Painting with White

Traditional watercolor painting is all about "saving the white", white highlights, reflected lights and white paper under transparent watercolors. But if you like to work on toned papers, white is a different story. White gouache, white acrylics, white chalk are all good whites. But my favorite is Dr. Martin's Bleed Proof White. I keep a tablespoon or so in a small plastic pill holder. It does dry out, moisten it with water at the same time you wet your paints.

This painting shows a few uses for white, one is sky. Skys are usually the lightest thing in the landscape. Water sparkles add a sense of movement to a sketch. My dog has a white ruff, handy for finding her in the dark, but only the part of her ruff is totally white. The shadow color is made by adding a bit of blue and orange to white. This will gray down the underparts and make the "white" whiter.