This week is a really advanced piece not for the feint of heart! ‘Bathing Belles’ uses every technique we have to create a fantastic finished painting. We’ve got subtle reflections and refractions in the water, a colourful background sky and sand and our four main objects which have varying skin tones of pink on a very hot day in ‘Peurto de la cruz’. This is over 2 hours so give yourself a good amount of time to really preserve those highlights. Enjoy…

After our advanced tutorial last time we’re doing a simple, single figure. This is what I start with on my in-person workshops. We have one focal point being the woman, and we can let our background run a little so we’re genuinely not too focused on background details. We do just one wash, and this is perfect for beginners and intermediate students alike. I really hope you enjoy this as it’s a great way to have some fun with your background and try to make your single figure the star of the painting. Enjoy…

Let’s get back to painting some figures, and this week we’ve got one of my favourite topics. Buskers make great subjects for “studies of light and shadow” because they are usually in the direct sunlight and so focused on their music there is an intensity and focus about what they’re doing, and that’s what we have to capture. This guy also has a great hat that masks the face but gives us great highlights and so we are going to do one wash only using the bright whites of the paper for our highlights, no first wash, no little adjustments, just one pass creates the entire painting. This is quite advanced so if you’re starting out, either slow the video down to half speed or watch 20 mins then go back and paint that section, take a break and repeat. Take your time here and really preserve those highlights. Enjoy…

This week is a beautiful image of a father and son fishing from the steps in Tenerife. This is a great tutorial for all abilities and is broken down into easy sections. You can start with the usual light wash followed by focusing on our two fisherman, then the sea and the dark background steps make our two fishermen lift off the page and become the stars of the painting. You’ll all enjoy this one.

Remember when we were ‘Back in the pub’ well this image is a close up from that very painting that were going to do in more detail. He’s looking quite sombre as he contemplates life over a good old British Pint. Lot’s of light to use here, in fact its the most important element, use it to accent where the brights hit his face and the table in front of him is important as it bounce light back onto him too. Use those deep tones to create a rich, wood effect, and don’t forget to let the soft furnishings feel nice and rounded. This is great for all levels.

And now for something totally different… Yellow Beetle is a fabulous painting that everyone can complete. No figures here but plenty of detail to add as we create this beautiful image from Mexico. Lots of wet into wet with a little bit of wet into dry for our crisp details and we add a final layer of dark detail to really accentuate the colours and highlights here. This is a great tutorial for all abilities and a fun way to start your new year.

It’s Christmas season and what better way to celebrate than painting our winter scene. This is ‘Snow Shadows’ and is a beautiful composition of my own using two photos to create this stunning snow painting. This year we aren’t using any masking fluids, we’re going old school and using the paper to create our highlights. Plenty of colour is still used in our surroundings to accent the whites, a great painting for all abilities. Merry Christmas everyone.

This is our second painting in our cycling series and is faster paced and has a little more detail. We kept our Charleston cyclist very loose but here we’re spending some more time focusing on the bike detail, still loose, but a little more focused and precise. Plus our background matches more with our reference. We’re trying to improve our observations and retain detail from our reference photo this time whilst moving slightly faster to ‘keep it loose’. We’re not fine art painting just adding a little more precision here. Enjoy…

It’s highlights week, so we are painting “Two old friends”. This image was chosen specifically to give all of my fabulous members some real practice on your highlights, It’s a stunning, bright subject with tonnes of white sunlit areas, so be bold and go for the best highlights you’ve ever created. Remember it’s easier to add layers than take away layers so slow and steady wins the race here, watch a section, rewind and watch it again as you do it. You’ll love it the results if you PTW (preserve those whites) enjoy everyone…

This week we start a three part series on one of my favourite subjects, cycling. This week is our beginner piece where I take a little more time on a beautiful image from Charleston in 2017. But we won’t do the second instalment straight away, so next time will be something involving people and we will revisit cycling in a month or so. Here though we really focus on highlights and using colourful shadows to create depth in the image. Don’t get bogged down in every detail, keep it loose, especially in the background, less is more here. Enjoy…

Small boats. The title says it all. This week we’re not painting any people but this beautiful collection of small boats floating in the harbour. I love painting boats as they present a different challenge for us. We have stunning reflections, which are not just mirror images of the boats, so look for the subtle changes in tone and shape as the water around them moves, ripples and bounces our sunlight towards us. This is a great intermediate piece but everyone can give this a go. Enjoy…

