Watercolor Winter Bird House

[Irish]

Watercolor Bird House

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I promised when I started the Winter Birdhouse Wood Burning
tutorial that is posted here on the WCI Message Board
that I would be teaching the coloring steps at the
end of the burning. Today I can finally keep that promise.

There are many coloring agents you can use on wood burnings.
Which you chose depends on the media or surface that you have
burned, your skill level with any particular type of paint and
the final effect that you want to achieve.

Watercolors, oil paints, colored pencils and acrylics are the
most common coloring agents. Acrylics are often used on burned
leather since they require no sealer or finishing spray.
Colored pencils are excellent for wood, paper and gourds as are
oil paints.

I have chosen to use watercolors. They are extremely transparent
which allows the full shading and tonal values of your burning
to show through the color. They are easily blended on your tile
to create new colors and on your project to make smooth color
transitions.

Watercolors do require some form of sealer, I
prefer a matte or semi-matte spray sealer for my watercolor
painted projects. Spray sealers applied in several light coats
protects the watercolor painting without moving or damaging
the color by the brush strokes needed for a liquid sealer.

Supplies:
Watercolor paints - either tube or cake
cadmium light yellow
cadmium medium red
cadmiun deep red or madder brown
raw sienna
cobalt blue
pale green
evergreen
burnt umber
burnt sienna
paynes gray
chinese white
Soft sable brushes
2 pans of clean water
paper towels
mixing tile
matte or semi-gloss spray acrylic sealer

Susan

[Irish]

Step 1: Coloring the birds

As you work through these steps please refer to the photos
for the exact color placement.

Watercolors come in either a tube of thick color or as dry cakes.
Each type needs to be thinned with water before they are applied
to your project. Both types are available through your local
art supply store or online. They can be purchased as individual
colors or in sets.

I work two pans of clean water during any watercolor session. One
pan is used to clean my brush between colors. This pan quickly becomes
a dirty mud color. The second pan is use only for adding water to
the colors on the tile. I keep this pan of water as clean as
possible so that I do not effect my color mixes with left over
color from cleaning my brush.

Before you ever touch a brush to your Winter Bird House burning do
a small test sample burning and painting so you can test your color
rangee, your color mixtures and the thinness of your watercolors.
This is a practice board similar to our wood burning practice
board for textures and temperature settings.

I am working with tube color and start by placing a small amount
of cadmium light yellow, cadmium medium red, raw sienna, cobalt blue
and paynes gray on a ceramic tile.

I thin my colors with water as I work until the mixture is thin
enough to be able to read a newspaper through the color. As you
work you will find that watercolors dry rapidly so you may need to
add more water when you return to a color or color mix. If you
add too much water and the mix becomes extremely thin simply add a
small amount of fresh paint.

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I have loaded a small sable round with my cadmiun light yellow then
blotted the tip of the brush on paper towels to avoid dripping.
The breast, undersides and lower tailarea of all three birds have
some yellow areas. Because the yellow is so pale I have used two
coats where these areas touch another part of the bird's body.

The gold finch's head is worked in cadmium light yellow.
The chickadee's tail area blends from a light yellow into a soft
brown color so I have added a light coat of raw sienna in this area.

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Cadmium light yellow and cadmium medium red mix together to create
a clear bright orange. The orange has been worked over the breat,
underside and lower tails of the birds where the yellow had been
applied. Not all of the yellow is covers, allow some of it to
show.

Susan

[Irish]

Step 2: Adding color to the back and wings

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I have mixed paynes gray and cobalt blue to create a wedgewood
gray tone. This is the coloring for the tail, wings and back of
the nuthatch.


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The backs of the gold finch and chickadee are golden sienna so I
have mixed raw sienna with the orange tone left from the preivous
step.


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A small touch of the orange mixture around the gold finch's eye,
throat and cheek add a little shading to his face.


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The beak of the gold finch is also orange with a second coat
on the bottom beak to make that area just a little darker than
the top beak.

