Qs for Sue — Issue 01

Sue Bradley answers your questions.

1. “My washes always dry two shades lighter than I want. Am I doing something wrong?”

You are not doing anything wrong. Watercolour paint becomes significantly lighter as it dries; this can be 20% paler or even up to 40%. This is due to evaporation of water and loss of surface reflection as the pigment settles into the paper and becomes more matt/dull. Therefore, compensate by making your washes a higher pigment-to-water ratio. I suggest you test your paints to see how they look when dry by using different wash consistencies/volumes of water. For example, these are sometimes described as ‘tea’, ‘milk’, ‘single cream’, ‘double cream’, etc. The other alternative is to build up strength of tone by using layers of washes (glazing), allowing each layer to dry thoroughly before adding the next.