Why does my painting look wrong?
You can see something is off and cannot name it. A teacher can. Lessons on real paper, and a teacher who looks at photos of your work in progress and says what to fix next.
Ochra is an app for iPhone and Android. Lesson 1 needs one brush, one sheet and about 20 minutes.
A hard line about a third of the way down: the first pass had already dried when the second reached it. Rewet that third until it just shines and lay the wash again in one pass.
The horizon edge stayed clean across the whole width. That is the hardest part of this step.
The paper buckled here. Tape all four edges before the next wash.
Read from a photograph: if the paper says otherwise, trust the paper.
Before you go on, correct the wash: the second coat will not cover the hard line.
Paint. Photograph. Read what to fix next.
- Step 1
Paint on your own paper
Each lesson is one thing: a flat wash, a graded sky, a hard edge. The steps are written by a person, and you paint them with the paints you own.
- Step 2
Photograph each step
When a step is done, you take a photo of the paper. Nothing else to fill in.
- Step 3
Read three things at most
What’s wrong, why, and what to do next, on your own painting. When something worked, it says so, and why it was hard.
From the first wash to a small landscape.
Easy to hard, one thing per lesson. Each one ends with a photo of your work and what to fix next. Watercolor comes first; other techniques get their own path.
- Lesson 1 · Materials and water
What your paints, your brush and your paper do when they meet.
- Lesson 2 · Flat wash
One even field of color, edge to edge, without a mark.
- Lesson 3 · Graded wash
A sky that lightens toward the horizon, in one pass.
- Lesson 4 · Wet on wet
Color dropped into a wet sheet, and where it stops.
- Lesson 5 · Values: light and dark
Three values that read as one shape.
- Lesson 6 · Hard and soft edges
Where an edge stays sharp and where it melts.
- Lesson 7 · Glazes
A second coat over a dry one, and what it changes.
- Lesson 8 · Saving the whites
The paper as your brightest light.
- Lesson 9 · A simple landscape
Everything above, on one sheet.
A video cannot look at your paper.
Millions of people are learning to draw and paint online. Big course platforms teach with videos; personal feedback there is communal or selective, not guaranteed per student. Learners post their work in progress asking what’s wrong every week in art communities. Ochra looks at your painting at every step, and answers in plain words.
Your art happens on real paper and canvas — Ochra never paints for you.
Ochra looks, teaches and says what to fix next. The brush stays in your hand.
Four plain answers before the first lesson.
- Who looks at my painting?
- Ochra is software, not a person on the other end. It reads the photo of your painting and writes the notes in a teacher’s words: at most three things, each with what to do next. It reads from a photograph, so if the paper says otherwise, trust the paper.
- What do I need to start?
- The paints you already own. Lesson 1 needs one brush, one sheet and about 20 minutes.
- Does it grade my work?
- No. There are no scores, stars or grades, and no streaks. You get at most three observations on one photo, each with a next step.
- Is it for beginners?
- Yes. The lessons start from the first wash, and the blotchy middle of a painting is treated as normal, because it is.
What’s wrong, and what to do next.
Lesson 1 is one brush, one sheet and twenty minutes. Paint it, photograph it, and read what to fix next.
For iPhone and Android.
Nobody paints well at the beginning.