How to Paint a Farm Landscape in Watercolor

Few people today will see a farmer ploughing his field using a hand plough and a horse, but today we are going to paint one in watercolour.

It is always best to preserve all white and light areas with masking fluid.  Use a small round brush for this and periodically clean the brush with water to stop it from gelling in the hairs.

Lightly paint in the sky with a mix of blue and a touch of red to tone down the bright blue and then let it dry.

Use a darker mix to paint in the mountains making it a bit lighter towards the horizon.

Paint the far field with some Yellow Ochre.  The closer field is  painted in green, and if too dark, lift out using a tissue.  With some light Burnt Sienna add the field in between these other two.

Add some Yellow to the mountain mix to make a dark grey-green for the trees. See how this lifts out the distant houses.

Add the darker shadows right on the horizon line. Make the mix a bit darker still and add the closer trees, as well as the small row of blushes or hedge at the edge of the ploughed field.

Cover the whole field with some light Burnt Sienna, while letting it get darker towards the foreground. This adds distance perspective to the scene.  This also warms up the foreground and cooler as it recedes into the distance.

See how the masking fluid has preserved the farmer and the horse.

Paint the underpainting of the trees with Yellow Ochre and a touch of Blue.  With a darker mix begin adding in the darker leaf clumps and the shadow areas.

While the paper is still damp, but not too wet,drop in some very dark mix into the deep shadows.  Then paint in the shadows on the ground.

Paint in the furrow lines, making them broader and darker towards the foreground.  Be careful to get the linear perspective correct.

With the very light mountain colour on the brush, and using it almost side-on (flat), lightly pull the brush over the paper surface.  This ensures  nice random markings on the soil, getting lighter in the distance.

For even more texture, use a sponge to create the very loose soil effect, especially on the heaped soil lines.

Add green plants to separate the one field from the other.

Remove the masking fluid with some masking tape and then add some more green patches on the dark ploughed lines for the upturned vegetation.

With some Orange add the horse collar and the farmer’s face, hat and arms.

Mix a dark Gray and paint the pants and braces.  Lift out any highlights using a clean damp brush.

Paint all the dark lines on the horse and plough using a rigger brush.

With a light blue-gray, paint in the shirt shadow and only a few on the light coloured horse.  Add just enough to show the rounding of its body.  Less is always more – as they say.

Make sure that the farmer’s feet, the plough and the horse are all in the same furrow!

With that our landscape painting of the farmer ploughing his field with a horse drawn plough is complete.

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