Stunning illustrations make The Urban Sketching Handbook Working with Color a MUST HAVE!


Expert watercolourist, illustrator, and instructor shows us her color tips about color-water ratio, achieving bold color, avoiding muddy washes, painting in layers, and using wet-in-wet techniques. She also shares supplies you will need to achieve beautiful illustrations.

A detailed analysis on drawing and art in the urban landscape. One of the better art books i have come across. I am a collector of all things art and I was very impressed with how articulate Blaukopf is in their explanations.

If you know your watercolor basics (but hey, ipad + procreate is a popular option too) and want to sketch outdoors, but struggle to get things looking nice, like “why can’t I get perspective right?”, “how can I draw people?”, “it doesn’t have the same mood” etc, then I would recommend you to check out The Urban Sketching Handbook series. They have several books focusing on different aspects of urban sketching and, in this case, color.

First chapters have brief explanations on materials, how to choose your colors, watercolor techniques (washes, glazing, wet on wet, splattering, dry brush), skies, mixing greens for trees and shrubs and mixing darks and shadows.

The following chapters explore color and value, limited colors (1 or 3 color palettes), color relationships (how to express moods with color/ color temperature), neutral colors, how to catch the mood and atmosphere of a place, using expressive colors and using other media (like pens, gouache, pastel or even ipad). Each chapter consists of inspiring watercolor artworks by different artists + their personal tips related to the chapter in question.

At the end of the handbook, there’s a nice art challenge list to get you started and experimenting. What I loved the most about this book, is that it’s mainly filled with tips from different artists. It’s inspirational and specially useful for intermediate artists.

A very complete and useful book for those who want to improve their technique in watercolor drawings. It includes tips for drawing on the go, but is mostly centered in color, how it works and how you can use it. Would definitely recommend to people who have been doing urban sketching for a while and want new ways of coloring and learning about this medium

A solid book on color that emphasizes intuitive color over technical theory. If you've enjoyed other Urban Sketching handbooks, you'll definitely want to pick this one up too. If you haven't seen other books in the series just yet, I think this is as good a place as any to start. Color often makes the urban sketch - giving it a sensation of life and immediacy. Blaukopf gives sketchers a solid overview of how to employ color in urban sketching, focusing mostly on watercolor, while also touching briefly on other media. The examples are thoughtful and useful, and the suggestions and techniques are well worth it to expand how color is approached in any kind of sketch!

The Urban Sketching Handbook: Working with Color is both instructional and inspirational. The book teaches how to use color to convey mood and emotions in urban sketches and should appeal to anyone looking for guidance and fresh ideas.

The book is packed with wonderful artworks and would be good to keep at hand just for the inspiration they provide. Author Shari Blaukopf does a thorough job of discussing how to pick, create and use palettes and gets into the specifics of mixing colors to create proper tone and feeling.

Working with Color (digital galley, Quarry Books) does not, however, dive into the basic techniques of sketching and drawing. There are other Urban Sketching Handbooks for that. This book is best suited to those who consider themselves to be beyond the absolute beginner level who are interested in improving their use of color.

This book is great for colour theory and has a lot of great examples to complement it. It's not a die-hard step-by-step book, so you do need a bit of background to understand some of the concepts, but the book does cover the basics in a nice way without dragging it out.

For the intermediate to advanced artist looking to improve technique with color. This book has great insight and ideas for different scenes and color families. En plein air is popular in my community, and I'm sure this book will be a big hit with our local artists.

Though I am not an urban sketcher (more an "art journaler"), I faithfully follow Shari's blog as well as her Instagram posts. Shari seems to be able to use her brush to magically and effortlessly create lose but stunning images of the world around her. She can turn a sketch of a wheelbarrow in her backyard into a thing of beauty! Seeing her paintings makes my heart happy with its clean and eye-catching colors. I've never seen a muddy one!

I was very excited to receive a digital copy of Shari's Working with Color - one of the Urban Sketching Handbook series. At first, I was rather disappointed to discover that not all the paintings featured in the book are hers. Though the first few chapters mostly show her work and describes how she chooses her palette for each painting, the galleries in the last few chapters are all filled with paintings done by other artists from around the world.

Then I realised that not every urban sketcher has to use colors the way she does. There are many other ways a scene can be portrayed. This handbook then is a great reference book for inspiration for when you want to use hues in different ways. If you are a new sketcher, this becomes incredibly useful as you try out different styles.

Do not expect step by step instructions though. Descriptions are also very brief.

Having said that, I loved the pages on how Shari mixes her green, how she paints her shadows, and creates "darks."

There's very valuable information and examples on how to use lightness and darkness, how to limit colors, how to use color to tell a story, and how to use neutrals without making a painting dull.

This book therefore is not necessarily just for urban sketchers but also for other artists who feel stagnant in the choice of colors for their paintings. I know for sure that it will help me to create some variety in my art journal and look forward to trying out some of the techniques.

