Supplies & Colors Needed
White, Black, Sap Green, Cad Yellow light or medium, Dioxazine Purple, Raw Sienna, Yellow Ochre, Magenta.
Transfer Paper, blending medium, variety of small brushes, 1 large flat brush, 11 x 14 canvas
Background
Prepaint canvas with pale green (white + Sap green). Use a large flat brush, with criss-cross (slip-slap) motions and a touch of blending medium on your brush. Brush mix white + Sap green + touches of Cad Yellow and create a varied background, coming all the way up & into the edge of the design. You may add some tints of white+purple &/or white + magenta toward center of canvas. Dry.
Transfer design.
Background Leaves
Use pale mixtures of White _ Sap Green + tch of Cad. Yellow (do not mix colors completely & use varying brush mixes).
Do “press-slide-lift” (the motion is almost like a very short “check mark”) faded leaves behind & to the side of the lilac blossoms.
Main Leaves
Use medium to deep mixes of Sap Green, Medium Yellow, & white. Shadow w/ Sap Gr.+Diox Purp.+Raw Sienna. Highlight w/ White+ Cad Yellow + tch Sap Gr.
Base leaves with main mix, then using shadow mix, add center vein and pull that INTO &OUT from thato to create various shades of green and the subtle look of side veins.
Lilacs
Base center area of one section at a time, with a BIT of blending medium on your brush +Dioxazine Purple, Magenta & touches of Raw Sienna here & there. While still wet, use a small 1/4″ flat or filbert brush + White and starting in center of the section, make 4-petaled flowerettes. As you pick up the base color on your brush, move to the outer areas of the blossoms & continue to make flowerettes. You may overlap the flowers.
Here & there, pick up some of the DP and Magenta and tuck it in between the flowerettes.
When done with one section, move on to the next untill all sections are done and each lilac is one single blossom. Go back & repaint some of the highlight flowerettes with more white to enhance the rounded shape of the blossom.
Use the tip of one of your brush handles + Yellow Ochre to add centers of the flowerettes in the highlighted area.
Butterfly
May use colors of choice. Mine is a bit whimsical and probably not those of a real butterfly species (altho, there are so many, who knows).
Place colors on and then go back with a fine liner brush & very thin black paint to outline. You may use a black marker after dry instead, if desired.
Lilacs are one of my favorite flowers and the one I miss most by living in Florida. (of course, there are lots of others to help make up for it)
I hope you have fun painting this !!