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What paper I use and why
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Recommended document size regarding Pixels per inch (ppi) for digital watercolour
- Choosing a paper texture before you start to paint
- Why you want to reduce the dye concentration before you print your digital watercolour
- What approximate settings to use to reduce the dye concentration of your painting before printing it
- Pros and cons of adding a non-destructive Paper Texture that remains as you paint
- How to add a non-destructive paper texture * link to a tutorial on how to do this
- Lifting Canvas to Watercolour Layer and Wetting Entire WC layer helps the texture look more cohesive
Why I use Red River's Aurora Fine Art Paper
I have been using the
Red River Aurora Fine Art paper (White and Natural) for several years now and my results are crisp and more like traditionally painted watercolours. I tried Epson's Radiant White Watercolour and liked the results with this technique as well, but it only comes in 13 in. x 19 in. paper and is more expensive ($1.32 per sheet) than the Red River Aurora White ($1.25 per sheet). Many people have said to me that they can’t tell my art work was not painted with real watercolours.
M
y other goal is to make my artwork available at a price more people can realistically afford in these tough economic times. I strongly believe we all need art and beauty in our lives to nourish our souls and I am heartened by the resurgence of the act of creating. It is clearly becoming more important in many peoples lives as evidenced by the explosion of people communicating about it on the internet.
About Red River Aurora Fine Art Paper: an excerpt directly from Red River Website
Taken from Red River website Jan. 20, 2011
Recommended Document Size regarding Pixels Per Inch
When I wrote this article originally I was still painting at a higher resolution (300 ppi) and recommended lowering the resolution of your document to 100 ppi (pixels per inch) before adding texture to get a more realistic watercolour textured paper. Since then I have started painting at 100 ppi because the watercolour brush variants (both digital and wet watercolour) work much better at this resolution. They tend to be way too slow at higher resolutions as well.
Choosing a Paper Texture for Digital Watercolours
The following illustration shows a 5 in. x 5 in. document at 100 ppi with the Italian Watercolour Textured paper chosen. The brush strokes were done with the default Digital New Simple Water brush. It's difficult to see here, but if you zoom in on it you can see the slightly bumpy texture of the watercolour paper.
It is important to have the correct kind of paper chosen for your painting because some of the brushes react with the grain of the paper. Typically brushes that have the word "grainy' in them do. You may use quite a few custom brushes that don't have this word in their labels still, but are dependent upon a paper texture for a certain look.
Some Examples of Different Paper Textures Chosen
To illustrate why it makes a big difference in the look of your painting look a the examples below.
Why You Want to Reduce the Dye Concentration of your painting before printing
This step is very crucial. Even after figuring out how to use colour profiles and experimenting with different papers, my results were still too dark and lifeless. Increasing brightness and reducing contrast in Tonal Effects either lightened it too much, or not enough, and was too dependent upon the original being a certain tonal level as well. So, I tried reducing the Dye Concentration which is found in Effects/Surface Control/Dye Concentration as shown in the next illustration.
The results were much more like what I could see on my monitor and more like the colour intensity of most watercolour paintings. Of course, this is a matter of taste and preference.
The settings I use to reduce the dye concentration to achieve an authentic watercolour look
I use the Uniform Colour Setting and the values at approximately 80-85 %/40-45%. This setting lightens the colours uniformly and gives me a dye concentration that prints more like the original dye setting before it was reduced. If you have found your prints coming out darker than on your monitor try this.
Pros and Cons of adding additional texture to your digital watercolours before printing
If you have painted your watercolour without having added a non-destructive texture that remains as you paint and are happy with the appearance of your painting without added texture, reducing the dye concentration may be all that is needed.
If, however, you can see areas that do have some texture and areas that are totally blended this will, in my opinion, detract from the cohesive appearance of your painting. Lifting the Canvas to the Watercolour Layer and Wetting Entire WC layer can help with smoothing out areas like this. This technique is outlined in another tutorial found
here.
Lately I have found that wetting the canvas layer very slightly and applying a very light watercolour texture gives me the best look when printed. Too much texture and wetness can make the print look muddy. You can experiment with these techniques to find the best levels for your paintings and the look you want to achieve.
As always, if you have any comments or questions please feel free to comment or contact me and I will be happy to help if I can.
