Welcome to the Watercolour Christmas Cards mini workshop.
Below are the designs/templates that you will need to copy or trace onto your cards before we start painting. Simply click on the image and print or save to your computer for future use ...
In order to complete this mini workshop you will need:
a pencil;
a black fine liner pen (optional);
a paint brush (I used just one for the whole workshop so you do not need different sizes);
a set of watercolour paints;
watercolour paper if you have it otherwise a thickish paper or card stock;
blank cards to mount the designs onto; and
glue or double sided tape.
{Snowman Card}
click onto the images to see them in more detail
Either trace your Snowman design onto your water colour paper or cut the Snowman out and draw around it with a pencil as shown here ...
{I used a colour copy of the final card as my template so that you could see the image better. Your template is a black and white outline!}
If you are tracing the image you will already have all the detail of the face once finished. Otherwise, you will need to copy the details of the Snowman's face onto your picture ...
Mix a little dark brown watercolour on your palette. The trick to watercolours is to add more water than you think you will need. If in doubt add a little more! You can always add more paint later.
Begin to add the watercolour to the Snowman's hat. You will achieve a more professional finish if you add several layers of paint to the picture (letting the picture dry in between) instead of trying to add all of the colour in one go!
{hopefully you can see that the paint is really quite thin and translucent}
Once you have painted an area you will need to move to another place on the picture and start to paint the new area. This will prevent one colour from running into its neighbour. Again keep the colours translucent. If you find that your paint brush has missed areas on the page and you have white bits, leave them, they will make it look as if light is coming through your picture and will add to the final effect.
Here the Snowman has a little more colour ...
Let the first layer of paint dry (or use a hairdryer to dry it as I do) and then using the same colours that you have already mixed add a second layer of colour onto the picture. See below ...
Hopefully you will be able to see on the scarf that by adding the same colours as before to the top and bottom of the scarf it has left a lighter stripe in the middle which will create dimension on the final picture.
Add the dark brown around the edges of the hat and this will also create some dimension.
Continue to add a second layer of colour onto the areas of the snowman. You may have to add a little more pigment into your palette to achieve a stronger colour but on the whole you are basically using the same mix of colour from layer 1.
Here are a few closer images of various parts of the painting at this stage ...
Keep it as loose as you can. You do not want to just colour in the lines but rather let your brush glide over the page. A brush made for watercolour paint will hold more water and will help to give a more professional finish to the picture...
At this point we will begin to think about adding shadow. For this project it will be simple to use the colour of the Snowman's hat as the shadow colour.
Start by painting a wet line of paint under his hat...
Whilst the paint is still wet, clean your paintbrush and with a damp brush soften the line,
dragging the paint around the top of the Snowman's head...
dragging the paint around the top of the Snowman's head...
If you need the shadow to be a little darker just repeat the process once the first layer of paint is dry ...
Add another line of wet paint under his scarf ...
and again drag out with a clean wet paint brush whilst the paint is still wet ...
{there are 2 stages shown in this picture as not only have I dragged out the paint under the scarf, I have also added the same colour to the bottom of the scarf in a curved line to create dimension}
Notice how adding the shadow colour over all of the original colours creates the effect of dimension...
Continue adding shadow on the scarf and around the body of the snowman (which I have drawn in now).
{this is all done in exactly the same way i.e. adding a line of wet paint and dragging it out with a clean wet brush}
Take a pencil and draw 2 boxes around the Snowman to create the frame {you could do this freehand as I have done or with a ruler}
Roughly add lines in to divide the frame up ...
Paint in your colour choice. I also added an oval for the button/coal and painted this in the same colour as his hat using the layering technique. {You may have noticed that on the final card he has 2 buttons as he was not quite finished with one button so I added another one at the end!}
Once you are happy with the painting ... Let it dry completely ...
Then take a black fine liner pen and add a
little detail to the picture ...
little detail to the picture ...
{the picture really does need to be dry before starting with this stage. If your picture is a little cold it is probably still damp. Either give it plenty of time to dry or use a hairdryer to speed up the process}
Let your pen drag over the page loosely. The pen is not being held that tightly and is moving over the paper quite fast. It helps to have a nice textured paper so that the pen catches the texture and 'hits and misses' the paper.
