Yesterday I showed you one way I work from photos, and today I’m showing you the more literal way I sometimes work from photos for commissioned watercolors. In my commissioned watercolors, I start with a pencil sketch. If a client wants me to crop out sections of the photograph or zoom into an portion, that is even more fun! While I was lucky in the case above in that the photo was gorgeous to begin with, there may be instances where a beloved photo did not turn out as you intended, or has a distracting element in it that you’d rather have removed. Turning not so good photos into watercolors is a great way to showcase the reason you love a photo and turn it into a piece of artwork that will last for generations to come.

To view the work in progress post for this painting, go here.

Top photo by Maryanna Scarpato. Painting by Hand-Painted Weddings.