Susan

[Irish]

Step 3: Adding black and white markings

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The darkest tones of our burning are in the brown hues but our
birds have black markings on their tails, bakcand wings. There
is a black watercolor but it is extremely strong and tends to
become opaque. To keep the soft transparent coloring for this
burning I used paynes gray instead.

Chnese white is also a strong coloring so check the thinnes of
your water/color mixture before you use it on your burning.
Use several very thin coats to add the white areas in the faces,
wings and bellies of the birds.


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Paynes gray was applied to the legs and feet of the nuthatch.


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The orange mixture was used for the gold finch's legs and feet.

Susan

[Irish]

Step 4: Working the holly leaves

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The foreground
leaves were flooded with a mix of pale green and
cadmium light yellow. Green can be a very powerful color in an
autumn/winter scene. By adding the yellow I am keeping the
green in a softer hue.


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A small amount of orange has been added to the pale green/light
yellow mix. This coloring was added to the mid-ground leaves.


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Evergreen has been thinned and worked as a shading color in the
foreground and mid-ground leaves and used to flood the background
leaves.


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A second coat of evergreen was used in the background leaves to
add a small amount of shading where the leaves tuck under the
bird house.

Susan

[Irish]

Step 5: OOOPS! and berry vine stems

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Everyone makes mistakes including me. In the last step I painted
part of an acorn with my evergreen leave color. I cleaned
my brush well and with clean water washed the color as much as
possible out of that area. Not all of the color will lift when
you are working on wood. But enough will come off so that when
I add my acorn color that evergreen will disappear.


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The berry vine stems have recieved one coat of raw sienna.


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A small amount of burnt sienna was added to the raw sienna and
a small amount of shading was added to the vines where the vines
tuck under another element in the design.


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The acorns have a coat of raw sienna to the caps and the raw
sienna/burnt sinna mix on the acorn bodies. Notice that the
evergreen spot has disappeared.

Susan

[Irish]

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A touch more burnt sienna was added to the raw sienna/burnt
sienna mix to make the mix go more to the red hues. This coloring
has been used to shade the sides of the acorns.


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In both of the previous acorn steps you can see that I avoided
the center of the acorns. Since acorns are globe shapes that area
would have highlights. I have thinned chinese white and painted
in those highlights.


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I returned to the raw sienna/umber sienna/burnt sienna mix for
my acorn caps and for inside the bird house hole in the darkest
burned areas of that hole.

Susan

[Irish]

Step 6: Berries

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I have returned to our orange mixture and flooded the holly berries
with that color.


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A small touch of cadmium medium red was used to shade the berries.


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The vine berries are also worked in the orange mixture.


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A small touch of cadmium medium red where the vine berries touch
the vine adds shading.

Susan

[Irish]

Step 7: Coloring the bird house

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By now you should have a second pan of very dirty, mud
colored water where you have been cleaning your brush. This
muddy water was used as my first coating over the inside
section of the bird house and to the bird house post.

Old wood is seldom brown in color. As wood ages it takes on a
gray tone that can also contain touches of green, blue or
raw sienna. So now matter what color your brush cleaning water
is it will add a touch of aged look to the house.


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Raw sienna has been added to the inside section of the house.
This color has been brushed randomly onto the wood to add
small strips of color. Do not paint over all of your muddy
water color.


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The horizontal support sticks have also had a coating of
raw sienna.

Susan

[Irish]

Step 8: Finishing Steps


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Burnt umber has been thinned with water and used over the areas
in the bird house that we darkly shaded with the wood burner.


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The inside of the bird house hole needs one more coat for darkness.
I used burnt umber.


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I have returned to my chinese white and add small dots of highlights
to the vine berries and to the acorn bodies.


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With the painting steps complete I have signed this burning with
a mechanical pencil in the lower right corner. I have also added
the date.

Let your watercolor burning dry over night. Use two to three
light coats of your favorite spray sealer to finish the piece.

Susan