Loose watercolor daffodils and bumble bees for beginners: an easy semi-abstract watercolour flower-studded landscape tutorial using a variety of watercolors plus watercolor pencils, as well as getting started with paint color choice and mixing.
A good way for beginners to get started with loose watercolor is to play with semi-abstract designs. No painting needs to be an exact replica of the real thing, and in fact using your imagination to create fantasy paintings is one of the most rewarding ways to start your art journey.
You can use any medium and any colors, and the composition and other elements of making a painting are reduced in this type of semi-abstract loose watercolor.
A new way to start! When you are deciding what to paint, and how to go about it, one way is to look through your tubes of paint and mentally paint a picture using your colors. Of course, if you are painting loose you will probably want to use paint from a tube, which will be looser and freer than a tiny pan of hardened paint. That’s why I prefer tubes, although I do also have pans which I use for smaller more detailed paintings, and if I am traveling.
In order to paint my subject of Springtime Daffodils and Bumble Bees in Loose Watercolor, I decided on a motif of a beehive, some bumble bees and some daffodils in a grassy setting, and set about choosing yellows, greens and blues for the flowers, leaves and bees. I decided to stick in the yellow/green range to avoid any muddiness, as I have a strong tendency to mess up daffodils which I try to put in the shadows.
Sketching the beehive is good practice for perspective drawing, but you can use my sketch to speed things up if you like. As well, you can practice drawing the bees and flowers, as you don’t need to make them in any way accurate. Just use your imagination!
Download the sketch of Springtime Daffodils and Bumble Bees in Loose Watercolor.
Materials for Springtime Daffodils and Bumble Bees in Loose Watercolor
9 x 12 inch sheet of 140lb watercolor paper
Selection of yellow watercolor paints in tubes
Plus cobalt blue, black and sap green watercolors
Ceramic palette or dishes
Size 8 or larger watercolor brush, round, synthetic
Selection of yellow and green watercolor pencils
Regular HB pencil and eraser