Easy Watercolor Sunset Landscape | Relaxing Step-by-Step Painting for Beginners, by Painted Under Starlight on YouTube. 11 min 52 s.
- Video length
- 11 min 52 s
- Time to do it
- 45 minutes
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Steps
- 9
What you need
Steps
Tape your watercolor paper to a board and draw a light pencil line about a third of the way up. This is your horizon.
Wet the whole sky area with clean water. Drop yellow near the horizon, then orange and pink higher up. Tilt the board so the colors blend.
While the sky is still damp, add soft cloud shapes with a clean damp brush and a little pink or violet. Leave white paper for the glow.
Mix ultramarine blue with a touch of burnt sienna for a grey blue. Paint the far mountain ridge with a pale wash, then a darker ridge in front.
While the mountains are still damp, tap small vertical strokes along the horizon for distant trees. Keep the edges soft and broken.
Wet the water area below the horizon. Pull the sky colors down in flat horizontal strokes, keeping the paint lighter near the horizon line.
Paint broken horizontal strokes of mountain color under each ridge for reflections. Leave gaps of dry paper so the water looks like it is shimmering.
Mix a dark earthy wash from burnt sienna and blue. Paint a loose band along the bottom for the foreground, then add a few grass strokes.
Let the painting dry completely, then peel the tape off at a low angle. Press the sheet under a heavy book to flatten it.
Tips and common mistakes
Keep a scrap of the same paper nearby to test each color before it goes on the sky.
Stop touching a wash once it starts to dry, or the paper will lift and the color will go muddy.
Dry each layer with a hairdryer on the cool setting if you want sharper mountain edges.
Load the brush with plenty of water but never let a puddle sit on the paper, or you will get hard blooms.
Questions
Do I need special watercolor paint for this?
No. A basic pan set with yellow, orange, pink, blue and burnt sienna covers the whole painting.
How do I stop the sky from turning muddy?
Use plenty of water, keep brush strokes to a minimum and let each color drop in instead of scrubbing.
How long does the painting take?
About 45 minutes including drying time, or less if you dry each layer with a hairdryer.
This guide was drafted from the video's details and general task knowledge. It has not been checked against the full video. Check the video and relevant product instructions before following a procedure. Report a correction.
