Urban Watercolor Sketching: A Guide to Drawing, Painting, and Storytelling in Color

Love the details and commentary in this book. Great for beginners who want to get used to the techniques and language. Each topic presented in short spurts with easy to understand language.

The drawings are inspiring, not intimidating. The text is extremely helpful. You are never talked down to. You will find a gem in every paragraph.

TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRO Watercolors—In or Out? A Painting for the Emperor Gum Arabic: Where the Watercolors Grow Pigments: The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of Yellow and Orange: Of Camels and Crocuses Red and Purple: Of Bugs and Snails Blue: Of Lapis Lazuli, Indigo, and Woad Green: Of Plants and Poison Introducing Color to Sketches: We’re Not in Kansas Anymore FIRST ATTEMPTS Multiple Choice: To Design Is to Decide From Dusk till Dawn: Shadows and Light Black Is Back: Glazing with India Ink Layer for Layer: The Glaze Mixing Colors with Glazes Fish Soup: Practicing the Glaze The Wash: The Paint Does as It Pleases! On the Run: Graded Wash Techniques Once More, with Feeling!: Washes It’s a Give and Take: Applying and Removing Paint Wet-on-Wet Combining Techniques: A Little Bit of This and That EXCURSION IN COLOR THEORY Where Do Colors Come From?: The Simple Science Arranging Colors Opposites Attract: Color Contrasts From South Park to Stoplights: Types of Color True Color: The Effect of Light Every Color Tells a Story: Intensifying Your Sketches It’s All Relative: The Effects of Colors Color Harmonies: Simple and Complex Analogous, Monochromatic, and Complementary Harmonies Triadic and Tetradic Harmonies Cool-Cool and Warm-Warm Harmonies Collecting Colors Designing Color Harmonies: Working with Color Code Strips Getting Out of Your Color Comfort Zone The Blue Ridge Mountains: Color and Perspective YOUR OWN STYLE Less Is More Me, Myself, and I: Finding Your Own Style Style and Creativity Throwing Down: Loosening Up Your Painting Seek Not and You Shall Find: Imagination vs. Internet Make It Matter Priorities BASICS / TOOLS Paintboxes Watercolor Pencils Buying Paints Mixing Paints Impossible Hues: Bright Colors Pimping Watercolors: Making Colors Pop Liquid Watercolors: Bright Now, Pale Later Into the Wild: Brushes Even More Brushes Paper The Permanent Wave: Stretching Paper The Contents of My Bag OUT & ABOUT Bad Weather: Painting Outdoors The Other Viewpoint: Changing Perspective Painting Water Air, Fog, Smoke Smog and Atmosphere What Is Beauty Anyway? TIPS & TRICKS Composition and Design Smudges and Spots Painting What’s Not There: Negative Space White: A Special Case Studies, Sketches, and Drafts Undo Merging Colors: Working from One Color Working with Colored Paper Special Effects Lettering and Writing Layouts, Scribbles, and Storyboards Watercolor Illustrations How Much Is Your Picture Worth? Everything Ends: When Is a Picture Finished?

not really about urban sketching. Very unique art style, written in an interesting readable way. Good explanations of such things as color theory. Hard to pigeon-hole this book, but worth a space on your art book shelf. Just not the first one.

I'm only about halfway through the book so far, but what I've read is very informative. I'm not an artist, but a scientist with an interest in illustration; this book is full of details about h0w and why watercolors are the way they are and why they're made that way - details that help me understand how and why watercolors behave the way they do (and, therefore, how to control them better!). I have already gotten my money's worth from this book, and I'm only halfway through it - I'm impressed!

This book is marvelous. I was looking for something on how to approach drawing cityscapes (Marc Taro Holmes' Urban Sketcher is a bit more pragmatic on that), but I find myself reading and rereading this one. Scheinberger has an amazing style, and I've gotten a lot out of studying his sketches over and over again. He works in a very loose, gestural style most of the time, so rather than getting precise "architectural" looking drawings, he produces something much more personal. The way he then adds color is intriguing and also very free. It's not truly a how-to, and a lot of the watercolor technical advice he does give can be found in other places, but the in-depth look at his work and also at the way he thinks about art are tremendous. This is one of the very small handful of books on sketching that I will hang on to. (Mark Taro Holmes' book is another, as are the Bert Dodson books _Keys to Drawing_ and _Keys to Drawing with Imagination_.) By the way, this book works fine in the Kindle format. I read it on my Voyage, then often look at the images on my phone to get the effect of the color.

Discusses a range of techniques.

Borrowed this book from painting friend Merrilee, after she heard me saying I was curious about using pen n ink along w/watercolor. When she handed it to me, it was in such a way I could see she so valued that book, and wanted to make sure she got it back, handled gently. Well, couldn't have taken more than three minutes later in the day to understand why that protective stance, book cradled close. This book is more than wonderful. This author artist Felix has shared so very much of his knowledge of watercolor, the tools, the pigments, techniques - amidst his iconic charming and oftimes screamingly hilarious sketchy pen and ink expressions. He's a take it with you kinda guy, and you see inside his travel depictions, into his brain and heart as well. I felt I was on an instructive ride with an experienced teacher/mentor that was letting me get to know him, and see how his personal being translated on ea page - black pen and ink w/watercolor fluorishes, subtle and overt. After just two times of leafing through: Urban Watercolor Sketching, I nabbed a piece of watercolor paper and several pens. Within just one and a half sittings at the table, I copied a recent photo I shot while in N.Y. and drew the Statue of Liberty. Then quickly came the flying of the brush adding the awakening of an image too little acknowledged these days! This book has inspired me to carry on w/pen n' brush as partners in some of what I do. Dr. RB Marin County, Ca