How To Draw Vibrant Koi Fish With Lily Pads

With Rosh HaShana coming on Friday night, which includes the theme of fish, now is a great time to learn how to draw vibrant koi fish with lily pads! Previously I shared how to draw koi fish though that was with fewer fish and with no lily pads, and friends, learning how to draw and shade lily pads is so much fun! Additionally, this is perfect for making Rosh HaShana cards, which I plan to do, hopefully and a quickish way to get some creativity into your day! Let’s do it!

Supplies For Drawing Vibrant Koi Fish With Lily Pads:

• sketchbook with watercolor paper, or sketchbook prepared with gesso (my case), or just watercolor paper

• a waterproof black fineliner pen, and a pencil and eraser

• stabilo woodies and caran dache neocolor II aquarelle, or any watersoluble pencils/crayons

• a large paint brush and a small paintbrush, paper towel for removing color

• how to draw koi tutorial from peggy dean

How To Draw Vibrant Koi Fish With Lily Pads:

1. Check out tutorial linked to above, and figure out the layout for your fish and lily pads, sketching roughly in pencil, finalizing in pencil, and then drawing over pencil with waterproof fineline black pen.
2. In my previous sketchbook drawing of koi I masked off the fish to paint the background, but here there are too many elements to do that, but do know that is an option, using masking tape
3. Scribble on background with 3 shades of blue stabilo woody, and then blend with brush and water. Pat where necessary to remove spots with too much color or to lighten things up a bit.
4. Using caran dache neocolor II aquarelle crayons, outline lily pads in dark green, fill middle with light green, and blend with water and brush. Add yellow on top once that has dried a bit and blend. Pat with paper towel to remove color here and there.
5. Add orange to spots on fish and grey to fins, and blend.
6. All of the color applied here can of course be done with watercolor, but I love using the water soluble supplies listed, and it certainly makes it travel friendly.

That is it, enjoy!