This was a fun exercise I did last November.  You tear a piece of newspaper and glue it to your board or in my case watercolour pad.  Then do your watercolour (or any other medium) to paint or draw your image.  You can choose how much newsprint to show through.   I found the whole process quite fun as I didn’t feel that it mattered if I made mistakes.  I was using water colour and I just slapped the paint on a went with it quite carelessly.  It didn’t matter if the lines were not straight or if I couldn’t get the shade on the house right. (the inspiration is from an image found on the web while doing a search for ‘thatched cottage’ or ‘English cottage’ or something like that but I have forgotten where.)