You know how I always say thst shadows give depth and make a drawing pop. Well, too much shadow will kill the drawing! Or it will make it frown at you. This was all fine, until I decided to go bold on the shadows and added a darker value on top of what was already nice and pretty. That is how one learns.
This is an English cottage sketched from a book reference. @monikozi
@monikozi You did a great job of rendering this darling cottage. Shadows are a challenge. What I've noticed that many artists make their shadows a color vs grey as we see with our eyes.
@theredcamera Thank you, Ellen. I did mix my own grey with a touch more on the violet side. I've been advised to go bolder with my shadows. And I did. And I am totally disappointed. But I learned something: that hanemuhle booklet takes well watercolour and i should step back every now and then to look at the result. Perhaps it isn't just the shadows. I don't know.
@monikozi Not sure what it is that you don’t like about this. The windows especially are so believable you do such a remarkable job with them. I’m trying to find Where there is too much shadow in this painting and I can’t find it. Nicely done
@grammyn@summerfield Thank you very much for your encouraging comments. Overnight I found out what the problem is. The shadow is too dark on the white of the windows. White in the shadow is not as dark as brick in the shadow. If you look closely at the reference photo, the shadow below the rim of the roof is almost black. But not so on the frames of the windows. Now that I solved the mystery, I can try to fix it by lifting a bit of the colour from the window frames, or draw the scene all over again, and paying attention to this detail.
I also came to the conclusion that those bushes lack some depth. But that is another story and another lesson.
I also came to the conclusion that those bushes lack some depth. But that is another story and another lesson.