For November there's a new mini tutorial on painting Amanita muscaria mushrooms, otherwise known as Fly Agaric, which you can find on the Tutorials page of the website HERE.
My foray into fungi painting began a few years ago after stumbling across these beautiful red capped mushrooms growing very near to my home. Since that time and from early October I always get very excited to go out looking for these mushrooms, and this year couldn't resist making a new tutorial painting this iconic red fungi.
There are actually two separate videos in this tutorial, firstly a single mushroom, followed by the longer tutorial with two mushrooms at different stages of development, and including the all important habiitat of leaves, grasses and mosses, as shown in the image. In total this adds up to for over 3 hours of video, as I like to demonstrate the process as fully as possible in real time with voiceover throughout - as I chat through the whole process, from materials, colours, techniques and approach. There is also accompanying step-by-step text.
If you're wondering how the paler markings were created on the cap of the mushroom I used masking fluid, which is something that I rarely do, but this is one instance where masking provides the perfect solution. Lots of colour layeing was used to achieve the rich reds and colour shifts and some dry brush work to deepen that colour further. In the habitat, I demonstrate negative space painting.
A number of reference photographs are provided withthis tutorial, all are taken by me and not from stock images, so you can use them without any restrictions (just a polite credit is all that required). A materials list is provided in the downloads as is a little document about Fly Agaric with a description, more photos and information, providing you with all you need to know about this fascinating fungi.
The tutorial costs £20 and you will have access to it for 12 months.
Other Courses and Planned Tutorials for 2024
Botanical Illustration Course
If you're interested in a more in depth taught course, my Botanical Illustration Course, begins in January 2024 and is open for booking now, with just a couple of remaining places available. CLICK HERE for information and to secure your place.
If you want a good grounding botanical illustration, 'from plant to painting', this course includes the fundamentals of drawing, watercolour, study pages, sketchbook, scaling and dissections and composition in botanical art and illustration.
Botanical Illustration has been running for over 10 years, in fact it has grown so much with new content that it now has its own dedicated website.
New Tutorials for 2024
My next blog post will be about two new tutorials, the first is the long awaited Complex Drawing Tutorial, which is a follow up to the 'Drawing Perspective and Creating Form' tutorial.
The second tutorial will be 'Watercolour Techniques 2', which is also a follow up to my most popular (and first ever shorter tutorial), which was released over 4 years ago! This time I'm delving further into my favourite medium, watercolour.
Both will be available to pre-book to kick start your skills in 2024! There will be more about these slightly longer tutorials in the next blog post.