Nature journaling: Painting a Bluebell Woodland

I love being outside in nature.

The month of May has been such an inspiration since discovering a secret bluebell woodland close by to where I live. The colours and scent are simply divine. The sunlight falling through the trees, and capturing the iridescent bluebell colours beneath is simply magical. There’s so many blue- purple AND pink shades to take in. The vibrant green of the trees with their new leaves above almost showing off their new form now it’s spring.

I just couldn’t wait to capture this magical bluebell woodland in loose watercolour on my paper!

What you’ll need:

• Paper: 300gsm Arches (140lb) cold pressed watercolour paper
• My sheet size is: 38x76cm (22x30inch) Fairly large as I like to paint big)
• Brushes: Jennifer Rose sizes, 3/0 and 0 Mop brush. Link here: https://www.rosemaryandco.com/jennifer-rose-mop.
• Kitchen towel (to dab off any excess water)
• Water in a container and a little bowl. A palette to mix your paints on.
• A scrap of paper to practice and mix your colours with by your side.

Paint colours I used: I took my handy carry case with me)

• Winsor Lemon
• Cobalt Blue
• French Ultra marine
• Cobalt Violet
• Permanent Rose
• Rose of Ultramarine (Daniel Smith)
• Yellow Ochre
• Burnt Umber
• Burnt Sienna
• Olive Green
  

  Here’s how I went about it:

   I wanted to make sure I captured what was in front of me, and work from real life. Making notes on your paintings can help bring back the experience when back at home.

  

  1. I began by observing where the trees are first and where the sunlight was falling through them. By mixing my olive green and light winsor lemon colours together with my larger brush, I created a vibrant light green wash and placed the leafy sections in patches allowing the lighter yellow to settle at the edges. Keeping the paints watery allowed me to place the colour and not commit fully.
  2. With my larger brush still in hand, I placed my burnt sienna, and brown umber shades to create and form to the woody trunks underneath my patches of leafy green sections. I also brought in some branches using the tip of my paintbrush. I could immediately see my woodland come to life on the paper in this early stage giving me a base to work from, and the start of a composition. I couldn’t resit dropping in some watery purple colour to the brown tree trunks along with some light winsor lemon. With this combination placed, it looks already like the bluebell colours are reflecting onto the tree trunks themselves. Be careful not to muddy your colours when you do this.
  3. Observing the bluebells with their blue- purple colours, I began to experiment and mix up the exact shades I was seeing. I found the perfect combination to be cobalt violet, cobalt blue with some French of ultramarine. There were also colour pops of vibrant pink bluebells within, which were important to include, and only enhanced the blue and purple shades I was seeing further. Painting their bell shaped form using my smaller brush, allowed me to capture their tiny curled up petal tips too.
  4. You can see from my photos the pink colours I could see – By mixing my permanent rose and violet colours together to a watery mix they settled nicely to compliment.
  5. With the mix of various blue and purple shades on my scrap piece of paper, I was able to continue capturing the bluebell shapes and create a blurred placement of bluebells in the distance to create a landscape composition. I always like to leave sections not as detailed for intrigue.
  6. By allowing each layer to dry, I was able to continue building up the shapes to the bluebells, tree shapes and leaves with darker shades of colour. By dropping in light winsor lemon throughout my painting process, brought vibrant enhancements along the way capturing the sunlight through the enchanting bluebell woodland. What do you think?

  Have I inspired you to paint your own Bluebell Wood too?
  

  If I’ve inspired you to paint your own Bluebell Woodland painting, I’d LOVE to see! You can tag me on Instagram and Facebook, and use the hashtag #jenniferrosegallery or email me personally at jenniferrose.gallery to see how you got on. I always love hearing from you.Love

  Jennifer Rose xx