Painting a Watercolour Mountain Landscape

My first step is the preparation. I apply masking tape on all four edges of my paper and place all the materials, brushes, clean water and towels nearby.

I then splash my watercolours with clean water so they will be soft and ready for painting.

I begin with a basic pencil sketch onto the watercolour paper. It is not very detailed – just the edges of the peaks are enough.

I begin the painting with the sky. I carefully wet the paper in the sky area with clean water and apply the watercolour.

The violet-grey colour of the sky is made with cobalt blue hue mixed with cadmium orange, the bottom part of the sunset – with Naples yellow and rose madder, the splashes of blue sky in the centre – with phthalo sapphire blue. To make it more realistic I add a drop of rose madder to the upper part in the grey wash. After finishing the wash I let the paper dry. Sometimes I speed the drying with a hair dryer, other times I let it dry naturally by waiting.

When I start again I work with the base colour of the snow – I’ve chosen a mix of ultramarine and cadmium red orange for the distant mountains. Approaching to the nearest mountain, I use the previous mix of ultramarine and cadmium red orange with a little cobalt blue and rose madder. The closest peak, covered with snow, I have left as just white paper.

I next begin painting the rocks and shadows on the distant mountains. For these rocks the colour is a mix of ultramarine and indigo. I also use the same colour for just a few dots on the tops of the far mountains to create the feeling of shadows. For this part I also use the dry-brush technique.

Next I move to the stones in the closer mountain range. The technique is the same, the colours here are a mix of indigo and sepia.

And again, I used this technique with the closest peaks and stones, the colour here is pure sepia.

Next, I work with the closest peak that is covered with snow. I want the snow to be just white paper, so it’s critically important not to cover it with any colour – so I just paint a little shadow on the snow in the left edge with a mix of ultramarine and cadmium red orange. The big rocks are painted with a mix of sepia and transparent brown. After I paint this, I cover all of the work except this white area with spare sheets of paper and spatter the watercolour with the same colour. I then let it dry naturally – if you use a hair dryer on this step, the dots of paint can crawl away.

Finally I look at the painting and compare it to the reference photo and take note of any areas I want to modify. I’ve added some more dark spots and used opaque white in some places to create a more interesting image.

The finished painting after removing the masking tape – voila!