Sponge bob painting with a Mona Lisa twist!
Today we are going to paint something really special and dear to me and I am sure if you're reading this blog post, you love Spongebob square pants as much as I do! This beloved character throughout the world is known for its optimistic approach to life. The good-natured, naive, and enthusiastic sea sponge bob taught us the values of friendship, honesty, and the most important - courage to be yourself!
In this tutorial, although we would not make the conventional Sponge bob painting but his character with a little twist - Spongebob as Monalisa or should I call him "Boba Lisa"? Okay maybe that sounds a little weird but it cracks me up haha! It was originally coined and created by Marek Dolata as a digital painting from which our fellow watercolor artist got really inspired and brought us this watercolor tutorial.
I promise you it is going to be a lot of fun! so before we start, you would need a couple of things as follows:
Catch all in action here in the video
Step 1: Let's prepare a rough sketch
1) Make a very basic cubical shape
2) Add some wobbly lines around the face area.
3) Next, add in some details like facial features and some pores
4) Some more background details like adding the flowers (called Sea Anemone) from the bikini bottom. :D Super!! Now you have a base to paint on.
Step 2: Apply a base layer with 'Deep Yellow + Raw Sienna'
Very simple and straight - Mix Deep Yellow + Raw Sienna and add one base layer on his face.
Step 3: Add depth to the face with 'Raw Sienna'
Shadows are so important to make your painting look more alive and realistic. It adds a 3rd dimension on a 2D surface. With the help of your fine liner brush add a thin line of strokes at the edge of his face, nose, and mouth shown as above.
Step 4: Highlight his face with 'White Gouache'
The next important thing is to highlight the portions that need to pop out. This further adds to having a prominent depth.
Step 5: Thick outline for his face with 'Burnt Umber'
Paint the thick outline of the face with one layer of translucent burnt umber(keep water consistency high). See if that's what you want or you can make it darker by adding another layer. I prefer a light layer as this piece of a baby is going on my wall! And it's always safest to not have too many dark shades on the wall.
Step 6: 'Shallow Blue' eyes with shadows+highlights
1) Let's make the pupil first - Paint the bottom half of the pupil ring with a very light blue and the top half darker blue. This gives an illusion that the light is shining through his eyes making them look so magical!
2) Fill the inner circle of the pupil with thick burnt umber which almost looks like black
3) To paint the edges of the eyes - Use very thin burnt umber and paint the right edges with it. you can blend it with white gouache. This simple step makes the eyes pop out so beautifully! I love it
Step 7: Add details
1) For details, paint the wobbly outline of his face with concentrated burnt umber
2) Fill the pores with burnt umber and make outlines for eyelashes and the mouth area.
3) Add shadows wherever necessary by blending Burnt Sienna and some more highlights with white gouache
4) Lastly, add thick white spots in the pupil with white gouache for his eyes to look more realistic
Step 9: Let's paint the dress with Burnt Sienna
1) Give a solid base of burnt sienna
2) Now take a thick burnt umber and paint dress except for the folds and greases. You can have a pencil sketch for the folds to know which areas to keep protected.
3) highlight the folds and greases with white gouache
4) Lastly, cover the bottom portion of the dress with burnt umber and in the next step, we blend the dress with the background.
Step 10: Paint the background!
Almost done my creators! I am so proud of you for sticking to the process till the end. Just a few more steps:
1) Paint the bottom half of the painting with black gouache and blend the dress using a mix of burnt umber and black gouache
2) Mix deep green + raw sienna to paint the top portion of the page and the middle portion with raw sienna
3) Add some background details as shown in the above image with Deep green, Burnt Sienna
4) Lastly, add some white sea anemone flowers with white gouache.
