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Aug. 4th, 2025 10:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
yuuagoAir quality this weekend was, to quote The Weather Channel, "Atrocious and unsafe". Wow. (It's smoke blowing in from Saskatchewan.) Anyway, I stayed inside for my stat holiday today, which is not how I wanted things to go.
Stuff that I did this past weekend:
+ Went to a coworker's birthday party
+ Went for a coffee meetup organized by the local pride group
+ Did some reading (but not as much as I'd have liked)
+ Hauled out my watercolours and did some paintings
+ Brainstormed some fic concepts (that I don't have time for at the moment but maybe at some future point), specifically some NL/DK/NO and also some NL/NO, the latter will probably require research but we'll see.
+ Had planned to do some writing for IIBB but found myself exhausted. So. That will have to be... later. (I'm in the "I hate this fic" editing stage.)
Man, watercolour sure is hard to photograph*. The colours are so much more vibrant in the originals. Then again, I couldn't be arsed to put much effort into it, so there is that.
At this point I'm basically re-learning how to do everything, since it's been almost, what, 20 years since I painted anything and honestly, I was never much good at it to begin with. So there we are.
Even just from this brief try, I can see why I would've found this stuff challenging. Aside from the fuss that it takes to get set up (clear the table, put down a cloth, get water, etc etc etc) it's very... Well, my medium of choice is pencil crayons, and watercolours are not like pencil crayons at all. They're very hard to control! And you have to wait for things to dry before you add more things! Augh!
I currently don't have a proper palette, and it's actually not possible to buy one in town (I ordered one on amazon, which has not yet arrived) so I'm currently using an old ice cube tray that I picked up at the thrift store. The wells are shaped like Mickey Mouse heads, with the "head" shape deeper than the "ears", and it's actually pretty convenient for mixing various dilutions without wasting anything or risking things getting mixed together that I don't want mixed together. When I was a kid I was stuck using plastic plates instead; this is much better.
The tube of Chinese White was totally dried. Upon doing an internet search, I discovered you can cut the tube open and just use it like that. So I dumped the dried paint into a well and yeah, it works fine. Cool.
I'm glad I didn't bother buying any new brushes, because the ones that I have are fine. I didn't have a board, so I picked up a shabby clipboard at a thrift store, removed the clip, and used that. Washi tape has been pretty effective at keeping things taped down.
The pad of postcard-sized watercolour paper also had a very old drawing that I'd done in watercolour pencils. I added some water to that, and I'm happy with the result, but will not be sharing it. It confirmed my feeling that I don't want to draw humans any more, at least not at this point. It's too much of a challenge.
I have other sets of watercolours, including some that state they are "Chinese watercolours". I'm not sure how those different from European watercolours, but I guess I'll find out eventually, probably. And then there are also two different brands of watercolour pencils.
It'll be a while before I figure out if I enjoy painting or not. Fortunately, I have plenty of things to experiment with. I figure, I already own the paints, the brushes, the paper, and it was all just sitting in the back of my closet. I might as well give it a good honest shot.
Stuff that I did this past weekend:
+ Went to a coworker's birthday party
+ Went for a coffee meetup organized by the local pride group
+ Did some reading (but not as much as I'd have liked)
+ Hauled out my watercolours and did some paintings
+ Brainstormed some fic concepts (that I don't have time for at the moment but maybe at some future point), specifically some NL/DK/NO and also some NL/NO, the latter will probably require research but we'll see.
+ Had planned to do some writing for IIBB but found myself exhausted. So. That will have to be... later. (I'm in the "I hate this fic" editing stage.)
Man, watercolour sure is hard to photograph*. The colours are so much more vibrant in the originals. Then again, I couldn't be arsed to put much effort into it, so there is that.
At this point I'm basically re-learning how to do everything, since it's been almost, what, 20 years since I painted anything and honestly, I was never much good at it to begin with. So there we are.
Even just from this brief try, I can see why I would've found this stuff challenging. Aside from the fuss that it takes to get set up (clear the table, put down a cloth, get water, etc etc etc) it's very... Well, my medium of choice is pencil crayons, and watercolours are not like pencil crayons at all. They're very hard to control! And you have to wait for things to dry before you add more things! Augh!
I currently don't have a proper palette, and it's actually not possible to buy one in town (I ordered one on amazon, which has not yet arrived) so I'm currently using an old ice cube tray that I picked up at the thrift store. The wells are shaped like Mickey Mouse heads, with the "head" shape deeper than the "ears", and it's actually pretty convenient for mixing various dilutions without wasting anything or risking things getting mixed together that I don't want mixed together. When I was a kid I was stuck using plastic plates instead; this is much better.
The tube of Chinese White was totally dried. Upon doing an internet search, I discovered you can cut the tube open and just use it like that. So I dumped the dried paint into a well and yeah, it works fine. Cool.
I'm glad I didn't bother buying any new brushes, because the ones that I have are fine. I didn't have a board, so I picked up a shabby clipboard at a thrift store, removed the clip, and used that. Washi tape has been pretty effective at keeping things taped down.
The pad of postcard-sized watercolour paper also had a very old drawing that I'd done in watercolour pencils. I added some water to that, and I'm happy with the result, but will not be sharing it. It confirmed my feeling that I don't want to draw humans any more, at least not at this point. It's too much of a challenge.
I have other sets of watercolours, including some that state they are "Chinese watercolours". I'm not sure how those different from European watercolours, but I guess I'll find out eventually, probably. And then there are also two different brands of watercolour pencils.
It'll be a while before I figure out if I enjoy painting or not. Fortunately, I have plenty of things to experiment with. I figure, I already own the paints, the brushes, the paper, and it was all just sitting in the back of my closet. I might as well give it a good honest shot.
Yuu. Fic writer & book lover. M/Canada.
no subject
Date: 2025-08-06 02:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-08-06 01:00 pm (UTC)Watercolor <3
Date: 2025-08-06 04:16 am (UTC)Very lovely paintings :) Particularly like the sense of depth on the landscape and how you've shaded the lemon!
When I started painting watercolor, I used a porcelain plate from IKEA. I still think it works quite well for painting at home. Chinese watercolors, if they're 国画颜料, use animal glue instead of gum arabic as the binder. I don't know how different the handling quality could be, though.
Re: Watercolor <3
Date: 2025-08-06 01:01 pm (UTC)Thanks for explaining re: the Chinese watercolours (will have to check to see if they specify anywhere). I'm looking forward to seeing if they perform differently.