Painting the Allure of Nature

I'm gonna paint a bird. This book convinces me that its not really all that hard to do. I've ordered paints and can't wait for them to come in the mail.

I've always been captivated by the beautiful realism of nature art, but the majority of books I read that covered detail-style nature painting focused mostly on opaque media, particularly oils and acrylics. While I do enjoy both of these media, I've longed for a good book that captured the meticulous detail and inherent beauty of nature, in watercolor. This book is exactly what I was longing for. If you love meticulous detail and realism in nature painting, and the soft, flowing feel of watercolor, but never envisioned putting them together, hold on to your paintbrushes! Susan D. Bourdet captures the incredible details and textures of nature with watercolor, while also embracing the soft, free-flowing beauty unique to this amazing medium. Better yet, in Painting the Allure of Nature, she shares her mastery of both subject and medium, to take the reader on a step-by-step journey through various techniques and breathtaking projects, one right after another. The chapters in this book include: - Materials, Preparations and Choosing Pigments; - Ideas from Nature; - Background Techniques for Nature Painters; - Painting Flowers and Leaves; - Painting Birds; - Painting Nature's Textures; and - Putting it All Together, Step by Step. I found the chapters on backgrounds and textures to be particularly enjoyable as they really show the uniqueness of the medium, and how it can be harnessed to create incredible, realistic nature paintings. If you're interested in capturing the realism of nature with watercolor, this is the book you've been looking for. It is definitely one of the better books on the subject. I can't recommend it enough.