This Photoshop tutorial will show you how to complete an underwater landscape painting step by step. This is part one of a two part series. Seascape Painting Part II will show you how to draw the fishes and apply finishing touches to the painting.

*This tutorial was meant to be completed using a pen tablet. If you are using a mouse, the brush sizes will be irrelevant. However, a good estimate for brush sizes when using a mouse is about 1/3 the size of the brush I am using.
Open a new project (16 x 20 inches, 300 pdi).

Use color #0095A2 and the paint bucket tool to fill in the background layer with a teal blue.

Make a new layer titled “ocean floor” above the background.

Block in the ocean foreground with color #A87300 (261 pixels, opaque, hard edged round brush).

Indicate the major shadows with color #926400 and the same brush.

Highlight the floor with color #AF7800.

Make a new layer “coral” above the other layers.
