British Beetles & Bugs Watercolor Templates — 20 Insects with Painted References & Color Cards

Mix & match: get 20% off sets & kits when your basket is £25 or more (about 3 sets). Use code BUNDLE20 at checkout.

WHAT'S INSIDE

20 pencil-outline templates, soft grey lineart on white, A4 portrait:

→ Seven-spot ladybird · stag beetle · green tiger beetle · rose chafer · cockchafer · violet ground beetle · dor beetle · cardinal beetle · bloody-nosed beetle · rosemary beetle · lily beetle · thick-legged flower beetle · wasp beetle · black-and-yellow longhorn · tansy beetle · devil's coach horse · green shieldbug · hawthorn shieldbug · red-and-black froghopper · 22-spot ladybird.

20 painted references: the same twenty compositions, painted loosely in natural colour.

20 Colour Inspiration Cards: five colours pulled from each painted reference, each with a plain colour name and hex code, plus boxes for your own dried test swatches. No colour rules: swatch your own paints and compare.

1 beetle identifier index: all twenty at a glance with names.

A ladybird on a leaf. A stag beetle with its antlers up. A rose chafer glinting green in the middle of a dog rose.

Beetles are the best watercolour subjects nobody paints. One glowing wet wash, a darker drop while it's still wet, a spot of white paper for the shine, and suddenly you've got a jewel. This set is twenty British beetles and bugs, each drawn as a soft pencil outline big enough to paint loosely, with a little bit of the plant it lives on.

Every insect has a painted reference in natural colours, so you can see where the scarlet and the emerald go, plus a Colour Inspiration Card with five of its colours.

FORMAT

22-page A4 template PDF: cover, identifier index, 20 templates, 300 DPI

20-page A4 painted reference PDF, 300 DPI

Colour Inspiration Cards: A5 card PDF (20 cards) plus a zip of 2-per-page A4 / US Letter print sheets and 300 dpi PNGs

Two PNG zips: every template and every painted reference as its own file

Paper tip: print the templates straight onto 300gsm watercolour paper; it holds a wet wash best. Lighter paper will ripple a little, which is fine.

Instant download. Yours to keep and reprint

MADE FOR

Nature journallers and anyone who loves a bit of garden wildlife

Beginners: the ladybirds and the lily beetle are the kindest place to start

Anyone who wants to practise glossy, glowing colour and white-paper highlights

Autumn and Halloween-season sketchbooks that want something other than pumpkins

If you paint one, I'd love to see it. Tag @artsydee_inspiring_creations on Instagram.