Composition Tutorial : Cheap Joe's Watercolor Demonstration

http://www.cheapjoes.com -- Welcome to Cheap Joe's Test Studio!

I want to talk to you about composition because it seems like every workshop you go to everybody has a different idea about composition.

I want to show you something I learned from a book years ago - I don't even remember which book it was - but it's the simplest thing I've ever heard on how to get good composition.

It's a simple way and it's fun.

It's called the "Tic Tac Toe" method of composition. If you'll imagine this is your paper you're working on, you're going to draw the tic-tac-toe lines. Now you'll do this with a pencil - I'm doing it with a marker so you can see what I'm doing.

Anywhere these two lines cross is a good area for your center of interest. It doesn't matter the shape of your paper, you do the same thing. Divide it into thirds. This intersection is a good area, and so is this, etc.

To show you a little better, I have this little painting. I'm not going to mark on it with this marker, but if you apply the tic tac toe method, you'll find the area of interest is right where this house is with the trees.

Isn't that easy? It works everytime for a simple way to get your center of interest out of the center of the paper.

Composition . . . have fun!

Category:

Howto & Style

Tags:

• cheap
• joes
• composition
• watercolor
• painting
• art
• workshop
• tips
• tic
• tac
• toe
• method

[DesiFuyuko]

Thank you, I've been looking for a tip like this :) Composition is like my problem.

[Klebkatt]

that's pretty handy. Thank you.