50+ Watercolor Mountain Painting Inspiration Ideas Tips & Tutorials [Art Scene Examples]

Below are 50+ watercolor mountain painting ideas. These ideas are intended to provide you inspiration for your own watercolor mountain painting. After the photos, I have included a list of watercolor mountain painting tips for beginners and five watercolor mountain tutorial videos for you to learn from.

Watercolor Mountain Art Inspiration Ideas

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Watercolor Mountain Painting Tips for Beginners

• Tonal Values – If you’re a beginner I recommend you to start with understanding the three main tonal values for mountains: light, mid-tone, and dark. Use light washes to establish mid-tones, then add darker tones for shadows and lighter tones for highlights, maintaining the balance for a realistic effect.

• Texture – Experiment with textured techniques like dry brush for rough mountain textures and wet-on-wet for softer, distant mountains. Tools like plastic cards or craft knives can be used to scrape off paint, creating natural-looking ridges and highlights.

• Gradient Background – Begin with a gradient background, starting from lighter sky colors like light blue or soft pink at the horizon, and transitioning to deeper tones higher up. This sets a mood and depth before painting the mountains.

• Wet and Dry Techniques – My advice is to use a combination of wet-on-wet techniques for blended, soft edges in distant mountains, and wet-on-dry for sharper, more defined edges in foreground mountains.

• Color Mixing – Mix colors carefully for mountain painting, often using combinations like blue and brown (e.g., cobalt blue and burnt sienna) to create natural mountain hues. Adjust the saturation depending on the distance of the mountain in the scene.

• Perspective – Pay attention to perspective by making distant mountains smaller and less detailed, and foreground mountains larger and more detailed, to enhance the sense of depth in your landscape.

• Simplified – When beginning, I recommend you to start with simpler shapes to form the basic outline of mountains. This helps in capturing the essence of the landscape without overwhelming you as a beginner.

Watercolor Mountain Tutorials for Beginners

Below are five watercolor mountain painting tutorials so you can follow along and learn:

Watercolor Mountain Tutorial 1 – This tutorial demonstrates three mountain painting techniques using tonal values and textured effects, employing tools like a plastic card and a craft knife for highlights and details. Click here to view.

Watercolor Mountain Tutorial 2 – This tutorial explores various techniques for creating textured watercolor mountains, focusing on dry brush and wet on wet methods, and encourages experimentation with paint-to-water ratios and brush strokes. Click here to view.

Watercolor Mountain Tutorial 3 – This tutorial teaches a beginner-friendly watercolor mountain silhouette painting, emphasizing gradient washes and layering for a misty, sunset backdrop. Click here to view.

Watercolor Mountain Tutorial 4 – This beginner-oriented tutorial guides through painting sharp, detailed mountains using a combination of cobalt blue, burnt sienna, and various brushes for creating a realistic landscape. Click here to view.

Watercolor Mountain Tutorial 5 – This is an advanced tutorial on painting snow-capped mountain winter scene. It uses masking fluid and various techniques to create a misty, atmospheric mountain landscape. Click here to view.