Here is the Snowman with some extra detail on him added with the pen ...
and here are a few more images of the detail ...
Once you have finished your painting and it is dry you will need to mount it on your blank card ready for sending.
You will need to trim the picture somehow. You could use scissors, fancy edging scissors, a paper trimmer, a craft knife or you could tear the image out as I have done here to give a deckle edge effect ...
{This technique will work best if you have painted on a thicker card stock or watercolour paper. Tear the paper upwards, towards you as shown in the picture and this will create a feathered effect on the final image}
Finally you will need to mount your painted picture onto the card blank. You could use glue, or double sided tape as I did here. You could even use craft foam to give a 3D effect if you have some.
and there you have it - a watercolour Snowman card. Hope you enjoy having a go!
{Christmas Pudding Card}
Trace the design onto watercolour cardstock as with the Snowman card ...
Use the layering technique that we learnt in the Snowman card to add layers of paint to the pudding.
{start with a light brownish colour and then add a little dark blue to the paint to create the darker brown colour}
The picture below has 3-4 layers of paint on the pudding base ...
Using the same technique for applying shadow that we used in the first card i.e. add a line of wet shadow colour paint to the bottom of the pudding and drag with a clean wet paintbrush ...
Once dry, add detail with the back pen as before ...
Here is a simple way to get the lettering 'Happy Christmas' even around the pudding ...
First, write the word/s that you want to add to your card on a scrap of paper and count the letters INCLUDING the spaces between the words ...
Happy Christmas has 15 letters and spaces from the 'H' to the 's'
From here find the middle letter/s of the whole phrase. As 15 is an odd number there will be one letter which is exactly in the middle of the phrase. In this case the 'h' in Christmas. There are 7 letters either side of the 'h'. If you have an even number of letters and spaces then you will have 2 middle letters!
Find where you would like the middle of your phrase to be on the card (here we want it to be at the bottom of the pudding). With a pencil write the letter 'h' here...
Then write the rest of the phrase working out from either side of that middle letter {Remember to add the space between the words}
Once you are happy with the spacing, take the fine liner and write in the phrase ...
Simple stick writing with dots at the ends works well!
If you find that the phrase is not as symmetrical as you would have liked at the end. Add one or two dots either side of the text. You could add one on one side and two on the other (what ever you need) but this will balance the overall effect and the eye will overlook the fact that the phrase was not completely symmetrical ...
And there you have your finished watercolour pudding image to mount on to your blank card as before ...
{Christmas Wreath Card}
This card is a little more advanced in that it requires some drawing as well ...
Draw a circle on the watercolour paper ...
Draw a small circle at the top of the large circle and then 2 squashed circles either side as shown ...
Add a further 2 squashed circles over the first 2 ...
Add 2 wavy lines falling away from the squashed circles ...
and you have your bow on top of the wreath ...
The holly around the wreath is created by roughly drawing a holly shape with the pencil.
Please bear in mind that once the picture has been painted you really won't see all of the holly leaves on the wreath. All you need to do is scribble this shape around the circle to create the effect of the wreath ...
Begin by adding groups of 3 berries evenly around the circle ...
Then add the holly ...
You can see that most of the leaves are just a suggestion of the shape and not complete holly leaves ...
Once you have your picture, use the techniques learnt in the first 2 cards to add colour ...
First, add the berries ...
Then add the green in layers (adding a slightly darker green with each layer). Mixing a little brown with the green for the darker layers will achieve a nice finish!
Bear in mind that the wreath will be lighter on the outside and darker in the middle (closer to your original circle drawing) as this is where the foliage will be most dense.
Remember not to try and paint every leaf, just add bits of colour here and there ...
This final image also has the detail added after the painting is dry but this time I have used a pencil to add the detail and not a black fine liner so that the finished result would be a little more delicate ...
And finally tear or trim as before and mount onto your blank card ready for sending ...
I hope that you have enjoyed joining in with the mini workshop.
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Happy Crafting
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All images and text is copyright Philpotts 2012
