说明

作者：Vivian Swift

版权：Vivian是来自长岛的水彩画家，擅长风景画。原文及图画、照片归原作者所有，译文版权归苏珊姐所有，如需转载或商用请申请授权。可以参考译文学习。译文仅为本人理解，不一定完全准确，欢迎讨论。

正文

10月的落叶

October is Leaf-Painting Month！

十月是画树叶的月份！

Two of these leaves are real, and two on them are my paintings of leaves.

I can't  tell you how the real leaves are made, because I am not a tree.

But I can show you how I made my facsimiles.

上图中，有两片叶子是真实的，另两片是我画的。

我没法告诉你真正的叶子是什么构成的，因为我不是一棵树。

但我可以告诉你，我是如何画我的叶子副本。

Leaf No. 1: 第一片叶子

第一片叶子

The first thing you have to do when you look at a leaf with a painter's eyes is to suss out your strategy. You do not paint a leaf all at once, you paint it in sections, sections (I call them “cells”) that are evident in its structure. And in this leaf, I see four cells:

当你以画家的眼光来看树叶时，第一件要做的事情是，解构出你的绘画策略。你不是一次就画出整片叶子，你按部分来画，各部分（我称之为格）的结构是明显的。在这片叶子中，我看到了四格：

解构

This is how I'm going to paint this leaf; cell by cell.  Step 1:

这是我要画这片叶子的策略；一格一格画。步骤1：

步骤1

Step 1: You can't quite see it in this picture, but I've outlined the leaf (I laid the leaf on my paper and dragged a pencil around it so that I have an exact-sized silhouette).

步骤1：你在这张照片中看不太清楚它，但我已经勾了一遍底稿（把叶子固定在纸上，用铅笔沿着叶子周围画线，这样就得到一个大小一致的轮廓）。

Now I'm ready to begin with the first cell:

现在我准备开始画第一格了：

第一格

While my first wash of the main color (in this case, it's an ocher-yellow)  is still wet, I will bleed in several other colors — in this leaf, it has green edges and brown rot spots inside the cells. And next, still while the paint is wet, I'm going to get out a straight pin and do this:

当我刷完主色（这里是中黄色）画面未干时，我会晕染其他好几个颜色——在这片叶子上，有绿色的边缘和区域内棕色的腐烂斑点。然后，趁画面仍是湿的，我要拿针并这样做：

画叶脉

This is why I picked this leaf: it has great veins. And I've found that by using a straight pin to dig lines into the wet paper, I can make the best veins.

This is not hard to do. Just use the straight pin like an itty bitty pencil, and “draw” the veins into the wet watercolor. (Sorry that you can't see it well in this pic — but remember, I'm snapping photos with my right hand while I'm painting with my left and we should be grateful that I'm able to get even these crappy shots.）

OK. Veins done, we skip to another cell while the first one dries.

我选这片叶子的原因是：它有明显的叶脉。我发现通过使用针在湿纸上划线，就可以画出最好的叶脉。

这并不难做。只需像用铅笔芯一样使用针，并在湿画上“绘制”叶脉。 （抱歉在这张图上你看不清—— 但别忘了，我右手拍照，左手画画，应该庆幸，还能得到这些照片。）

好。叶脉画完，在等这一格干的过程中，我们去画另一格。

Cell 2: 第二格：

第二格

Cell  3: 第三格

第三格

Note (above): This is a good shot of what the straight pin does to wet watercolor paper — see the veins? Not bad, huh?

注意（上面）：这是在湿水彩上用针画出很好的痕迹——看到叶脉了吗？还不错，是吗？

The most boring part of painting a leaf is waiting for the watercolor to dry. So, to keep busy, I'll do the stem:

画一片叶子最无聊的是等待水彩干。所以，为了保持忙的节奏，我会画这里：

叶柄

Cell 4: 第四格

第四格

Done. 完成。

第一片叶子完成

Yes, Grumbacher watercolor lightens when it dries: you might want to keep that in mind as you're painting. Use lots of color! Use lots of red! Like this:

是的，当水彩变干时画面会变亮：你想要留下的画画时的色彩。

要用很多的颜色！用很多的红色！就像这样：

第二片叶子

I chose this leaf because I want to show you a trick of the trade, namely Masking Fluid.

我选择这片叶子是想向你展现一个技巧——遮盖液。

遮盖液

Masking Fluid comes in a little bottle (75ml for about $14.00) and it's liquid stuff that you apply onto the parts of your picture where you want the paper to resist paint. I use a toothpick to “brush” it into small places — use whatever is easiest for you, but don't use a paint brush. When this liquid dries it becomes waterproof, like rubber, and that is murder to get out of the bristles of your paint brush (I speak from experience).

But since it's waterproof, you can paint right over it and when your painting is done, you just peel off the mask and voila!

The reason I'm using mask here is because this leaf has some tiny holes in it:

遮盖液有一个小瓶装（75ml，约$ 14.00），是液体的，可以涂到你不想上色的地方。我用牙签“刷”小点——用任何你觉得容易用的工具，但不要使用笔刷。当液体变干时，会变得防水，像橡胶一样，这对画笔来说是致命的（按我的经验）。

但因为它是防水的，你可以在它上面刷颜色，当你画完时，剥下胶质就出现空白区了！

我在这里使用遮盖液是因为这片叶子里有一些小孔：

叶子上的洞

I'll be putting  Masking Fluid on those little  holes,because I paid $14.00 for the stuff and I want to get some use out of it.

Now we can begin to paint:

我会把遮盖液涂在那些小洞上，因为我花了14.00美元，我想要它有用。

现在我们可以开始画了：

第一格

第二格

Remember, the key to getting your Fall leaves to look real is to paint wet-into-wet, to create bleeds, like this (up-close):

记住，要让你的秋叶看起来更真实，关键就在于湿涂法，形成晕染，像这样（接近）：

晕染

And so on: 继续：

第三、四格

第五格

And, finally, we peel off the Art Masking Fluid:

最后，我们剥掉遮盖液：

第二片叶子完成

I can't tell you how peaceful it is, to paint these miniatures. I enjoy the concentration and smallness of painting one leaf at a time — it's like meditation.

Just take your time, look closely at the leaf, get your strategy worked out before you start, let each cell dry before you paint the next one,and get lost in the details.

我没法告诉你，在画这些画时，是多么的平静。我喜欢集中注意力一次画一片叶子——就像冥想一样。

只要你花时间，仔细观察叶子，并在你开始画之前制定你的绘画策略，等每格画干了，再画下一格，并沉浸在细节中。

苏珊姐说

虽然是高阶教程，但因为这两片叶子所涉及的颜色不多，所以还是值得初学者一试的。

一个出乎意料的地方是，Vivian的勾边方法，直接在叶子边缘描绘。简单到想起了小时候画画的情景，我以为这方法只有小孩子才用，大人何况是成熟的画家，应该都是一边看一边描绘。好吧，苏珊姐又局限了。

所以，画画就是享受整个过程，表达所有情绪，不用管那么多规矩。

本译文仅供个人研习、欣赏语言之用，谢绝任何转载及用于任何商业用途。本译文所涉法律后果均由本人承担。本人同意简书平台在接获有关著作权人的通知后，删除文章。