How to Use Watercolor Crayons for Figure Painting

One of the things I enjoy about water-soluble crayons rather than pencils is that you don't have to stop to sharpen them, you simply tear off another section of the wrapper. The quality of line you get with them isn't as fine or delicate, but perfect for expressive or gestural mark making.

The brand I used in this painting is Lyra (Buy Direct), which can be bought as a set or, occasionally, as individual sticks. The colors shown in the photo are ones I've put into that tin specifically for working from a life model. (Note: The stick with the orange wrapper is an oil pastel, which I used to for wax-resist techniques.)

I used a small sponge rather than a brush to turn the crayon into paint to save time. You can get more water onto the paper in one go. Use a corner of the sponge to work in a small section.

I started with an outline sketch of the pose using a light color that would work as a general skin tone for the model. Next I shaded in some form on the figure.

There aren't any measuring marks or adjustments on the sketch because I knew I had such limited time and wanted to get on with it. I had also been working with this model for several weeks in the life workshop so was familiar with her proportions. Looking at it now, I'd say the feet and lower legs are too small.

Swapping to a darker brown, I added further form to the body. Then with a very dark brown I added a touch of the deepest shadows. Knowing I was going to turn the crayon into paint, I didn't want to add too much of dark at this stage -- when you add water it very easily overwhelms everything else.

Using a sponge, I started turning the line into paint. Depending on how aggressive you are on the surface with a sponge or brush, you can retain more or less of the line.

These two photos show the effect of adding water, how if softens the line and adds a color wash (paint) to the piece. There's no rule that says you must apply water to every single bit. Retaining some as dry lines can be very effective.

Without waiting for the water to dry, I added more line to the body, particularly shadow. Watersoluble crayon works differently onto wet paper than dry, spreading out a bit. It adds another type of mark to the painting, but if you don't like the result either wait for the paper to dry (which doesn't take long) or work in another section where it's still dry.

Next I started adding some blue for the background. I chose blue because it would be a contrast to the warm browns of the figure.

After dissolving the blue I'd put down with the sponge, I realized I needed to apply a lot more crayon to get the depth of color I was after. I also added more color to parts of the body in shadow so this would have a deep enough tone to fit with the background.

It's very easy to focus on a single part of a painting and adjust only this, but you need to remember to consider the overall composition too. Otherwise you can end up with a painting that isn't unified, with individual bits that work but don't feel as if they fit together.

Having scribbled all the way around the figure with the blue, I then used to sponge to eliminate these obtrusive lines, to dissolve them into a blue wash.

In the last few minutes I added more line to the figure, for shadows and to refine forms. Lastly I added more blue to the right of the figure, to anchor it to the surface a bit. Then time was up.

Overall I was pleased with this painting. I feel there's a sense of the pose, it's not too out of proportion, and I like the mark making I made with the medium. Most of all, I had tremendous fun painting it, exploring what I could do with the crayons and pushing myself to keep going against the clock.