Snow Capped mountains

Continuing on the Watercolor academy of Art Tutor, in the last exercise I created a couple of simple snow scenes. I painted in the sky first, laying down a layer of phthalo blue on wet paper (around the mountain itself), then letting it dry, re-wetting and adding a thin mix of ultramarine and permanent rose to darken the atmosphere a bit.

It’s important to leave the mountain white, and gradually add in snow shades using cobalt + ultramarine + permanent rose. Lost and hard edges are vital to “form” the snow coverage itself. The last step is to use a dry-brush effect with some really thick burnt umber, varied and darkened with ultramarine blue to create a sense of 3d shapes in the rocks. As simple as it is, give it a go 🙂

By the way, the first one should be the Matterhorn…I guess! 😀