This week we have something totally new, its two paintings in one. We do our first painting with a sea and sky background and then replace that background with a darker version based on our original photo. This is a great opportunity to see how just changing the background can transform your painting without touching our main subject at all. It’s a great exercise in knowing how to correct something using darker tones. This is fairly advanced but good for all levels to try if you can set aside a couple of hours to complete it. Enjoy…

Something a little different this week! We’re painting a seascape, from San Francisco. It’s not the Golden Gate but we are further along the coast and painting the equally beautiful and often overlooked ‘Oakland Bay Bridge’. We have plenty of opportunity for expressive brushstrokes here in both our water, backgrounds and sky with some lovely details in the sails of our boat and the bridge itself, especially those cables, so take care on those. You’ll love this change of pace and it’s a great intermediate level piece for everyone to enjoy…

I love this weeks painting, it’s a nice intermediate to advanced piece that’s quite long but produces a fabulous result. “Join the queue” is something very British, we will stand in queues for pretty much anything, but this is a typical scene you see on our streets and this one is from our great city of Oxford.  We split this up into bitesize chunks to allow some time for coffees, but you could do it all in one sitting if you’re really brave and let your brush stay loose and expressive. I really hope you enjoy this one it was a fun one to paint…

This is a stunning scene of a once thriving small port that is now more or a tourist attraction for people in England. Many scenes of boats have been painted here as the regular low tide and stunning background buildings give us a great composition. So today watch those darks don’t go too dark in the background, keep it bright enough as its in sunlight, and dot and dash your foreground with some nice texture in it to show the pebbles and stones with the sands here. Keep your boat the focal point, that’s the star of the piece…

This week we’re going to paint “Lady in the red top”. This is an intermediate level piece but anyone can still give it a go. We start with our three colour wash to map out where we want to keep our brightest highlights. Then we use our six colours to paint our main subject using wet onto dry, add some deeper tones to the background this helps emphasise the lighter tones in our main subject and we finish off with our foreground adding some interesting texture. This is a great piece to really understand our painting process and how we structure our work to achieve a great painting.

Today we are painting a scene similar to ones we’ve done before, but were doing this one in a different way, rather than three washes were doing it wet onto dry in just one wash so I chose a subject we’ve done before and something we see everyday, this one is called “On the bench”. We will use all 6 colours with dry paper and only one pass over the entire image but splitting the background form the subject. This is nice and short so you can watch it several times and try it several times. Do submit each attempt and I’ll critique each one. That’s the way we improve folks…

This is a fabulous image of a woman sat in the sunshine, (where we all want to be in January). What caught my eye was the shape and highlights in her hat so were calling this “The Red Hat”. Plenty of lights and shadows here and a nice textured foreground which blends to a calmer sea and sky, don’t merge you’re sea and sky colours too much you still want your horizon. This is nice an quick so you can do this several times and try to improve each one. Enjoy everyone…

This week it’s something a little different we’re painting something that could be anywhere in the world really, two geraniums outside an ornate window with the sun beaming across them beautifully casting shadows. There are no people or facial features to worry about here just use your brush to create shape, shadow and light areas. This is something a little different to our ‘people paintings’ as it’s always good fun to do something a little different and see how our brush strokes create the overall effect. Enjoy…

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE. Well nearly, it’s 31st December so I thought I’d get in there first. Todays painting is one of my favourite subjects, and I particularly like this one because they’re standing in the boat which is not an easy task in itself, there’s plenty of wet onto dry here with highlight retention being your primary objective, try to keep this one light and bright and most of all enjoy some downtime during this busy period with a little bit of painting…

Merry Christmas everyone, I thought a lovely themed Christmas painting of a little Robin amongst some festive holly in the snow would be perfect for this time of year.  This one is great for practicing maintaining highlights and we even use masking fluid here which I don’t normally like but here its perfect to protect the whites. Enjoy...

