5 tips for watercolour landscape painting
ondine de perettiWhen you first start out with watercolour, it isn’t always easy to know what to focus on when looking at a landscape or a photo. Whether you want to capture a memory or create a unique interpretation, making those first creative choices can be daunting.
I wrote this article to share my tips on how to adapt a landscape or a photograph into a watercolour painting with ease. You'll also learn how to choose the right colours and simplify the composition so you can focus on what really matters and faithfully capture what you see.
Here are my 5 tips for painting watercolour landscapes:
- Preparing your colour palette in advance
- Moving away from realistic colours (using a seascape example)
- Defining your composition
- Creating a brush sketch
- Stepping away from the reference photo
Tip 1: Prepare your colour palette in advance
Preparing your palette beforehand ensures your colours will harmonise beautifully. It also allows you to mix your washes in advance, freeing your mind from "colour stress" so you can focus entirely on the painting process.
If you’re a beginner, here are a few tricks for creating a balanced palette.
Limit yourself to 5 colours
This is the first step to simplifying a landscape. Using a limited palette creates harmony by linking different elements together. For example, the blue of the sea can be the same as the blue of the sky, just in a lighter wash. Every plane or detail should "respond" to another area of the painting. In the following example, you’ll see how I used the same colours in multiple places to create overall cohesion. Finally, it’s much easier to stay focused when you aren't juggling too many different mixes.
Balance your tones and intensities
Aim for a mix of light, dark, vibrant, and muted (dull) colours. Generally, the darkest and most intense colours are reserved for details, while backgrounds and large areas work best in softer, mid-to-light tones.
In watercolour, using too much water can make it hard to achieve deep, dark tones, often resulting in a "washed-out" look. To avoid this, use very little water to activate your pans and choose a fine brush to keep the moisture levels in your mix low.
✍️ I go into more detail on this concept in my article on watercolour techniques for beginners.
Here are three paintings that illustrate the importance of mixing vibrant and muted colours. The first two watercolours are interesting and showcase certain effects that some artists look for, but for a more traditional style, the final one is the most balanced.
An extract from my 'Colours & Landscapes' course, illustrating the importance of mixing saturated (vibrant) and desaturated (muted) colours to create a balanced palette.
I also invite you to check out my YouTube tutorials, where I explain my colour choices in every video. In particular, you might enjoy this one, where I paint a soft, imaginary watercolour landscape and show how I use the same colours across different areas of the painting.and show how I use the same colours across different areas of the painting.
Tip 2: Moving away from realistic colours – The Seascape Example
Often, the colours in a photograph are less vibrant than we imagine. To illustrate this, let’s look at how I selected my colours for a coastal scene.
I took this photo in Brittany. When you extract the colours and place them below the image, it’s striking how muted they actually are (I recommend using Coolors for this kind of extraction).
In the first example, I used a palette faithful to the photo: Indigo, Warm Grey, Chromium Oxide Green, Burnt Green Earth, and Phthalo Blue. To my taste, the result is a bit dull. I decided to swap some of these muted tones for vibrant ones to add contrast and light.
The second result used:
- An Olive Green: not strictly "accurate," but very luminous.
- A Phthalo Turquoise: also bright, used to wake up the sea.
- Custom mixes: Indigo + Phthalo Turquoise, and Payne’s Grey + Olive Green to tie everything together.
- A Warm Grey for the beach.
By "pushing" one or two colours while keeping some desaturated (muted) tones, you can create intensity and light without making the landscape look garish.
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🎨🖌️If you enjoy creating your own balanced and impactful palettes, I’ve dedicated a large part of my Colours & Landscapes course to this very topic.
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Tip 3: Defining the composition
Before you put brush to paper, you need to think about composition. A few basic rules can guide you toward a layout that works every time.
The Rule of Thirds
This is the most essential technique. Imagine your paper is divided into a 9-box grid by two vertical and two horizontal lines. You should place your main subject at one of the four points where these lines intersect.
The Rule of Thirds also helps with the horizon line: place it on the top horizontal line if you want to focus on the ground/sea, or the bottom line if you want to showcase a dramatic sky. If your photo doesn't follow this rule, don't be afraid to crop it!
The power of the Crop
Phone photos are often too "wide," and the subject gets lost. In the lighthouse example, the original composition makes the lighthouse look tiny, leaving the eye to wander over rocks and sand. By zooming in and cropping, we make the lighthouse the star of the show.
An extract from my 'Colours & Landscapes' course, from the lesson 'The core rules of composition'.
🎨🖌️ To find out more about how I break down a photograph, check out my free mini course. In it, I analyse three photos, create two colour palettes, and finally, show you how to paint one of the scenes.
Tip 4: The "Brush Sketch" stage
This stage is about being guided by what you see rather than following a rigid plan. In my sketch, I started with the lighthouse because it was the element that interested me most, then filled in the surrounding shapes with colour.
This allows me to see which areas I want to detail later. You’ll notice I again pushed the colours: Royal Blue, Olive Green, Warm Grey, Light Grey, Caput Mortuum, and Vermilion.
Once this sketch is done, you can establish your final plan: a first layer for the background, followed by details, making sure to leave "whites" or light areas for highlights.
Trouville lighthouse
Tip 5: Break free from the photo
Now that your palette is set and your composition is defined, put the photo away.
What remains in your mind is what you truly want to convey. This helps you simplify the landscape and stick to the essentials. Rely on your palette, your preliminary sketch, and your memory to create a painting that feels like you.
If you stay "glued" to the photo, you lose the big-picture vision you worked so hard to build. You’ll be tempted to add unnecessary details or extra colours. Trust your preparation and let the photo go!
🎨🖌️To take things further, discover my Colours & Landscapes online course. We explore colour balance, composition, and photo interpretation! And if you’re just starting out with watercolour, I’ve created a dedicated beginner's course focusing on the basics of watercolour through minimalist landscapes.
Ready to start? Let me know in the comments which of these tips helped you the most!
