Figuring out the Composition

(C) 2017 Dale DiMauro

This is a drawing for a future painting. It is a contour drawing done on trace paper providing room for change prior to painting. It is important to figure out your composition as much as possible before you start your watercolor. Determining the size of watercolor paper that I need is an important consideration. It is better to have a sheet bigger than you need, from which you can eventually trim off any waste, than force your picture into a smaller sheet.

This is an image of my wife checking her phone as she waits for a subway train one morning in Brooklyn. Her wet hair is swooped up onto her head in a loose bun, and she has that slack-jawed expression of distraction and obliviousness to her immediate surroundings. The new normal in our contemporary society seems to be a lack of awareness of our environment and a hyper focus on the little screen. 

The first wash will likely be a gray-blue to set back the stark white of the paper enabling the figure to pop forward. Or I may even paint a graded wash which would become less intense as it fades into the distance. Either way the background will be kept simple.

I apologize for the poor photograph but have not had much success taking pictures of clear tracing paper in the past. It seems to capture that milky gray color with the crinkly quality of the paper. I try to take all my photographs in natural light as this was done and a majority of the time they come out just fine.