I read in other reviews that the paintings are small and the text are too grey to be read easily. I did not find that this is the case with the digital copy read in my Bluefire Reader.

Thank you Netgalley and Quarto Publishing for the preview copy of this title. I may just have to get a hardcopy so that I can thumb through it often for inspiration!

This is an inspiring book full of beautiful illustrations and projects. It is suited to a more intermediate artist as there are not many detailed steps. The colour palettes and instructions on colour are very good. I loved the style of the pictures and the approach the artist takes. It definitely makes you feel like getting out there and having a go.

As much as I love art guidebooks, I find that usually I am either underwhelmed or overwhelmed by them. This one was just right: packed with ideas, tips, materials, color prompts, plenty of wonderful examples, space to try your sketching and even a list of challenges at the end, this handbook somehow manages to include all this and still feel approachable.

Beautifully illustrated book that contains practical information about sketching in ink and pencil and then using color as well, in the field. In-depth information about choosing color, color theory, color's relationship to mood, etc. with very specific advice (names of paint colors, etc.)

This book really inspired me to try out urban sketching and made all the techniques seem quite easy. The explanations and experiences the author shared were quite helpful. I also liked the book's design and the mix of text and sketches.

Simple explanations of colour for urban sketchers.
This book is quite handy with useful information about colour presented in an easy to understand way. There is not much instruction on painting techniques or exercises to do yourself, it is really just a book of inspiration, in my opinion.
Thanks to NetGalley for the review copy. The opinions expressed are my own.

What a good manual - I'll consider taking it along on my next trip, along with my little Winsor Newton travel watercolor set. It's better than most novels that pass the time on long flights, that's for sure. I enjoyed the layouts and explanations - if you're looking to ramp up your sketching practice, this book is for you.

I really like this press' format - the illustrations are lively, the text clear - and the subject matter is interesting and timely for me.

This book is one of the best watercolour handbook I have read, with plenty of information, simply explained and chapters that pertain to working with colour. The book is divided into chapters, the first being the basic, which is all about your kit, colour and the importance of sketching. The following chapters break down both colour and technique much further with Pigment and Colour Mixing, Colour and Value, Limited Colour, Colour Relationship and Neutral Colour. My favourite chapter is working with limited colour to start with, one simple colour can say so much.
The second part of the book deals with Mood & Atmosphere, Light & Shadow, Expression Colour and lastly other media such as pastels, gauche etc. At the end of each chapter there are student challenges which are detailed at the end of the book.
This is a very colourful book that just makes you want to pick up a brush and paint.

I have read and enjoyed several Urban Sketching books in the past and this one was no exception. This book sits at the intersection of useful and inspiring. There are two major sections. The first one covers key areas around color like pigments & mixing, color & value, color relationships, etc. And then the "galleries" section covers things like mood & atmosphere, light & shadow, etc.

The author does a fantastic job of covering the basics without dragging it out. If you know absolutely nothing at all about color, this book doesn't really do a step-by-step. It's more structured as: introduce a concept, give an example on how it's used, and then encourage practice with an idea or challenge. It's intended to be practical and not super instructional.

For me, it was the perfect mix of enough instruction and inspiration. I especially liked learning some new-to-me things like what a local color is and then the specific examples the author showed when she used several techniques in one drawing. Once I saw her break it down, it helped clarify the concepts for me. I immediately used some of her ideas in my next sketch (especially the ones on how to paint a sky.)

And finally, the variety of sketches, both by the author and by other sketchers, is the best part of this book. There's a huge range and you are guaranteed to find something that inspires you.

Overall, this is another winner from The Urban Sketching series.

With gratitude to netgalley and the publisher for an advanced copy in return for an honest review.

Perfect for watercolor enthusiasts looking for Urban sketchs (buildings, people, nature) to draw inspiration from. Unfortunately though, I found this to be not to my level of expertise in using watercolor (it is not a step-by-step book), but it is a major source of inspiration for me to look forward to reaching such advanced level in the future! So, so beautiful that it gives me pleasure just to read the book and look at the sketches! It reassures me of how much I love watercolor!! Thank you Netgalley for my ARC in Exchange for an honest review!

Excellent! This doesn't provide much help with technique or technical instruction, but isn't meant to. That's OK because it is certainly inspirational and the example art is simply fantastic. Great job by the author of curating. Definitely recommended for aspiring artists or maybe best for current artists focusing on color.

I really appreciate the advanced copy for review!

I have a few Urban Sketching books, so I was excited to see this one dedicated to color (mostly watercolor, my favorite!) The book is written very clearly and concisely, with many illustrations throughout, both by the author and by other well known urban sketchers. I would classify this as an excellent choice for beginners in the realm of color mixing and choosing colors for compositions, but even as an "old timer" I found it interesting to read. I particularly enjoyed the explanations behind many of the example pieces included.

All in all an easy and informative read, and one that I look forward to nabbing in print for my watercolor library.