Paint the Fish

While you are waiting for your background to dry create the fish that will swim in your sea. You can use the reference photos below. Draw the fish with a pencil on another sheet of watercolor paper . When you are satisfied with your drawings, use the watercolor paints to color them in. You can color them like the fish in your reference photo, or you can paint them in your own color combination.

Your fish may look something like these:

Add The Fish to the Water

With your background now dry and your fish complete, cut them out with a pair of scissors. Decide where in your picture your want them to go. They may be swimming the same direction, opposite directions, or they could overlap each other. Glue them to your painting with a glue stick – I like to use glue sticks instead of white glue when working with paper, since the paper is repositionable and the glue doesn’t make the paper buckle.

Painting by L.E., Age 7

Great job! Your undersea painting is complete! Don’t forget to sign your work!

Variations: Include other sea creatures, such as starfish, dolphins, and sea slugs.

If shells are available, they can be glued along the bottom edge of the picture. Shells would need to be glued on with white glue to insure they stay, in which case the glue should dry overnight.

A small thick piece of cardboard can be added to the back of the fish to make them stand out from the background.