Crabapple Watercolor

CRABAPPLE WATERCOLOR PAINTING

Take a walk through the Garden or in your neighborhood and look for crabapples. Create a drawing from life or use the photos provided. Use a pencil to draw a light sketch on watercolor paper a few crabapples and a couple leaves. You could also include the branch or stems.

1.      Use a pencil to draw the outline of your crabapples. Use curved lines to draw the crab apples and leaves. Crabapples are spherical but not perfectly round, they’re sort of oblong in shape. It is important to look at your subject matter more than your paper to capture a likeness. Draw the outline of a few leaves and a few interior lines for the veins in the leaves.

2.      Use watercolors to paint in the colors of your crabapples and leaves. Use yellows, reds, greens, blues, browns, and white (for example alizarin crimson, cadmium red, cadmium yellow, lemon yellow, viridian, sap green, cerulean blue, yellow ochre, burnt sienna, burnt umber, and white).

3.      Layer colors as you paint but remember that layering will mix the colors together, so choose your color combinations carefully. For example, if you layer opposite colors on the color wheel like red and green, they will mix and become brown. Try working with layering colors that are on the same side of the color wheel like yellows and reds to keep colors from getting muddy.

4.      Use browns and blues to create shadows on your leaves and crab apples. You can also use a variety of reds and oranges to mix the colors of your crabapples. Some crabapples also appear a little waxy or muted so adding some white to your reds will help achieve that color and effect.

5.      Once you have colors you like on your painting begin adding details, such as the crown like sepals at the base or the long cherry like stems. Look for highlights and use white and yellows to create lighter areas, you may also notice a few spots on your apple and can use reds or browns to paint some on top.

6.      Lastly you may want to go over the top of your painting once it’s dry with a black fine tip pen such as a Pilot V5 or V7 pen. You can use the pen to add details as well, draw outlines, or interior lines on your painting.

Crabapples are edible straight from the tree, although they are quite tart and a little sour. Many people use crabapples to make jellies or juice. Crabapples come in many colors including red, yellow, and green. Crabapples are part of the Malus genus and in the family Rosaceae.