Tip on Painting Water

If you want to paint water, you need to know and understand water. Start by building up a library of references; get several reference photos. Go sketching by a creek so you understand how water moves, how light reflects, about depths and water running over stones.

Also, people tend to use too much white in water. Water itself has no color, but gets it colors from what is under it, in it or above it. Think of it as a liquid mirror.
Tip from: Starrpoint.

While painting a body of water, first paint the paper with a thin coat of a color for plain water, leave it for some time and then paint a colour (whatever shade) for ripples. This makes getting the ripple effect easier, as well as foggy water reflections. This can also be used for a cloudy or fogged sky.
Tip from: Krishna Prasad

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