Tips and Tricks for Getting the Perfect Watercolour Effects on Aquabord

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Tips and Tricks for Getting the Perfect Watercolour Effects on Ampersand Aquabord

Ampersand's Aquabord offers the artist the ability to do more on the surface and to create effects more easily than on other traditional surfaces.

Aquabord is an archival panel with a unique clay coating which includes a tiny mineral that helps to dissipate the water and pigment throughout the painting. It can be used for other media as well but is very absorbent and is designed to work with water media such as watercolour, gouache and water-based inks.

You can create soft flows of colours on Aquabord as is done on traditional paper surfaces. Aquabord also allows glazing (the stacking of colours, damp or wet paint laid on top of dry paint) without disturbing the underlying layers. Unlike other products on the market that only allow one quick colour placement because a second would disturb the first, Aquabord helps the painter generate more brilliant, luminous colours by allowing colours to be glazed one layer on top of another. The smother surface offers a greater reflection of the pigment that sits nearer the surface. On paper the pigment drops down into the lint of the cotton and dulls down.

Aquabord responds to a “damp-into-damp” process. Water can be placed on the surface in a very wet, splashy manner. If the paint is applied in this wet and juicy manner, the colour will tend to marbleize throughout the water and dry in irregular flows. If you allow the water to drop into the surface, dry a bit, and become damp before applying paint, the colours will flow more slowly across the surface creating a smoother, soft wash appearance. Remember that colour will move naturally as long as it is offered water in which to move.