How not to create watercolor mud. It is easy to avoid creating mud once you know what causes it.

Mud, when talking about watercolor painting refers to a section of the painting which is not smooth and transparent looking. Instead, it looks dull and lifeless. If the paint is not allowed to flow on the paper, you will not see the colors softly merge with one another, which is one of watercolor’s beautiful qualities. My PATREON MEMBERSHIP PAGE: https://www.patreon.com/user/membership?u=57731929 - in addition to ad-free content you get exclusive content (new videos will be more in depth than those on my YouTube channel), hi-resolution reference photos, photos of my finished painting, and drawing outlines where available. Other benefits are also included. My teaching manual: Mastering Watercolors - A Practical Guide: https://amzn.to/3CgYQfB In a clean wash, the paint is allowed to settle on the paper, and to dry before being disturbed. In the muddy wash, the watercolor paint is kept moving around while nearly at the dry stage. This often happens when beginner artists mix insufficient paint and must try to mix more. All the while the painting surface is drying – at the damp stage. Another cause is when the student uses too small a brush and must make many more brush strokes than are needed. This is the 17th video in my beginner watercolor artist series. If you are a beginner, and this is the first of my videos in this series you are watching, then I highly recommend that you go back and begin at Watercolor Class One and do the exercises in each. These exercises are what I used to put my beginner face-to-face students through, before allowing them to progress to more advanced subjects. Even now, before a student, new to watercolor, can join my online class they have to first prove they have studied and applied this beginner lessons. In this way, new students are able to more easily join my more advanced classes. I also have a couple of watercolor painting books which I published and distribute through Amazon. The first one, which has sold over 10,000 copies is bascially my teaching manual and is titled: Mastering Watercolors - A Practical Guide. The second is full of step-by-step demonstrations and is titled: Watercolor Step By Step: https://amzn.to/3z4YXEu Both books are available in kindle format and paperback. You can also find a lot of useful information on my website: https://www.paintingwithwatercolors.com/