The look
- Soft bleeding edges where one wash runs into the next while it is still wet.
- Transparent layers, so earlier washes stay visible through later ones.
- Highlights left as untouched paper rather than painted in white.
- A thin, watery palette that fades out toward the edge of the frame.
- Visible paper grain breaking up the darker washes.
Where it comes from
Watercolor is pigment ground in a gum binder and thinned with water on paper, so the white of the sheet does the work that white paint does in other media. Tate defines it as a water soluble paint with transparent properties, and that transparency is the whole effect. The medium was used for botanical and topographical records long before it was treated as a finished art form in its own right, and Britannica traces its establishment through eighteenth century English landscape practice. Digital versions imitate the same two things: bleed at wet edges, and paper showing through.
What it suits
- A soft profile picture for a personal or creative account
- Wedding and engagement portraits given as a print
- Anniversary and Mother's Day cards
- Gentle nursery or family wall art
How to shoot for it
- Shoot in diffuse daylight, such as beside a window on an overcast day, so there are no hard shadow edges fighting the washes.
- Frame head and shoulders with space above your head, because the wash needs somewhere to fade out.
- Keep the expression calm and the mouth relaxed; soft edges suit a still face more than a wide laugh.
- Use a plain light wall so the background can dissolve instead of competing.
This look is not in Toonsta today. It is described here so you can recognize it; the closest Toonsta styles are listed below.
Related styles
- Storybook illustration: A storybook illustration turns your photo into a picture book page: warm painted color, a soft drawn outline, and a scene built around you rather than a cropped background.
- Pencil sketch filter: A pencil sketch filter reduces your photo to graphite on paper.
- Oil painting portrait: An oil painting portrait rebuilds your face in thick worked paint.