Painting: Watercolor Basics

Painting: Watercolor Basics Master the art of painting in watercolor by Deb Watson is a gorgeous and helpful book I requested from NetGalley and the review is voluntary. This book starts by telling you the tools and tips of watercolor. It then gets into the good stuff by showing the reader through step-by-step projects how to use salt, mask, blend edges, soften, blur, sharpen, add interest, and create depth. This is an excellent book for beginners or those that just want to improve. I loved the close up pictures and the many photos throughout the book. Simply gorgeous! I have this book on my wishlist!

Painting: Watercolor Basics is a tutorial technique guide to watercolor. Due out 7th May 2019 from Quarto on their Walter Foster imprint, it's 40 pages and available in paperback format. This is one of a series of technique guides being released this spring by Foster.

The formatting of the booklets is similar, with an introduction to tools and materials (circa 5% of the content) leading directly into the tutorials. The tutorial subjects are formed around specific painting projects which each illustrate a different technique such as creating the illusion of depth, creating mood, creating texture, etc. Note: this is not a how-to introduction for absolute beginners; it presupposes some level of familiarity with papers, watercolors, blending, surfaces etc.

The project paintings themselves are all very appealing. Several of them had my fingers itching to get painting right away.

Four stars. Attractive and worthwhile technique book.

This short book is well done. Art books have to be pretty focused, and this one does a good job on it's focus, which is a few basic techniques. Good images and examples. Nice tips are included.

I really appreciate the ARC for review.

Title : Painting Watercolor Basics

Author: Deb Watson



Whether you’re a master painter or an absolute beginner, watercolor is the perfect partner for your painting pleasure—and Watercolor Basics teaches you everything you need to know to get started in the medium.



From rendering light and shadow to creating realistic textures, discover how to bring dimension and depth to your paintings. Featuring the artwork of Deb Watson, this book includes a variety of easy-to-follow, step-by-step projects, including a landscape, still life, and portrait. With engaging, inspirational lessons and useful artist's tips, Watercolor Basics will help you master this beautiful and luminous medium.



Designed for beginners, the How to Draw & Paint series offers an easy-to-follow guide that introduces artists to basic tools and materials and includes simple step-by-step lessons for a variety of projects suitable for the aspiring artist. Watercolor Basics allows you to widen the scope of your artistic abilities, demonstrating how to begin with a basic sketch and then develop your painting step by step with special techniques that will bring your painting to life.



My thoughts
Rating: 5
Would I recommend it? yes
Will I check out anything else from this author? yes
I'm so glad that I decided to pick this up because I've been wanting to try water colors in my adult coloring books and this made it seem so easy to do , that what I loved about it because it showed you step by step how to do it and this would be a perfect gift for anyone no matter the age , with that said I want to say think you to Netgalley for letting me read and review it exchange for my honest opinion

Painting: Watercolor Basics is a good book for students in schools or just any artists. There is plenty of information and techniques.

Learned some new techniques! Am especially interested to try masking fluid. Loved how she walked you through her process. So much easier to learn by doing!! Tried tackling the ladybug project as I read and was pleased with my results. Will want to try the other projects once my library copy gets here

This is another one of the series’ more complex titles and the first I’ve seen that uses techniques and skills from a previous addition.
It’s an ideal book for those who are looking to develop their artistic skills.

I’ve been trying to improve on my painting skills lately. Having a file on my iPad with all the basics, really helped me to achieve progress. This “book” has all the basics I need to learn more on how to use water color paint!

This book has instructions for a total of 5 drawings, telling how each step adds more depth and realism. I love the examples and am awed by the art, but as an amateur, there were just not enough instructions for me to replicate it. Granted, I am a beginner, but I bet if the instructions would’ve been more extensive or clear, with step by step pictures, I would’ve learned so much more! However, if you’re already advanced, this book will learn you some tricks how to make your paintings more realistic and add more depth.

I got a free copy from Netgalley (thank you!) but my opinions are my own :)

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read and give an honest review of this book.

This book begins with materials and items necessary to start watercolor painting. Then, it immediately
jumps into the six painting projects that the book contains. As a person that began watercolor painting within this past year, I found that some basic principles and instructions would have been more helpful for watercolor beginners. It did cover the use of frisket or masking fluid. It could have benefited with an explanation of washes, wet on wet, and wet on dry painting as well as methods for removing paint/color. This was a good book for someone looking for small basic projects, but a true beginner might be frustrated.

Watercolor Basics by Deb Watson

This is a simplified how-to with tips on the art of watercolor. Not for the very beginner, but rather a brief refresher for a novice watercolor painter.

There are a lot of insets showing vivid color mixes, which are very helpful to create mood, emotion, depth and interest in your artwork. The author gives demos of flowers, bugs, scenery, people, birds and rabbits.

All in all it is a basic brush up for the novice artist, but not a good choice for a total beginner.

Fantasitic! Before I had the chance to read this book I was expecting some simple, basic water color pictures and steps, and wow was I pleasantly surprised!! The pictures is this book are amazing and the step by step for them are easy enough to follow and duplicate. I've never been very good at watercolor but after this book I feel confident i could produce a watercolor masterpiece!

Thanks so much to Netgalley, Deb Watson and the publisher for an Advanced Reader Copy of *Painting: Watercolor Basics* in exchange for an honest review.

My high school age daughter is enrolling in Portfolio Art this fall and has been drawing as long as we can remember. She has already gone through this book and told me how much she looks forward to learning as much as she can about watercolors and how to use them. She really liked the concise format and the language used to convey an idea keeping in mind that a beginner would be reading the book.

