what do you paint on?

Watercolor paintings may be done on watercolor paper, watercolor canvas or Aquabord.

Watercolor paintings done on cold-pressed paper are very nice. However I prefer to use Claybord or Aquabord.

This butterfly painting is done on Aquabord made by Ampersand.

what colors will you use?

I used tube watercolor paints for painting butterflies.

• New Gamboge Yellow (A warm yellow)
  
• Phthalocyanine Blue (called Thalo Blue for short)
  
• Quinacridone Violet (A reddish violet)
  
• Dioxazine Purple / Ultramarine Violet (A bluish violet)
  

Mix your greens from the blue and yellow and use purple to darken the greens when necessary.

draw the butterflies

Do a drawing on a separate paper.

Transfer it to the painting support with "Ad" graphite paper.

Erasures on the painting surface may damage it.

Place "Ad" art masking fluid around the butterflies to keep them white.

Also put some masking on the flowers and leaves in places for highlights.

The light in this painting is coming from the top left.

• Lay in Thalo Blue with a soft wash brush.

Make the upper left background darker.

The upper background color gets lighter, as you go to the right side of the painting away from the light source.

This is caused by reflected light.

• You may add a bit of yellow on the right side for the warmth of the reflected light.
  

• Lower in the painting, the colors get darker to help ground the painting.
  

Use a smaller brush for the tighter areas.

It is good to repeat colors throughout the painting to give the painting cohesion.

• Add some violet in the background because the flowers are violet.

• Add a bit of yellow in places, to co-ordinate with the leaves.
  

paint the petals

• Use a small round brush to roughly lay in the flower colors.

Don't try to paint individual petals.

Use the warmer, reddish violet on the left side of the flower which is towards the light.

Use the bluish violet on the bottom and the right side of the flower away from the light.

Let the colors flow together.

Vary the intensity of the colors by using more or less water.

• After the flower color is dry, remove the masking fluid from the flower.

• Now paint some individual petals with a small round brush.

Use variations of light and dark violets.

Leave white spaces for sparkle.

Mix blue and yellow on your palette for your green to paint the calyx, sepals and stems.

• Mix the green lighter for the side toward the light (add more yellow).
  

• Mix the green darker for the side away from the light (add more blue).
  

Notice the calyx color is darker on the bottom side which is shadowed.

Add a tiny bit of blue under the edge of the petals for a shadow

You may want to paint the leaves in more detail.

I saved my detail for the butterflies and the flowers.

Mix dark and light greens the way you did for the green parts of the flowers.

• Paint the leaves with a variety of light and dark greens.
  

The leaves toward the light will have more yellow.

Paint the shadow side of the leaves and stems a darker green, mixed with more blue.

remove the masking

Remove the masking from the butterfly wings.

• You may use a dry finger
  

• Or use a Pick-Up Rubber Cement Eraser

When you are painting butterflies keep in mind that butterflies actually have four wings. 

paint the wing colors

Mix lavender grey with yellow and red-violet. 

• Paint the grey where the wings overlap and where they attach to the body.
  

• Put yellow on the top outer edges of the wings.
  

The warm yellow brings bottom wing forward of the lavender grey wing behind it.

paint the veins

• Mix a black by using the yellow, bluish violet and blue and paint the veins.

You may use any small, round brush or even a liner brush for painting butterfly veins.

If you make a wiggle-wobble or fat veins, use a damp brush to pick up the extra paint before it dries.

I forgot to shade the wings before painting veins. So after the veins dried, I went back and did the shading.

Butterflies have three body parts.

They have a head with two antenna, a thorax with six legs and four wings attached to the thorax and an abdomen.

• Lighten the same color you mixed for the veins with a bit more water.
  

• The body will be lighter toward the light source.

The butterfly's legs go out over the flower petals because the butterfly is standing on the flower.

Look around your butterfly painting and see what you might want to touch up.

Values are what really make a painting sparkle!

• You may add more darks at this time, if you feel the painting needs it.
  

Do it whatever suits your taste. You have an artist's license for painting butterflies.

No two paintings will ever look the same. Every painting is an individual.

•  Every individual artist will do their paintings in their own manner.