Top Ten Tips and Tricks with
Watercolor Paints
Watercolors are kids' favorite paints! It is so easy to pull out that long box of
paints, grab a paintbrush and pour a jar of water...then let the fun begin. Here are
some tips and tricks to make those watercolor sessions even more exciting.
1. Just add salt! It creates a speckled, star-burst pattern when it dries, like. Sketch
a picture with a light pencil line. Paint only the areas you want to salt. Use lots of
wet, bright paint. While the paint is still wet and puddled, sprinkle salt on
top...regular salt from the kitchen. Then set the paper aside to dry. When you come
back, brush the dried salt away and see the beautiful pattern it left in the paint
underneath. Carefully paint the rest of the picture if you want.
2. Paint on wet paper. Get a big sheet of paper completely wet. Dip it right into
water in the sink. Then smooth it out on a cookie sheet or plastic tabletop. Brush
thick, wet watercolors on top. They blur and fuzz out on the wet paper, blending
together and making strange shapes. After your fuzzy picture dries you can draw
on top with a black marker pen.
3. Make a "zebra" painting. Use only black paint on white paper. Mix the paint with
water to make all sorts of shades of grey. Lots of water creates light grey. Little
water and lots of paint makes black.
4. Plastic wrap magic! Paint a picture with wet, colorful areas. While the paint is still
wet and in puddles, crumple a sheet of plastic wrap and smash it down onto the
wet paint. Don't move the plastic around...just press it flat onto the paint. Then set
the painting aside to dry for an hour. When you come back and pull off the plastic,
you will discover strange and beautiful patterns in the dry paint beneath.
5. Do the same thing as Trick #4, but this time use "bubble wrap," the sheets of
packing plastic that are covered with little air bubbles. This makes an even different
pattern as the paint dries.
6. Start with a seed! Glue a watermelon seed, or any kind of seed, onto a sheet of
white paper. Then paint an imaginary plant..the roots growing from the seed
underground, and the leaves and flowers and fruit of the plant above.
7. One half paintings are fun. Cut a big picture out of a magazine...a photo of an
animal or a person or any colorful object works best. Then cut that photo right
down the middle. Glue the half-photo onto a sheet of paper, then draw and paint
the other half.
This also makes a fun project to do with a friend. Each of you paints half of the
same photo...you do the right side while your friend does the left. After your
paintings are dry, remove the magazine photos and glue your two half-paintings
together to make one, complete, teamwork painting! It's a wild effect, especially
with faces.
8. Paint with homemade paintbrushes! Make your own brush with a twig, a rubber
band, and some hair, or a clump of yarn or string, or cut up strips of rubber band
or strips of foam plastic. Use your imagination...what would make a useful
paintbrush?
9. This is an old classic...but always lots of fun. Draw a design with white crayon on
white paper. Yeah...this is hard to do, because you really can't see what you're
drawing. So create a really wild design with lots of scribbles and dots and zigzag
patterns. Then paint over the top of your "invisible" drawing with bright
watercolors. Like magic, the drawing will appear in all its glory.
10. When watercolors are brushed on very light and using a lot of water, they are
called a "wash." Paint a scene or the outdoors using light washes of watercolor, and
then outline your painting with dark marker pen. See a great example of this in
our KidsArt Student Gallery.
For lots more fun painting ideas, buy the KidsArt booklet Paint, Paint and More
Paint! From the KidsArt on-line store.
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