Learn how to make amazing bubbles. Perfect for fish rock painting.

Learn how to paint adorable fish with amazing bubbles in this fun rock painting tutorial. With step by step instructions, you’ll be creating amazing fish rocks in no time!

Fish and bubbles

There are lots of directions I could have taken for our fish week on #52Rocks! But really, I wanted to share something else.

How to paint bubbles! Adding bubbles to an under the water scene can really help it pop. Now, this is your basic bubble structure. Once you get this down you can play around with adding more colors and highlights.

This page contains affiliate links which means if you make a purchase using the link, I could receive a commission. Check out all the details here.

Step by step instructions for this fish painted rock

Before we add the bubbles we need a rock to put them on.

Start by blending an underwater background. Make your water lighter at the top and you can add in hints of green to your blue.

If you haven’t done this with paint pens before you can check out this tutorial for tips.

Now add on a fish or any kind of sea life that lets out bubbles. I made a pretty coral and yellow colored fish.

Start by blocking out some color for your undercoat.

You can use your brush to pull out the fins so they have a good texture.

Keep adding on dots and layers of your fish colors and blending together until you like the look of your fish.

I also added an eye in black and gills by scrapping the paint back off with a toothpick or a darker shade.

How to paint bubbles

I used my 1M paint pens <LINK> for precision on these. It makes it a whole lot easier to make.

Start with white circles where you want your bubbles to be. Next, add light blue just inside each bubble. Make sure to go along the same side of every bubble. 

Then along the bottom and onto the opposite side add a bit of a darker blue. If you need to pull the line a bit thinner you can grab a toothpick here.

Then last add white highlights inside the light blue curve. You can do 2 on a bigger bubble and one on smaller bubbles.

101 Tip: Take some time and practice on a piece of paper if you need before trying on your rock. Since you are working on a blended backdrop it will be hard to repaint these if you make a mistake.

That’s it! I added a bit of seaweed on my rock to complete the look. Adding bubbles really brings the fish to life.

How to paint a fish scene on rocks

If you create one of these rocks, please share it with us!!  Leave a picture in the comments of our Facebook Live!

Pin this Animal rock to your favorite Pinterest board!