I have a feeling she will use this instructional book as a reference for a long time to come.

Lovely introduction to Watercolour painting. Quite short but with lots of examples to try. A good introduction to the basics for those just starting to paint in watercolour.

Watercoloring is one of my favourites techniques and this book was absolutely lovely.
Right away I have to say that I would not call it basics, it seemed that it rather gave tips on how to make your painting very real rather than teaching the basics of watercoloring.

Anyway, I'm excited to try some of the things that were shown, especially how to use shadows and how to create depth.

As a beginner in watercolour painting, this book is really helpful. It isn't a big book but the examples and instructions are extremely easy to follow and well illustrated.
A great book for picking up basic skills in watercolour.

Lovely little book that introduces the reader to watercolor technique with simple projects: ladybug, winter landscape, portrait, some animals and the beautiful flowers on the cover. Interesting the use of white ink.

This book teaches you how to start painting with water colors step by step. It's really helpful but I felt like it was a bit short on the example side. Most probably because it's about basics rather than improvement.

This book teaches you watercolour techniques through fairly detailed projects. The selection of studies is good, I especially liked the landscape, and the bird. There is enough instruction and step by step pictures for a beginner to have a go at. Overall a lovely book with a good variety of projects and techniques to learn.

A Booklet for Advanced Beginners
With "Painting: Watercolor Basics. Master the Art of Painting in Watercolor (How to draw & Paint)" published by Quarto Publishing Group - Walter foster the award-winning and self-taught artist Deb Watson offers a guide for beginners who are interested in watercolor. The 40-page booklet offers a brief introduction into tools and materials before presenting six projects (Creating the Illusion of Depth, Evoking Mood, Adding Interest, Creating Texture with Salt & Masking, Capturing Essential Details, and Rendering Soft Edges). The author lists for every project which colors are needed, how to mix various colors to get new ones, some instruction how to proceed (e.g., how to use masking fluid), and some tips. She shows the most important steps at the hand of progressing pictures in order that the learner can arrive at the final one.
This was my first book created by Deb Watson and also the first one of this "How to Draw & Paint" series by Walter Foster Art Books. I liked the approach of the book and the high-quality pictures (even in the digital advance copy), but I think that the projects might be to challenging for true beginners who are working by themselves. The booklet lacks some basic information, e.g., about the color wheel, wet-on-wet painting, wet-on-dry painting, which brushes to use for which project or step of the project and there is no explanation of the terminology. I would not recommend the booklet for true beginners, but it might be a help for beginners that have already some knowledge about watercolor painting.
The booklet seems to be a revised and slightly expanded version (40 pages instead of 32 pages) of "Watercolor: Basics: Discover the secrets of painting beautiful works of art in this luminous medium (How to Draw & Paint) by the same author which was published by Walter Foster Publishing in 2014.
The complimentary copy of this book was provided by the publisher through NetGalley free of charge. I was under no obligation to offer a positive review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.
#PaintingWatercolorBasics #NetGalley

Thank you to the publisher, the author and NetGalley for granting me an advanced digital copy. This review is given voluntarily.

Chapters include: tools and materials, creating the illusion of depth, evoking mood, adding interest, creating texture with salt and masking, capturing essential details, rendering soft edges.

It is definitely a book for beginners, as it reads completely step by step. The reader needs to read through the entire tutorial to get the broader picture of what's going to happen. The author did not tell you why you were doing something before you are doing it.

The steps are explained in paragraphs and might make a beginner feel like they're missing something. There are a few words from the painting lexicon that a complete beginner might not have automaticity with yet, such as foreground, wet-on-wet, "graded wash off color." However, I understand the situation must have been limited on number of pages and teaching those words might not have been in the scope.

The color mixing recommendations are extremely helpful.

The tutorial includes many little tips about how to make the final product that little bit much better. The expertise is apparent. I would recommend this to an adult who has tried other types of painting (perhaps even watercolor) and who wants the basics before taking an in person class.

The book mostly does what it aims to do, it might have just needed a little more structure.

This is an attractive book to help individuals learn the art of watercolor painting. The images and diagrams provide visual cues that are supported by the text instructions. The art is beautifully presented. The tools and techniques are well described and helpful to a novice painter or to refresh knowledge. Recommended to public and creative support libraries.

A very good watercolor basics and exercise book, although it's a little short.

Thank you NetGalley for this opportunity.

I selected this book to read and review as I have tried water color on my own a couple of times and have never liked my results. I am not a professional or even a great artist, it is definitely a hobby that I enjoy that is just for me. However, I would like to be better at it so I thought I would give this book a try and I am so very glad I did. The colorful pages coupled with the step by step instructions of how to recreate the pictures being taught in the book have renewed my desire to play with watercolor again. I actually want to purchase a physical copy of this book as I think that will help me even more so I can spend more time practicing the steps that the author takes us through. All in all, I think this is a very good book for beginners like me and I highly recommend it.

I tried reading this book and practicing along with it and turns out, I've been doing it wrong all this time. This book is an absolute gem. The illustrations are really cool and it covers many aspects of water coloring. I especially loved the snow scenery painting and the bird painting. The detailed explanations and step-by-step guidance are really helpful. I never even knew about masking fluid and it's not even available around here but I'm still glad for being introduced to it.

I did feel there could have been a bit more on how water coloring works so we could get the gist of it better, but I'm also totally satisfied. Deb Watson's how-to books would always be my go-to for anything art-related.

Excellent, easy to follow instructions and techniques in watercolor. The author goes through in detail from beginning to end how to compose and paint a watercolor painting.