Painting Watercolors (First Steps)

Of all the books out there on Beginning watercolors, this one ought to stand among the top. This is a no-nonsense, direct, practial and applicable book. Cathy Johnson, has covered a wide range of topics in a concise and apt manner that makes the most sense for the beginning watercolorist. Here is what is covered in the book. MATERIALS Papers, Brushes, Palettes etc. are covered enough to get started. THEORY Colors, Values, Composition are briefly discussed, again enough to get going. EXERCISES This is a beautiful part of the book, some of the exercises are : Round brush Exercise, Flat brush, fan brush etc.. Some of them introduces to different materials tools such as palette knife. And there are a few interesting ones, which she calls "fear conquering" exercises. these are beautiful and essential, particularly useful to learn and understand watercolor. In these exercises she explores 'happy accidents' which is the key to successful watercolor. TECHNIQUE Various techniques are covered next such as Flat wash, graded wash , wet-on-wet,dry, wet on dry, and the Glazes. SPECIFIC SUBJECTS After the essential techniques are introduced, and one is familiar with how to use the tools and paint, we next move to specifics. A variety of subjects are covered, and the color palette is discussed along as these are taken up one by one. Trees, foliage, grass, skies, water, surfing, falling water, snow, mountain, cliff, rocks, buildings, flowers, fruits, animals, and common things are some of the subjects that are dealt with. DEMONSTRATIONS The book concludes with a series of demonstrations of landscape and still life, such as Farm scene, boat scene, etc. wich are step by step, and applies the material covered so far in the book. This is the point when the learner can slowly take to his/her own wings and start creating their own paintings. There is one particular demo where the same scenery is painted using different palettes to create different seasons. Overall, this is a very crisp and effective introduction to watercolors.

Very nice book. Has great ideas. Seller was great shipped early and in excellent condition.

This is definitely a very good book for the absolute beginner. Johnson provides very clear and easy to understand explanations of the materials (along with popular brands to buy) and techniques. She introduces painting tips for a variety of subjects such as snow, flowers and trees, water, animals and more. She also teaches you how to stretch watercolor paper and has very simple and comfortable exercises to ease you into the wonders of watercolor. There was also a page that addressed some opaque vs transparent colors which was pretty helpful. The step by step demonstrations are easy to follow, and though the author doesn't tell what colors are used in each step, she gives the overall palette colors. She does focus a bit more on different palettes, especially seasonal ones, which are very nice for beginning landscape painting. However I did not give this book 5 stars because I found the author did not address color mixing very well. In fact there is next to nothing about how the slight nuances in the colors mixed together can entirely change the temperature. I have another book (Hazel Harrison's How to paint and draw), and in it the author extensively addresses how mixing primaries that are biased toward each other will create more brilliant colors and mixing ones that are not will produce more muted hues and so on. However I do realize this is not a book on color theory, and for what it does it is definitely worth the buy. The layout is very cute and refreshing to look at, and Johnson really makes you see how enjoyable watercolor is :)

I've bought a ton of "how to" books for watercolor and this one is waaaaayy at the top. I wish I could give it 20 stars, it's the most complete beginner's book I've ever seen. It gives you exercises to do to get various types of finishes and various types of common watercolor subjects (such as how to pain different kinds of trees as an example) in VERY UNDERSTANDABLE terminology with excellent examples. It shows how to paint shadows, use different household items for texturing (such as wadded up paper towels, sponges, etc), and how to use the "grid" technique to keep proportions correct. It also shows you which brushes will provide which kinds of finishes and how to use multiple colors of paint on one brush for really cool effects. Cathy Johnson should have been given some kind of "Beginner's Best" award for this book. Most of the other books I have show the finished product, along with a written explanation, but with no visual step-by-step instructions on how to achieve the end result (which, unfortunately, is what a LOT of art books do). I saw this book in the art supply store but couldn't afford the retail price, so I came home and found it on Amazon (MUCH cheaper). If you're trying to learn to paint with watercolors, buy lots of books but BUY THIS ONE FIRST. You might not want to buy anything else,

