Have you ever lost the white highlight in a watercolour painting?  Or needed to remove a backrun?

To the rescue comes a pastel stick!   Award-winning professional artist Johannes Vloothuis teaches this trick to his students.  The pastel cannot be detected and your painting has been saved.

The following images are taken from Johannes’ “Paint Along Class” on Dec 14, 2013.  Please check out his website at http://improvemypaintings.com/ for information on upcoming online classes.

Bringing back a lost highlight

The windows on the right of the middle building require more shading:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Once the shading is added the windows have lost their definition:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The window outlines are gone over with white pastel:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A much improved set of windows is evident after he briskly rubs over the pastel with his finger:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Removing a backrun

At the far right of the painting there is a dark line in the sky that was caused by a backrun.

 

 

 

 

 

The line is almost completely removed by going over it with a pastel that matches the sky colour:

 

 

 

 

 

 

The finished painting!

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