A Beginner's Journey into Watercolor Painting

Welcome to a new instalment in my Beginner's Journey into Watercolor Painting series! Today, I have 10 new watercolors to share with you, all dating back to March-April 2023.

The path. This is the first painting that I completed without putting pressure on myself. I used regular paint for the sky, the path, and the ground, while the flowers and tree were drawn with watercolor brush pens. The scene is quite pretty, despite the weird-looking clouds.

Close to the edge. During my first months of practice, I relied on low-quality paper. This one never did well with the wet-on-wet technique (which happens to be my favorite thing about watercolor). Needless to say that the rocky area had to be painted carefully, so I took it easy with the brush. The lighthouse and the house look good. I might use this painting in a future book.

Tree reflections. As you probably already know, reflections in water are one of my favorite subjects to photograph. Trees being particularly photogenic, I thought that it would be interesting to experiment with them in a painting. For some reason, I always tend to make branches thicker than they should be. Practice will help solve that problem. The shadows were created by applying a light layer of slightly wet paint. I found that this technique helps create a sense of depth. Overall, I'm very happy with my work. It will be used in a future book project!

A sunset. The piece is loosely based on this image. I say loosely because when I started painting it, I felt that the scene lacked movement. The solution was to apply a mix of white / light blue near the rocks. It's one of my favorite paintings so far! It could be framed.

Waves crashing on rocks. When I came across this photo, I was instantly drawn to the idea of painting something similar. My initial excitement quickly died down when I realized that my skills may not be advanced enough to complete the piece successfully. After six or seven hours of intense work, most of which were spent on the right area, things started to take the right shape. The next morning, when the paint was completely dry, I had to pinch myself. I could not believe my hands had made this!

A desert scene. The mountains in the background are the only decent element in this painting. The shaded areas look horrible. But, as you know, my goal is to share the good and the bad with you. LOL!

At low tide, based on a photo I took in Prince Edward Island. Another piece I do not like. And this is the third version! The other two are in the garbage. 😜

The lake. This scene comes directly from my imagination. Done just for fun, nothing fancy.

An evening at the lake. Another terrible painting. No matter how hard I tried, the paint would not spread evenly. As always with my botched work, the exception remains the watery area. That's why you see it today.

Tree reflections (2). One of the easiest and most relaxing paintings I have ever done! I love everything about it. Another piece that will probably end up in a book!

That's it for today. See you next time for more paintings from yours truly.

Want to see more of my work? Check out my other posts below:

• Part 1
• Part 2
• Part 3
• Part 4
• Part 5
• Part 6

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I hope you enjoyed this post. What is your favorite watercolor in the list? Do you paint? If so, show me some of your work.

Oh, and by the way, if you are a writer, author, or artist, I would love to hear from you. Click the link below for more information.

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Cendrine Marrouat is a writer, photographer, podcaster, blogger, anthology editor, and the co-founder of Auroras & Blossoms and A Warm Cup of Cozy. She has authored and co-authored more than 40 books, including The Train: A Short Story (2023), In Her Own Words: A Collection of Short Stories & Flashku (2022), After the Fires of Day: Haiku Inspired by Kahlil Gibran & Alphonse de Lamartine (2021), Rhythm Flourishing: A Collection of Kindku and Sixku (2020), Walks: A Collection of Haiku (2019-2020), and In the Silence of Words: A Three-Act Play (2018).

Cendrine's work has appeared in many publications. She is the creator of the Sixku, Flashku, Sepigram, and Reminigram; as well as the co-creator of the Kindku, Pareiku, Vardhaku, and Hemingku.