Tulip Circle Part One : Black Parrot Tulip - Preview

Hello, lovely painters, this week's project is a rather large and fanciful black parrot tulip, which marks the start of a three-tulip painting in a circular design. Of course, you don't have to do the design, you could just paint this beautiful tulip on its own and extend the stem to make it into a lovely single study.

In this project, I show you all the techniques I use to build the colour gently and break the larger areas down into manageable parts. It's all about a soft build of colours.

The refinement of this tulip can be completed with a small brush, slowly, drawing with the paint to add all the fine feathered edges of the petal. You can do this tulip in sections.

If you're new to painting, you can just do the first washes and see how you get on. 
You could draw parts of this petal across the page and just practice the processes.

You will see in this tutorial, how I choose how dark to go and use the reference as a guide rather than a direct copy. It's so important to know that you are the master of your painting and you get to choose how the painting develops.

So join me in painting this challenging subject.
Peace, sunshine and gentle rain 
Billy xx