Introduction to Botanical Art - Acacia, or Golden Wattle

This is the basic equipment you will require to complete a botanical painting of Acacias. Refer to attached list. Note that I usually recommend eight colours, but for this tutorial you only require six - French Ultramarine, Cerulean Blue, Winsor Lemon, Winsor Yellow, Permanent Rose, Burnt Sienna (the others I recommend for a limited palette are Scarlet Lake and Permanent White gouache).

I will start by looking at an Acacia pycnantha (Golden Wattle) specimen, and the different stages of flowers, from the buds through to a fully open flower head. I will sketch the different stages, in preparation for painting. I have included a couple of reference photos here, but you may also wish to look at the images in Section 6 (Lecture 20).

Having drawn the different flower stages, I will start to paint them, beginning with yellows.

It's important to get the shadows right to create the round form of the flowers, here I will show you how to mix and paint the shadow areas.

I add final details to finish the fully opened flower, with just more addition to come, the anthers.

Having drawn the developing bud, I now move on to painting it.

Having drawn the slightly smaller bud, I now paint it.

The last part, adding some anthers to the fully opened flower and then it's finished.

Observe the size and shape of the leaf, drawing an outline to paint. On the Acacia pycnantha, these are not called leaves, they are phyllodes, or flattened leaf stalks. Throughout this tutorial I will alternate between calling them phyllodes and leaves (because leaves is easier for most of us to understand).

The painting technique is 'wet in wet' - wetting the surface with water, then applying paint to that area. It is a valuable technique which can be used extensively in botanical art, especially for covering larger areas. Here I will observe the light on the leaf, and paint blue in the highlight area.

After the last layer has dried, I will use the wet-in-wet technique again, this time adding soft shadows.

I build up my paintings in many layers. Here I will add another wet-in-wet layer, this time with a green mix.

Having built up several layers using wet-in-wet, I will now begin painting on dry paper, using a very watery consistency of paint.

I am building up more colour and intensity, still using a watery paint, but gradually using more pigment as I get further along.

Adding final details to the leaf now, using my small brush and a much dryer paint - using 'dry brush technique' (where the brush is not dry, but damp, and the paint has less water).

This may seem a bit obvious, but I have seen some students hold their brushes in ways that make it difficult to achieve the detail and stay within the lines!

Another thing that sometimes people don't think about, a little overview of how to put the paint on the paper.

I really think the consistency of the paint is one of the most important aspects of watercolour painting, and it can really mess up your work if you get it wrong. It's definitely worth practicing and working out what is right for you.

I discuss choosing a specimen, and arranging it into a pleasing composition, in this case securing to a board with tape. It's a good idea to take a photo at this stage, as your specimen may wilt or move while you're drawing and painting it. There are several images and documents which you may choose to download here. "Acacia sketch 1" and "Acacia sketch 2" are copies of my actual drawing. You can use these, but you may wish to create your own composition. Please remember that I own the copyright to these images. I also have two photographs of my specimen set up. Then there are two more of the Acacia in the sunlight, so that you can look at how the light appears on the leaves (phyllodes).

I observe my specimen carefully, measuring where necessary, and create a sketch on sketch paper (NOT on my watercolour paper).

Just trying to keep things tidy, and to have a firm outline of my drawing before I transfer to my watercolour paper.

I will show two ways of transferring the drawing to the watercolour paper. This way is complex but worth the effort if you have a really detailed drawing.

This is the second method for transferring the drawing to the watercolour paper. If you don't have a lightbox, a window in the daylight will be just fine.

I am painting the full flowers, working my way around the whole painting.

I am working on the buds, the developing flower heads.

Here I am painting, not the main stem, but the secondary stems attached to the flowers.

Going back to my drawing, I will look at the specimen, and take note of the light and shade - drawing in the highlight areas and the shadows, to refer to when I start painting my leaves.

Working my way around the whole painting, I will be using the wet-in-wet technique to add blue highlights to many of the leaves.