basically this is the most helpful of the three beginner books I got about watercolor painting. The book makes no assumptions, so you get to start from the ground up. Author Cathy Johnson tells you what materials to buy, and how to experiment with them before moving on the "easy-to-learn ways to paint"; followed by exercises in painting specific things such as trees, flowers and a little about still life items and animals; and finally a chapter comprising about 12 step-by-step demonstrations of complete paintings. The last chapter, I might add, is not a slavish copying exercise, but includes much general advice for planning and executing you own creative work. A couple of points about materials. Johnson recommends that you only buy professional artist grade paints and materials, and claims that, at the time of writing (1995) you could get set up for around $50.00. You could expect to easily double that figure for such supplies in today's world. In fact, professional paints alone could run you over a hundred dollars and pro brushes are very pricey, too. My opinion is that you can do these exercises and projects quite well with good student-grade paints and supplies. Right now I am using a set of Grumbacher Academy paints, and that is working just fine. I also have large sheets of Bienenfang watercolor paper, which is useful because you can cut them up into small rectangles to practice things like "pulling a wash", AND you can paint on both sides of it. You will need a few basic brushes such rounds and flats, something called a "rigger", as well as a fan brush you can chop up a bit, and other brushes if desired. There is a full page devoted to ideas of how to play with your brushes to see what they can do--like jabbing, swooping, using the edge, etc. My favorite was the rigger, a supple long-haired brush you can practically dance with! A word about progress: you will be doing all this brush stuff and trying techniques like dry brush and wet on dry brush for a while before you even start on making anything that "looks like something". Then you'll get some simple tree shapes such as poplar, cedar, oak, etc before moving on to grasses and skies. That is where I am right now. But these basic picture elements are also satisfying to produce. Today I finished page 55, working a couple of hours in the afternoons for a week or so. That is about half of the book, but I expect the later sections to be more involved. Will revisit this review at that point. I hope this helps!

Just what I was looking for. Great explanations.Easy to follow.I already bought one for my daughter.Now, as well.Great product all worth the money.You should get it too.

I've painted for many years and stopped painting regularly. Painting for me is not like riding a bike, I'm very very rusty so I was hoping for something to help me get back into the swing of things. Despite having that painting background, I still felt that the examples in the book were challenging to follow. Most of the book covers techniques to paint different things, and some of it is the 'step by step' demonstration. The technique part doesn't contain color choices which makes them a bit hard to follow. The step by step part did contain color choices, but as with many books, the gaps between the steps are big. Overall the book's contents doesn't feel substantial enough. I find youtube videos more helpful than this book. On the plus side, I like Cathy's loose painting style. The size of the paintings are reasonably large and the font is really big. I feel that its better for inspiration and not really sufficient for learning how to paint.

Many watercolor books follow the format of providing an introduction to materials and then diving in to paint entire scenes. The good ones in this genre carefully describe the steps involved and have pictures of the various stages in the process. The bad ones have poor descriptions, images, or both. The problem with this approach is that the student merely apes the instructions for how to mimic the scene and only incidentally learns the principles involved. Cathy Johnson's book happily departs from this formula. She presents pieces of images, houses, trees, birds, etc., often in various views, different seasons and so on. Ms. Johnson is casual in her imagery, stressing the need for suggestion rather than photorealism and helpfully offering clever tips for achieving such suggestion. In effect, she provides the aspiring artist with building blocks for crafting their own compositions, along with principles that are useful more broadly. Now some readers will be put off by the fact that her images are not as beautiful or as perfect as those of the "paint by numbers" school. This is true and, I think, by design. First, her images are far more achievable for the beginner. There is a certain joy to producing a satisfying bird or tree, even if it is not perfect. Indeed, far more satisfying than producing that same image in comparison to a perfect rendering. So long as you have the right mindset--a desire for the "Lego blocks" of watercolor painting rather than perfect complete images--Cathy Johnson's book is a superb reference.

First steps it is . well planned and very well illustrated. this will be one of my primary reference books. I wish i had bought it earlier but still much to learn . should be first on all starts list

... finde ich die Tipps in diesem Buch. Vor allem Freunde von Landschaftsaquarellen finden in diesem Buch gute Hinweise, wie sich Himmel, Bäume, Gräser und Wasserläufe anlegen lassen. Der Text ist kurz und bündig, dazu gibt es anschauliche Bilder. Was mir an diesen gefällt: Jedes Bild ist noch einmal mit textlichen Anmerkungen versehen, die auf bestimmte Details hinweisen - etwa, wie an einer Stelle ein bestimmter Verlauf erzielt wurde oder welche Farben für welchen Effekt sorgen. Und obwohl ich kein Anfänger mehr bin, hat mir Johnsons Erklärung wieder bewusst gemacht wie Farben vom Kasten auf die Mischpalette übertragen werden, um auf der Palette Farbpfützen anzulegen und erst von diesen aus zu mischen.

It does what it says on the tin ...a really good choice not just for a beginner, but actually helpful if you're picking up a brush after a long lapse or want to change mediums.

it's a great book for beginners. As you read it seems like Cathy were there with you. Here exercises are great.

An absolutely excellent book which even for those of us who are 'accomplished' artists, can enjoy. Cathy Johnson's book offers a wide range of helpful hints and sound advice.