larger area, but will be more transparent. You'll need a thicker consistency of paint to cover dark tones with lighter spots.
With gouache, you start with the background, laying in general shapes, colors and tones, and then you add the foreground parts and more detailed areas.
Start with a limited palette of colors -- here, I used ultramarine blue, burnt umber, burnt sienna, yellow ochre, lemon yellow and zinc white. Put a small blob of each color of paint on your palette, and make sure to keep the paint moist by spritzing it with a small spray bottle of water.
You can experiment freely, knowing that you can paint over any mistake.
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