DIY Black Cat Watercolor Painting

Draw a simple circle on a blank sheet of watercolor paper to represent the moon. You can draw your harvest moon in the center of the paper or just off-center.

Using your 1-inch round brush, paint the entire surface of the paper with a very light Winsor Orange, leaving a large white circle around the moon.

Dip your 1-inch brush in Winsor Yellow and while the orange paint is still wet, paint the outer side of the white circle, allowing the orange and yellow to blend slightly. Leave the moon unpainted.

Allow the paint to dry slightly and then paint the inner side of the circle with yellow paint. Make sure you leave the moon white. Deepen the bottom of the picture with more orange paint if desired.

Allow the paint to dry and then lightly draw the silhouette of a cat along with some branches in the foreground. In order to give your painting more interest, draw the cat off-center.

Using very light Lamp Black, paint the outline of the cat with your No. 8 brush.

Use your No. 8 brush to fill in the rest of the cat with a darker shade of Lamp Black, leaving a highlight at the top of the head and top of the torso.

Deepen the color of the cat by applying another layer of Lamp Black.

With a paper towel, "lift" some of the paint on the left hand side of the cat's body. This will indicate the highlights on the cat.

Mix Lamp Black and Winsor Orange (1:3) to make brown. Using your No. 8 brush, paint in the branches and the details of the branches.

Apply another layer of the brown paint on the branches to create shadows, this time using a little more Lamp Black.

Using the very tip of your No. 8 brush, paint some leaves if desired. Make some leaves darker than others and some bigger than others. You can also darken the shadows on the right side of the cat with a little more Lamp Black.