Whether you’re traveling to beautiful landscapes, or just sitting on your own front porch, you’ve probably wanted to capture the natural scenery around you in your sketchbook. Landscapes have always been a favorite subject of artists.

The challenge is to find a way to really make them your own.

So in this class, we’re going to work in either watercolor or gouache-your choice—and then bring in mixed media, in the form of colored pencil, markers, paint pens, or ink.

With tools like these you can make quick, playful scribbles, add layers of texture, bring in highlights and shadows, and make something that’s really fun and has some spirit and some personality to it.

In this class, we’ll focus on:

• Discovering your go-to choices for blues and greens, the most common colors you’ll use in most landscapes

• How to make choices about what to leave in and what to leave out.

• Understanding where to place the horizon line

• Distinguishing between the foreground, middle, and background to give a landscape a sense of depth.

• Taking a very simple approach to skies in this class, because this time, we’re going to let the land be the star of the show.

• Using mark-making with mixed media tools to let your own style shine through

And I’ll show you my favorite trick for getting over that fear of messing up a perfect blank page!