How to Paint Clouds With Watercolors

Clouds help to create the illusion of depth and depending on the type and color of the clouds, can give a painting a sense of season and location. Painting clouds is not always an easy task due to their ungraspable shapes, but the beauty of painting is that each artist can portray them differently.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Watercolor paints Paintbrushes Watercolor paper Cup Paper towel or cloth

1. Study clouds in real life before painting. This will help you to capture them with your paintbrush by understanding their movement and forms. The "Cloudspotter's Guide," by Gavin Pretor-Pinney is a great reference.

2. 
    
   Cirrus clouds

   Soften your brushes if at all stiff by resting their tips in water for a few minutes. Create cirrus clouds, also known to many as "mare's tails," by using long, soft brush strokes. If using dry watercolor paints, wet them. If using wet watercolors, such as Chinese watercolors, then squeeze a dab of blue and white onto a pallet. Mix a small pool of water with a tiny dab of blue and white and create long wispy strokes that curve slightly up at one end as this is usually how these clouds form in real life. Experiment with different intensities of color and several thicknesses of strokes.

3. 
    
   Mackerel sky

   Paint altocumulus or cirrocumulus clouds, also known as mackerel sky, by creating multiple short dabs. These clouds tend to make the sky appear as if it's rippling and also often pick up soft hues such as pink or gold in a sunset. Start by mixing water with white, pink and a tiny dab of blue. Create dabs with the brush in a sideways motion, close together like the scales of a fish. Then as you work your way across the sky let the paint slowly run out, making the brush marks less and less distinct. This creates the effect of the wind pushing away the formation.

4. 
    
   Cumulus clouds

   Paint cumulus, the puffy, cotton candy clouds, by using a large brush. Fan brushes are useful in this case. Mix a slight amount of pink and blue, creating a soft lavender, and literally think of cotton balls as you make fluffy round strokes with your brush, letting the color pool slightly here and there to create shadows and densities within the clouds.

5. Highlight or shadow your clouds with different colors. Clouds can reflect many colors; using multiple hues gives the painting a time of day, or even a time of year, and helps to evoke the emotion you wish the painting to convey. More color is more dramatic, but gray clouds, depending on how they are painted, can have their effect, too.

Tips & Warnings

• Experiment with painting clouds that are out of the ordinary. Try painting a lentinular, thunderhead or mamma clouds, which are the udder-like protrusions than can form below a cumulonimbus anvil.

Resources

• Watercolor Supplies