Line and Wash: Balance

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Lesson Description

The importance of balancing the mediums of watercolor and pen and ink. In this lesson, we create a line and wash drawing of a paint tube.

Lesson Materials

140 lb hot press watercolor paper, masking tape, soft graphite pencil, sharpened pencil or pen, technical drawing pen, kneaded eraser, watercolor paints, nylon or sable brush, water.

Lesson Resources

Download eBook

Contour Line Drawing (to transfer)

Reference Image

Course Curriculum

Lesson 1: Introduction and Materials (4:50)Lesson 2: Balance (19:05)Lesson 3: Two Approaches (24:53)Lesson 4: Pen and Ink Techniques (34:01)Lesson 5: Watercolor Techniques (12:14)Lesson 6: Still Life Part 1 (17:01)Lesson 7: Still Life - Part 2 (19:11)Lesson 8: Landscape - Part 1 (7:46)Lesson 9: Landscape - Part 2 (13:52)Lesson 10: Portraiture - Part 1 (17:34)Lesson 11: Portraiture - Part 2 (10:53)Lesson 12: Conclusion (1:22)

Lesson Discussion

  2. Good morning Matt.
    I am hooked. So I upgraded to your lessons. Cannot think of a better forum to learn and expand my knowledge. Thanks to the internet and your effort, approach and ease of use.

    • Hi Dianne,

      Welcome! This is a new course. We release course modules as they are made. The next modules in this course will be released when they are created – usually every week or so.

  8. Thanks Matt – that is so good to know. I wasn’t sure how to bring ink and watercolour together successfully. Is there a way that we can change the speed settings on your videos? I have tried before and couldn’t find the setting. With limited time, it’s sometimes good to be able to play a bit faster. Regards, Anne

  10. Great new format. Looking forward to future lessons. Question: Would a watercolor painting with ink still be considered a watercolor painting or mixed media?

  11. Matt,
    You are GOOD…not that I had any doubts but this was a great module. I was glad that you fast-forwarded us through some parts as the lesson would be too long or even tedious if we needed to watch you make every stroke. But you included just enough to see how it is done and the use of the three renderings was very helpful in picturing what you mean by “balance”. Look forward to the next one. (Hope you didn’t get hit too hard by the storm.)

  12. Matt,
    Great videos.

    I have a question. Silver: in mixing cobalt blue, ultramarine, and burnt umber and add burnt umber I can’t get silver. What am I doing wrong?
    Thanks,

    • Hi Adam,

      Sorry I’m late to addressing your question. We are mixing a dark gray here instead of a silver. The reason I say this is because it’s a little easier to think of it that way. The white of the paper should show through in areas to produce a grayish color. The look of silver, or any other metallic surface, is the result of positioning light and dark values. With highly reflective surfaces, the dark and light values are often found right beside each other without much transition between tones.

  13. Hello Matt,

    Would you suggest the Watercolor course first and then the Line and Wash? I’ve been working my way through the graphite & colored pencils and haven’t got to the Watercolor portion yet.

    Thanks Gary

  17. Thanks Matt. I have just started the 7 day trial period and already after watching the first 2 videos on Pen and Wash I can see I am really going to learn something here. Today I have tidied up and reorganized my Art Corner in the Sitting-Room ready for these lessons. So I start by drawing and painting these tubes tomorrow. Thanks again for your very detailed and well explained lesson.

  18. hi there Matt; I’ve just signed up and am trying to watch this video but it wont play. it stops 1 minute in and will not continue to stream after that. any suggestions? kindest regards, mary from Australia 😊

    • Hi Mary,

      (I just responded to another user in Australia experiencing this same issue.) The videos are presented in 1080p High Definition by default – some are presented in 4K. For some lessons, these files are very large and can cause buffering. If you are experiencing buffering (or the stopping of the video playing), you can change the quality settings. To do so, scroll over the video player with your mouse and click on the small gear icon in the lower corner. Choose a lower quality and the video should play without issue. Keep in mind, that right now during the virus isolation, internet service providers, websites and video hosting providers are very strained and in many areas, the connection to the internet is throttled or overloaded. This will also cause the videos to buffer.

      • Thanks Matt, it seems to be working much better now 👍🤗 my trial ends tomorrow but ill definitely be continuing 😁 I love the courses 🙏😉 thanks for making them!

  19. Hello Matt! I have already learned a lot from just these first two lessons in this course. I haven’t viewed or perused through the remaining lessons yet, so I don’t know if my question will be addressed later… Well, is this course about achieving balance with watercolor and ink? The 3rd picture of the color tube would seem alright if you used just one color minus any tint or shade??? I haven’t yet started this lesson project, but will shortly. I’m eager to try this! I’m also going to test out my question… and see what happens. Many thanks from Georgia.

  22. Hello Matt. I just started and subscribed for the year. It seems I cannot download the ebook and other drawing for the line and wash lessons. How come? Do I have to wait?

    • Hi Anne Marie,

      The link to download the ebook is under the resources tab under the video. If the ebook doesn’t open for you when you click on the link, make sure you are using a browser that can read PDF files or right-click on the link and choose “Download file as”. You don’t have to wait and there is nothing more to buy.

  24. Hi Matt,

    I love to re-visit courses. This one, I have passed some time ago. Since I love colors but struggle how to gain more control by using water color washes, the pen & ink is the perfect match achieving it.

    Again, thank you so much for teaching art and creating all these materials.
    Buddy

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