How to Load Paint?

How to Load Paint onto a Brush?

The most challenging aspect I've encountered in my watercolor journey is controlling the water on the brush and on the paper.

When artists begin learning to paint with watercolor, there are typically two extremes: those who have painted with oil or acrylic before, and those who haven't painted at all.

Those with experience in denser paints treat watercolor similarly, using almost dry brushes to pick up paint from tubes.

Those new to painting tend to wet the brush and then immediately load it with paint, resulting in a large puddle on the paper.

How do we determine the right approach?

It's not as difficult as it seems.

The formula is simple: the wetter the paper, the drier the brush should be, and vice versa.

Let's assume we're painting on completely dry paper. If we load the brush with a lot of water and paint, we'll end up with a puddle. We can spread this puddle into a large colored spot.

What's next? 

First option: wait until it dries and treat it as a dry paper, simple.

However, if the paper hasn't dried yet, let's try to paint something else on top of this background.

If we load the brush with the same amount of water again, the water will quickly spread over the already wet surface, push out the pigment and will create so called "blooms". Therefore, to prevent the paint from spreading, its concentration should be much higher.

That's the whole science behind it.

But now the question is how to achieve the right amount of water in the brush?

To do this, remember the sequence of actions:

• Dip the brush in water.

• Squeeze the brush to the desired dryness. This can be done by blotting it on kitchen paper towels or simply squeezing it with your fingers.

• Load the brush with paint.

Note:it's convenient to premix the appropriate shade of paint on the palette beforehand and then load the brush into the already prepared solution. I usually mix paints with a cheap synthetic brush, which saves paint because synthetic brushes absorb less.

Summary

The wetter the paper, the drier the brush should be.