Down for Maintenance, Midnight June 18th
Due to mandatory maintenance and upgrades to our system, Watts Atelier Online will be temporarily unavailable for a brief period of time, starting at Midnight PST, June 18th. Thank you for your patience as we work to better the Watts Atelier Online experience for you. All the best, -The Watts Atelier Team
“Demonstrating the Craft,” Quicksketch demos
Last week on “Demonstrating the Craft,” we introduced you to a “long demo” completed over several sittings, by Watts Atelier instructor Lucas Graciano. This week we bring you something from the opposite end of the demonstration spectrum; E.M. Gist’s quicksketch demos. These in-class demos were completed by Erik Gist for his quicksketch course at the… Continue reading
“From the Sketchbook,” Mini Master Studies
When one thinks “Master Study,” they generally envision a scale replication of an old master’s piece, painstakingly reproduced in order to better understand their process (along the lines of this study after Bargue, by Watts Instructor Lucas Graciano). While these types of studies are fantastic learning opportunities, the hard reality is that many students lead a… Continue reading
New Content released; Portrait Painting Phase III
We are proud to announce the release of our “Portrait Painting: Phase III lessons. While we are still fine tuning a few videos and features for Portrait Phase III, our excitement over these lessons has led us to release them now to you, our students, so you may continue to push your learning and further… Continue reading
“From the Sketchbook,” Preliminary Drawings with E.M. Gist
While we’ve talked about utilizing sketchbooks for structured study, thumbnail exploration, and casual drawing, there is another area of sketchbook use that we haven’t delved into yet; the preliminary drawing. This is the stage where an idea starts to become a realized, “finished” image. While every artist works differently, the preliminary drawing is generally a… Continue reading
“Demonstrating the Craft,” Analyzing Angles
Analyzing the angles and relationships between key areas of the figure is an important part of the life drawing process. At the Watts Atelier, we embrace comparative measurement techniques in our drawings. This practice often relies on comparing and analyzing the angles between features to obtain proportional accuracy in your drawing. Note how Watts Atelier Instructor… Continue reading
“From the Sketchbook,” indulging with Jeff Watts
One of the most common uses of the sketchbook is simple indulgence; Drawing what you enjoy, and having fun while doing it. Practices such as these are usually what leads individuals down the path of the artists in the first place, and drawing for fun is especially important to remember as one starts to seriously study… Continue reading
“Demonstrating the Craft” Still life with Meadow Gist
As previously mentioned here on “Demonstrating the Craft,” all of our ten-week painting courses at the Watts Atelier begin with a 3-hour instructor painting demo. Still life painting presents it’s own set of challenges, unique and separate from other painting disciplines; Students must work to understand textures and their indications, the specularity and reflective properties of… Continue reading
“From the Sketchbook,” Practicing likenesses and texture with sellswords and the undead
Today in “From the Sketchbook,” we take a look at how illustrator and Watts Atelier instructor Erik Gist utilizes his sketchbook to improve his ability to capture likenesses, as well as his texture rendering and indication abilities. If you are familiar with Erik’s work, it should be no surprise that he is a fan of… Continue reading
Demonstrating the Craft: Construction of the Head
Not all of our in-class demos are done with technique demonstration and rendering in mind. In fact, the vast majority of instructor demonstrations in our classes are completed to clarify something far more important; The fundamentals. Without a solid understanding of the fundamentals, a strong finished piece can not exist. In this demo from last week, we take a… Continue reading
“From the Sketchbook,” thumbnail sketches by Jeff Watts
Exploring composition is an important first step in the planning of a piece. To find an interesting idea, the right visual balance, and to avoid visual tangents, many artists make small, quick “thumbnail” sketches. These sketches aren’t meant to capture details so much as figure out the overall staging of a piece. Working quickly, artists… Continue reading
A new feature for online students: “Skill Building Challenges”
While hard work, proper instruction, and dedication to the craft are the best ways to build one’s skills, outside factors can help give the student or professional a new reason to apply themselves and provide an additional “push” to their studies. For the professional, deadlines, art shows, and high profile clients are often reasons for… Continue reading
“Demonstrating the Craft:” Landscape demos
This week on “Demonstrating the Craft,” we bring you two demos from Robert Watt’s “Landscape Painting Essentials” course. Robert is known for his strong work ethic (and his charming wit), which over the course of his decades-long career has translated into an ability to execute masterful paintings in a short amount of time. Each of… Continue reading
“From the Sketchbook,” our new weekly blog feature
Every artist keeps (or should keep, rather) a sketchbook. Sketchbooks can help you record ideas, solve visual problems, strengthen and commit lessons to memory, and so much more. Every Thursday for the next several weeks, we will be giving you a peek into our instructor’s sketchbooks in a new blog segment appropriately titled “From the Sketchbook.”… Continue reading
Demonstrating the Craft: Portrait Paintings
This week on “Demonstrating the Craft” we bring you two new portrait paintings, completed last week for our in-class demonstrations. As painting can be a longer process than drawing, each of our ten week painting courses begins with a class dedicated entirely to an instructor demo, to highlight the concepts being taught in that particular… Continue reading
“Demonstrating the Craft,” a new weekly blog feature
Our Instructors (From left to right; Ben, Jeff, Lucas, and Meadow) Demonstrating the Craft We at the Watts Atelier believe that seeing proper technique in action is an important step in the learning process. Because of this, each one of our courses at our on-location Atelier in Encinitas, CA begins with an instructor demonstration. Our… Continue reading
Watts Atelier Illustration Boot Camp FAQ, featured at Imaginefx.com
“Alessandra,” by Michael C. Hayes Do you have questions regarding our upcoming Watts Atelier Illustration Boot Camp? We have the answers. Watts Atelier staff member, student and freelance illustrator Tom Babbey recently had the chance to sit down with Watts Instructors E.M. Gist, Lucas Graciano, and Michael C. Hayes, to talk with them about… Continue reading
The Watts Atelier Online Experience
One of the most common questions we receive from students who are considering studying with us is “How exactly does your online program work?” There are a plethora of online programs available, and it’s understandable for the student to want to know what sets our program apart from others. To help give you a better… Continue reading
Utilizing models and reference in your paintings
Whether your goal is to become a fine artist or an illustrator, if you are planning to create finished, figurative pieces you more than likely will be utilizing models and props as tools of reference for your paintings. To give you an idea of just what goes into getting “good reference,” we will be taking… Continue reading
Specialty Classes Now Available
“Siege,” by Robert Watts We are pleased to announce that the first of our Specialty Classes, “Drapery” with Erik M. Gist and “Painting Mood and Atmosphere in Gouache” with Robert Watts, are now available. These exciting new additions to our curriculum are designed to help the student build their skills in specific areas that will… Continue reading
Finishing Touches: New Content Delayed until 2/28
We at the Watts Atelier strive to provide our students with the highest quality online art education available. With that in mind, we are announcing a brief delay in our new content launch for September. Our Figure and Head Quicksketch courses and new specialty classes will be available a week from their original launch date,… Continue reading
Announcing our new Study Groups
Online schools such as ours offer the immense convenience of being able to study with the top artists in their field from the comfort of your own home…But how does an online school recreate the camaraderie of a brick-and-mortar school, with it’s personal interactions between students? If you’ve visited our Member Forums in the past… Continue reading