For better or worse, watercolor has almost a mythical reputation among art mediums.  However, once you understand watercolor, there is nothing mythical, mysterious, or elusive about it. Here I would like to discuss some of the most common myths about watercolor and shine the light on the truth, so to speak.

• Watercolor is the hardest medium to paint with:  Myth.  "Hardest" means what people find most difficult.  This myth stems from the fact that most people learn other mediums before they learn watercolor.  Because they are familiar with these other mediums, watercolor seems foreign, uncomfortable, and...hard.  Watercolor is different; vastly different from most other mediums.  That doesn't mean it is harder; just very, very different.  As a personal example, I learned to paint with watercolor first.  When I went to try pastels, I found them much more difficult than watercolor.  When I went to try oils, I found them much more difficult than watercolors. I have painted with acrylics for quite a long time, but...you guessed it; I find them much harder than watercolor.  Hard is what you are not familiar with.  If you learn watercolor the right way; with progressive, logical steps, it is no more difficult than any other medium.

• You can't fix mistakes in watercolor: Somewhat true, somewhat myth.  True: Unlike with opaque mediums, you can't just paint over your mistakes and start again with watercolor.  Watercolor is transparent, so whatever you paint over will somewhat still show through.  However, there are ways to make considerable corrections and leave room for changes in watercolor; especially if you plan your painting sequence properly.  This is one of the reasons why we focus so much on how to plan paintings at Watercolor College.  With proper planning and proper techniques, you can leave yourself quite a bit of "error room" to be able to correct things and change things when you need to.

• You can't paint realism with watercolor.  Huge Myth.  This myth stems from the historical uses of watercolor.  A long time ago, way back in the days of kings and white wigs, watercolor was used almost exclusively as a sketching medium.  It was used for field sketches and quick studies, often so that later the artist could use the sketch as a reference for a more "realistic medium" such as oil.  I don't know why, but for some reason this association with watercolor has stuck to it, somewhat even to this day.   Watercolor can create just as much realism as any other medium, especially with centuries of innovations in technique and tools.  The techniques taught at Watercolor College focus on representational watercolor, with the goal of painting in a realistic style.  How realistic is up to you.  We show you how to start loose, and then go more and more realistic, stopping whenever your level of realism is reached.  Don't believe me that watercolor can create high realism?  Check out the two paintings below that I did (and yes; they are 100% watercolor!).  I love realism.  And I think watercolor is not only capable of realism, but actually suited to it!