Again going around the whole painting, I will look at each leaf, and where appropriate, use wet-in-wet to add a light shadow to the leaf.

Some of the shadows need to be a little darker, so I am working on dry paper this time, and adding shadows to the leaves where required.

Time to add some colour, I will use wet-in-wet to start painting the leaves a light green, leaving the highlight areas.

Slowly building up the colour on all the leaves, I work my way around the painting, using wet-in-wet to add dark green to the leaves in some areas.

Having finished with the real 'wet-in-wet' I now work on dry paper and build up more colour with a fairly watery paint mix.

Here I add a light yellowy green to the midribs of the leaves.

Time to have another look at the leaf, closely observing the colours, how far the dark green follows the midrib, the slightly brown edges on the leaf.

Now I start to work on each individual leaf, starting with the bottom right, building up more colour with wet on dry.

Moving on to another leaf, this one is quite similar to the last, so I am only speaking for the first minute of this video. If you like, you can watch the rest of the video at double speed.

Painting three leaves this time, similar to previous ones, however I am working on a leaf that is behind a flower (there is an excerpt of all the footage of painting a leaf behind a flower in Section 8).

Building up the intensity on the two leaves at the top left. One of these is quite dark, but otherwise it's the same as previous leaves, and I only talk for the first 30 seconds. Again, you can play the rest at double speed if you wish.

Working on another leaf, then I also paint the red at the base of the phyllodes and add a little more detail to those.

This leaf needs quite a bit of work to build up the colour whilst working around the highlight.

This is another leaf which is quite dark, and also in this lecture I 'lift' the midrib which was getting too narrow (this is also in an excerpt in Section 8).

I've left the two 'trickiest' leaves till last. This one is at the bottom left, and has quite a strong highlight.

I've left the trickiest leaf till last. This one has some twists and turns, and it's crucial to get the lights and darks right to make it look realistic. First we need to do a good tonal sketch to decide where to have our light and shade, before painting.

The trickiest leaf again, now that we have a tonal sketch it's time to paint in all the lights and darks to finish our realistic looking twisty, turny leaf.

I have the left main stem till last. Painting this stem will really bring the whole painting to life. There is some variation in the colouring of the stem, with greens and reds, and shadows.

I've added all the main elements now, so I need to go back over the painting and work on the smaller areas such as the joins, the pulvinus (at the base of the leaves/phyllodes) and the glands on the phyllodes.

I stand back and take a look at the painting as a whole. I decide I need to vary the colour of the bottom leaf a little, and there are other touch ups required all over the painting, especially adding some darker green to the base of the leaves. Getting really close to finishing now, although I do say that quite a bit!

Finessing the painting now. Adding the tiny details now that can really make your work stand out. Adding some fine brown/red outlines to some areas of the leaves. Also working a bit more on the glands, and adding some little 'imperfections' such as little dark marks here and there.

On one of the leaves I had painted too close to the midrib. It is possible to 'lift' the paint out to a certain extent. I've taken the relevant parts and put them all into this one short video.

Painting a leave behind a flower can be tricky in watercolour, and takes some planning. Here I have pulled together the relevant footage to have one section on painting leaves behind flowers.

Watercolours often buckle, especially when there are some areas where we are using washes, and others where we aren't. I usually stretch most of my paintings after I have finished them. It is the same process for all of my paintings, so here I have actually used the 'stretching' video from my Eucalyptus leaf tutorial.

When you have finally decided that it's time to call your painting 'finished' - congratulations! Now think about where you want to place the mat, and therefore where you would like to sign your painting. Here I also talk about writing some information on the back of the painting, to really make it yours.

And we're done! A few words to say thanks for joining me, and I hope you continue with botanical watercolours. Remember to keep practicing, and enjoy!

Important: Copyright of this image and composition belongs to Cheryl Hodges.

Credits

Producer: Jack Hodges

Music:

Undertow by Scott Buckley - www.scottbuckley.com.au

Solace by Scott Buckley - www.scottbuckley.com.au