How do you blend watercolour water spots?

Question

Since I have been working on larger watercolours I am finding that I seem to be dropping some of my water on the paper and unfortuntely do not see it until after it dries......leaving of course an imperfect spot; usually in the worst places.........how to I fix this without overworking the paint area?

Answer 1

Use clear water on an almost-dry brush (wet it then squeeze all the water out) and lightly scumble the spot's "ring", cleaning the brush frequently by re-wetting and squeezing again. Use the brush only on the ring - over-wetting the area will create another ring!

The trick is to keep your brush clean so you're not pushing the pigment from the "ring" into the undamaged part of the painting, but rather you're lifting the pigment off with the brush. You can blot the lifted paint out with a clean dry silk sponge if there's a lot, but try to pick most of it up with the brush as you have more control. Hope you didn't use a staining colour! But you can usually tone that down enough that it's less noticeable.

Lesson: lay a piece of paper towel or a clean rag on your (dry) painting next to your water container. I am a "splasher" too!

Have fun!