Who doesn’t love a man fishing? Our main subject is looking down wishfully into the water hoping for that little nibble on the fishing line whilst relaxing in a great pose for practising your skin tones. With bright sunshine and some deep colours in the quayside and on the man himself this is a great way to relax a little after our last few large and long paintings! Enjoy…

Get comfortable. Todays painting is one of the hardest projects yet. It’s a busy scene with lots of small marks to help form the shapes of the people in the distance, but you must preserve those whites between, this will help to keep those lovely highlights in between as the sunlight bounces down. This one is a world famous market in London called “Portobello Road” enjoy…

The streets of San Francisco are famous for there undulating nature and we have a challenge here for our students, the perspective changes due to the nature of the hill but you’ll see as we paint along that it’s still using our normal techniques to create this effect. This is a really fabulous painting to display if you can master it, an interesting location, a great bustling scene and some vibrant colours, what more could you ask for…

The week its a sequel ! We did man and his shadow a while back so thought it only fair to do woman and her shadow too. This is perfect practice for all important shadow work, we want a nice light background with a dark yet colour filled shadow here, don’t go with greys or blacks use the colours mixing to create interest in your shadow areas. This is one you can do a few times so practice practice practice…

This week were using just one wash, no going back over areas, just one single wash to create this nice quick piece called “Been Shopping”. Keep your brights bright and your background nice and wet to keep the colour flowing.  Your foreground should be subtle and in the light here so don’t overdo it. Enjoy everyone…

This is a little different today, we’re using 8 colours not three or six ! So if you’ve been here a while you’ll know I use Winsor Violet and Winsor Green when I’m in the mood, lol, just to add some extra tones into paintings and that’s exactly what we're doing today. "A hot day at Long Beach" deserved to add those extra colours to give our greens and purple shades a little boost. You’ll have lots of fun here…

This week we are painting a man and mans best friend. This is an intermediate tutorial but beginners should really give it a go too as it’s all the techniques we’ve used before. Happy painting and enjoy a nice simple one ready for something a little different next time ;-)…

After our marathon painting last week this one will be a nice easy one. It’s a simple painting broken down into simple stages. The photo is of three women sat looking out to sea on a crisp spring morning, Just the thing to remind us this heat won’t last forever, there’s plenty to enjoy here and its under an hour so you can really practice and hone those skills multiple times. I hope you really enjoy this one.

It’s my favourite comedy duo Laurel and Hardy, this is my 100th Tutorial on Paintwithgraham and I’m so glad I kept this one for today. There’s lots in this one and the final result is fantastic, we’re using wet in wet, wet on dry, some nice interpretations of colour by taking a black and white photo and imagining the colours that would be present in real life. I hope you’ve enjoyed our last 100 and look forward to adding more and more to our collections. Happy painting…

It’s the height of summer here and we’ve just had our hottest days on record so today we’re painting a rather aptly named ‘summer couple’ with plenty of bright highlights to keep and great bright vibrant tones in the clothes here its an exercise in tone management. We have a bright pavement with an area in darker shadow to show our depth of field too, but keep that shadow bright and varied, you’ll love doing this one and its a nice quick one so you can enjoy the sunshine with a glass of something afterwards …

This week were painting this stunning little side street in Venice. This is an intermediate level tutorial with our highlights falling onto the balconies of the background building so its all about creating the correct angle of sunlight, so stay focused on what im doing, our foreground is in shadow so were using some nice blues to give that darker feel but most of all this is something a little fun and different to try. Enjoy…

It’s summer, so we wanted to give you something quite fast paced this week so you can go and enjoy the sunshine, or do another painting maybe? This one is great for your brush control and PTW, preserve those whites. Using only 3 colours and two washes this is only 40 minutes but gives you a great look into how the white of the paper creates the light of highlights. You can do this lots of times to really get it right and will help loosen up your brushwork. Enjoy…

This week its something a little different, no people just lots of fun painting these two fantastic dogs cooling off from the summer heat. And today we are using just three colours. Thats right only our first three primary colours are used to create this great painting, plenty of retaining those whites here, some nice sharp highlights which in places we soften later, but this is a great way to practice your brush control. I hope you really enjoy this one…

This weekend is the Jubilee so we wanted a typical British scene to paint, being from Blackpool we decided a small boy with his bucket and spade couldn’t be more fitting. This is more of a challenge than it looks but what a great way to spend one of your extra Bank (National) Holiday days painting this beautiful image. Enjoy…

Lazing in the park, a perfect way to spend a Sunday afternoon… This is a great example for our intermediate students of capturing everyday life and turning it into a great piece of art. We’ve got some great highlights throughout the main subjects to maintain , a nice deep coloured background, and a bright and vibrant couple that just hop off the page with the lovely green grass drawing your eye towards them. Enjoy…

This week its something a little different for our beginner and intermediate members, this is 'Figure in sunlight' and no hairdryer until the very end and were starting and not letting anything dry in between, its a great exercise in brush control and how much pigment vs water you put on your brush. Get painting...

