Tag Archives: Watercolor Techniques

Setting New Creative Goals with Watercolor Landscapes

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  • Day 1 – Night Falls
  • Day 3 – Dusky Skyline
  • Day 4 – Beach Bonfire
  • Day 5 – Golden Wood

It’s hard to believe we’re already into November, with Thanksgiving just around the corner. As I start looking ahead to next year, I’m setting some exciting goals for my art journey—planning both what I want to accomplish and the new techniques I’m eager to explore.

One of my personal goals is to complete a watercolor landscape in my journal each week. I’m a huge fan of Kolbie Blume, the talented artist behind This Writing Desk. Her books—Wilderness Watercolor Landscapes, Stunning Watercolor Seascapes, and Mastering Light in Watercolor—are my go-to guides for inspiration and technique. With all three on my shelf, I’ve decided to challenge myself to paint through each one, creating a new piece from her books each week until I’ve explored them all.

The paintings shown here were inspired by an online art challenge Kolbie hosted last year, which was a fantastic learning experience. I’m excited to dive back into her work and continue learning, especially as I build my skills in capturing the beauty of nature with watercolor.

If you haven’t checked out Kolbie’s work, I highly recommend it. Her books, website, and YouTube channel offer fantastic tutorials for watercolor lovers at any level. I hope this inspires you to set your own creative challenges for the upcoming year!

Wishing you a wonderful weekend filled with inspiration! 🌄✨

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Exploring Dark Watercolors in Abstract Art

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I decided to try something a little different in my 5.5×8.5″ watercolor journal. For this practice painting, I worked mostly with darker watercolors (shown above-left) instead of my usual brighter palette (shown above-right). I love how bold it turned out and how the brighter colors really pop against the deeper tones.

What didn’t quite meet my expectations was the neon-colored paint pens I used—they didn’t stand out as much as I’d hoped. One challenge with watercolor abstracts is that the paint moves and lifts when wet, which can cause those vibrant colors to get a bit muddied.

Still, it was a great practice piece, and I enjoyed the process. That said, I definitely prefer a lighter, brighter background for my work. How about you—do you lean towards bold and dark, or light and bright?

I hope this inspires your creative muse this weekend! Thanks for stopping by!!

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“Creativity is seeing what others see and thinking what no one else have ever thought.” ~Albert Einstein