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Author: Arnold_Lowrey, Contributing Editor
| Dry into Wet
If you paint an area of paper using “wet on dry” above and then squeeze all the water out of your brush, you are able to lift the paint off the paper. This is because you are using a “thirsty brush” i.e. there is less water in your brush than is on the paper. The water travels from the paper back into the brush leaving an area of paper dryer than that surrounding it. (This is the same effect as wringing out a sponge and soaking water out of a puddle.) |  |
| If you now repeat this, but having squeezed all the water out of your brush, you pick up some neat pigment (no water!) and paint it into the wet, you will find that you can place it accurately without it flowing all over the place. Water has, again, traveled back into your brush so that the new painted area is dryer than its surroundings.
Watch how the wet area tries to attack the dryer area and softens the edges. This is ideal for those soft-edged misty trees in the background of your landscapes or soft reflections. To lighten the tonal value of the added colour, drag out some of the pigment from your brush onto a dry piece of paper before applying. This will ensure the brush stays “thirsty”. (Paper wet but virtually no water in the brush) |
| The Half-loaded brush - Mingling
Dry into wet techniques tend to replace the existing paint with the new, so if you wish to create an area (say skies) by accurately painting into another whilst the paper is still wet, this method is the only way it can be done. Mix your first colour with water (on a flat palette) to a suitable tonal value. Paint this first colour on the surface wet on dry. Clean you palette and repeat this with the next colour. If necessary thin the colour with water so that tonal value is near the first colour. However, before you pick up the paint, squeeze out your brush, then pick up the wet paint with one sweep only. The brush loads from one side of your brush and is half loaded. This allows you to paint the new colour into the wet area without it flowing all over the place. You have total control. This action can be repeated as many times as you like as long as you keep the paper wet. All the different pigments mingle down to one layer and you keep the resulting luminosity. |
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| What about “Cauliflowers” (back runs)?
These are caused by painting wet paint into half dry areas. The water in the new paint leaches into the old causing strange light shapes. This often accidentally when water drips off your brush into a newly painted area which is “damp dry”. Do not, ever, try to paint this out while it is still wet – you only feed the cauliflower with more water and it gets worse. Here you can see where a drop of water accidentally was dropped into an area of half dry paint. |  |
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