What a view to paint... He looked a little lonely up there on his own so I've added mans best friend. You can add your own dog if you feel that way inclined or use the reference I created. Either way this is a really great intermediate piece for us all to do, if you're an expert you'll still find it challenging and our beginners can still give this a go, stretch yourself and see what happens...

What better way to spend the weekend fishing, or painting fishing... This is a beginner intermediate piece for all to enjoy and its about brush control with some small marks and some lots sweeping strokes to create the dark foreground. You'll have lots of fun with this one...Its a really fun quick one to do but pay attention to getting your background cool and foreground warmish yellow, that sets him off beautifully, don’t forget those little pavement marks too enjoy...

This is an interesting painting because we have one simple main figure, but, we have some hard shadows (using dry brush onto dry paper) for his trousers and some nice soft shadows around the shirt area where we’re using wet onto wet and adding further pigment to it. Its a really fun quick one to do but pay attention to getting your background cool and foreground warmish yellow, that sets him off beautifully, don’t forget those little pavement marks too enjoy...

This was taken in Oxford, England several years ago and it maybe “two go cycling” but we have five people in this one so it’s definitely in our advanced category. Everyone should give it a go but take your time and watch and rewatch areas of detail. Give some special attention to the wheels, they not round so draw it carefully. Remember above all, have fun and enjoy…

The perfect intermediate tutorial… We keep our colours really clean and vibrant here and using simple lines to create the bench you can see how Graham adds colours into wet paint to create the variations in tone and how he adjusts for light and dark areas. Not forgetting to add our our two people with their backs on the bench we also have a vibrant blue sky with some movement all created by loose simple brush actions during that wash. You’ll really enjoy this one…

Well, this one is slightly different to usual, we don’t have any people in this scene, but a lovely warm bright boat, sadly sat upon the sands. This is great for everyone to paint along with, nearly an hour long, it’s great for intermediate levels and its important to keep this one nice and loose.

This one is a great challenge to get that background pushed backwards and abstract without obsessing over every branch, which in turn distracts from your main subject, its a piece anyone can try but is around the intermediate/advanced level really as its over 2 hours. This is a photo of a family friend of Jemma and Bess and its a really lovely action shot. You’ll get great results if you tae your time here and plenty of breaks in between layers. Happy painting…

Happy new year !!! As a perfect cure for those with slight hangovers we thought you could do with a nice intermediate level painting, this one is called ‘couple on a wall’ and its ALL about preserving the whites on the two subjects. Happy painting…

This is a perfect Christmas painting, the Strictly Come Dancing final is this weekend (dancing with the stars in the USA) but it originated right here in my home town of Blackpool and I thought a “Last tango” would feel very Christmas spirited right now. Happy Christmas everyone, and see you in the new year for another great year of painting some fantastic subjects…

This is a fun little project to try a few times to practice some of our core skills. It's a quirky photo of two ladies stuck in an unfamiliar city, looking at their maps, trying to figure out where they're going, and I think it's something that's just fun to do. Happy painting.

This week were painting a subject we’ve painted before, but from a different photo and using just two main washes to try and create a vibrant painting you’ll be proud of. This is a great piece for all levels and at just over an hour long its one you can practice a few times.

This is a great piece for all abilities. “Sunny girl” was taken near Kew Gardens in London a few years ago and is a great way to hone your watercolour skills, especially maintaining a lovely warm but bright highlight on our main subject as well as soft backgrounds that hint at the setting without doing every tiny detail. Enjoy…

This is a fantastic beginner/intermediate piece. Its based on a photograph from San Francisco a few years back that I caught sort of by accident, its a woman walking her dog and i immediately loved the pose she was in. Rather than being pulled along by the dog she was in compete control and mid stride which gives quite a serene feel. I’d love to see a few of your own dogs instead of the drawing for our more experienced painters. That’s if you’re up to the challenge?