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How to Lift Out Watercolor - Tutorial |
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Use this technique to lift out watercolor that is wet, damp or dry. |
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You'll need a clean, moist brush and a dampened tissue. |
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![]() Lifting out using the flat side of the brush. |
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![]() Lifting out using the tip edge of the brush. |
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How to lift-out color using the flat side of your brush. With your clean, moist brush, make several brush strokes in the area where you want to lift out the watercolor. Wipe the watercolor from your brush onto the dampened portion of your tissue. Repeat the brush strokes. If you need to remove more color, rinse out your brush, blot it on the tissue, then lift out more color. Wipe the watercolor on your tissue. Repeat as needed. |
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How to lift-out color using the tip of your brush. If you want to lift out narrow lines, shape the tip of your brush into a chisel edge with your thumb and forefinger. Using short brush strokes, lift out a line of watercolor, then blot your brush on your dampened tissue. |
How to Scrub Out Watercolor - Tutorial |
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Use this technique to remove watercolor from an area that has already dried. |
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You'll need a stiff-bristled brush and a dry tissue. |
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![]() Scrubbing out using the tip of the brush. |
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![]() Scrubbing out using the flat side of the brush. |
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How to scrub-out color using the tip of your brush. Wet your stiff brush and tap it once lightly on the side of your water container. With the tip of your brush, lightly scrub the area, using continuous overlapping brush strokes. Take your dry tissue and blot up the excess watercolor from the scrubbed-out area. Remove the watercolor from your brush by thumping it on the bottom of your water container. If you need to remove more color, repeat these steps. | |||||
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How to scrub-out color using the flat side of your brush. Use the same method as when scrubbing out color with the tip of your brush, but now using the flat side of your brush. You can remove color with continuous downward overlapping brush strokes, or side to side overlapping brush strokes. For best results, remove the color only in one direction. Otherwise, you will be dragging color back into the area that you already removed color from. |
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How to Tissue Blot Watercolor - Tutorial |
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Tissue blotting is an easy way to lighten the value of an area you have just painted; it can add texture to your painting. How much watercolor is lifted depends on how wet or damp your wash is or the amount of pressure applied to your tissue. In the examples below, the top row of squares shows the results when you tissue-blot on a wet watercolor wash. The bottom row shows the results when you tissue-blot on a damp watercolor wash. |
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![]() Dried color |
![]() Using very light pressure |
![]() Using light pressure |
![]() Using firm pressure |
Results on Wet Wash Results on Damp Wash |
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Take a dry tissue and crumple it in your hand. This breaks up the stiffness of the tissue. If you are blotting to create texture, crumple it more. |
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Press the tissue to the wet area to blot up the amount of watercolor you want lifted. As you can see from the sample above, firm pressure on a wet wash can lighten a watercolor's value considerably. |
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