2016 Watercolor Calendar - November

Hello Friends!  We're nearing the end of our watercolor technique calendar ~ just 2 left!  Kind of sad as I have so many fun ideas to share - not enough months in the year - LOL!!  I'll share those later on though.  Today's technique is another fun one, what do you get when you cross watercolors with alcohol?  No, no, not that kind of alcohol!  Rubbing alcohol silly.   

This is what you get!  Amazing colors with an subtle embedded pattern created by the alcohol reacting with the watercolor paint.  Let's take a look at this technique so you can see what I'm talking about.

Start off by applying one or more watercolors to your paper.  It doesn't have to be perfect, just here and there is fine.  The look with change once you add the alcohol.

Immediately, sprinkle on the rubbing alcohol.  I dipped a paint brush into my bottle and initially dripped it onto the paper.  Once I was satisfied with the large droplets I then flicked/splattered the alcohol onto the paper to create small and tiny dots.   The best part about this technique is that it offers instant gratification.  The pattern begins to emerge immediately.  

Your pattern will depend on the colors you choose and how much alcohol you sprinkle on.

Here is another example - top - freshly painted, below - a few sprinkles...it looks like something you'd see in outer space huh?  

Since this is for November I wanted to go with some really intense autumn colors - oranges, reds, purple, browns and I added some golds.  This was my test page using this technique with these colors.  LOVE it!

And here's what the calendar page looked like before adding all of the other goodies.

SUCH a fun technique - 

this is something you could just sit and play with for hours. 

Just experiment and enjoy!