Water Color Renderings

Watercolor in Architecture

Reviewing an old style in a new way

from sddrawings.com

In this next part of Renderings & drawings, Sherrod Drawings continues to find fast and accurate renderings to be an integral part of architecture. Today, I am going to look at the Great House water color recently completed.

Watercolor renderings give a wonderfully romantic and beautiful view of Architectural design.  It allows the viewer to imagine the scene with a light hearted view, as opposed to a strict and harsh judgmental eye. Take a quick look at my past post with a night scene & dusk rendering. Where the building itself is fairly well composed, I can find several key elements that really stir my ire... for instance; the trees in the back and foreground leave much to be desired.  This is from fast drawing and limited resources of hi-quality digital photographs).

Since the digital rendering is so much more life like, it's easier to judge the picture and find faults, it's the minds natural way of working. "Hey", says the brain, "this is close... but I don't want you to be fooled, you know this isn't real and here's why... (dot dot dot)".  So we can appreciate the time put into a drawing, unless it's absolutely perfect, our brains are going to find a way to show us how it is not a real scene. A watercolor rendering (and this one is digital) gives the viewer permission to use their own imagination and "feel" the house as opposed to critiquing it; because the picture is so abstract (not abstract enough that you can not tell what something is) though abstract enough to not trigger the brain into complaining.  Then we are allowed to appreciate and find other emotions associated with the drawing.

Studio Sky Design, Milan Velimirovic Technical, Sherrod Artistry

The Great House rendering above represented about 8 hours of off the clock experimentation in this new style.  It is 100% digitally composed in a combination of Sketchup and Photoshop. I've drawn upon 30+ years of real life watercolor and painting experience.  One of the big things I had to think about, was how do objects actually look and what colors do they give off.  Purple hues on the shadows and blue greens in the distance.  I wanted the clouds to just barely be viewable so as not to be a focal point, though composed in a way, that they work with all the other elements to direct the viewers eye and point to the Great House.

Other elements I've taken from water coloring for years, is the bead around the palms and tree line. In this instance, the bead is prob. a little heavy, though that was on purpose.  I could actually watercolor this scene and have a real one, though time is a huge factor.  From drawing the actual house to sketching in the foliage, it's 8 hours versus 40+.  The question is, is a digital watercolor "good enough"?

The end product of any CAD system and drawing mechanisms (which ever you choose to use) should be a beautiful useful end product.

-Michael Sherrod