A Very Seriously Overdue Walk-Through

Although it has been a long time since I updated my blog, art has been very busy for me recently! I am in the midst of working through 3 commissions in 3 different mediums, and I am loving every bit of it! I thought I'd make this quick post update taking you through some of the steps I use in painting! The following painting is NOT finished, and has taken me about 30 minutes to paint (and another hour to write and blog!)

**The purpose of this entry is NOT for you to look at my work and think either how terrible or wonderful it is. The purpose of this entry is to simplify my work process into easy steps to show you how simple art can be. Hopefully, you will be inspired, as I often am, to just run over, pull some paints or pens out, and start creating art!**

Painting- So I've always liked trees at night. That was about all I had to work with. Also, my phone background is pretty neat- has some cool blues in it, so I decided to combine the two ideas into a painting. Here's the whole process!

Materials: 

The Canvas:

So when I paint in acrylics (this painting is one such example), I use canvas I stretch myself. Its WAY cheaper than buying pre-stretched, and actually responds better to the brush. I buy rolls of duckweave medium thick grade cotton from Utrecht in Boston. It usually runs me about 20 bucks for 10ftx6ft cut. That makes me a fairly decent number of canvases (usually around 6-8). Stretcher bars can be bought at any art store (any run of the mill brand works)- usually 40 cents for an 8" bar, up to 9 dollars for a 72" bar. After that, I use Liquitex white gesso (1 gallon is 20 bucks). All in all... A single canvas should run you about 8 dollars for a 16x20. This will take you around 15 min to stretch and prep, and will paint like a charm! 

Paint:

For the most part, Paint is like Auto Maintenance- you get what you pay for. There are, however, a few corners that can be safely cut (especially in acrylics). 

In this painting, I use Mars Black, Ultramarine Blue, Cobalt Teal, Manganese Blue (very little), Diox- Purple, Cad Red Hue (very little) and White Gesso... The brand for your warm colors (reds and yellows) usually CANNOT be skimped on. I use Golden Acrylics for my reds and Liquitex for Yellows (this is because Liquitex is generally thicker and more opaque than Golden, and for yellows I need maximum covering. Honestly, Golden are the best brand out there in my opinion, and my favored option.)

Because none of us are made of money, I use mid range paints for my cool colors (blues and some blue greens) My purple here, for example, is Liquitex Basic, their mid grade paint. Cheaper and less great coverability, but it works for this. The Ultramarine and Manganese are Golden (happened to be what I had lying nearby). The Mars Black is Liquitex.

Brushes:

Brush choice is both important and personal. For acrylics, I like Artist Loft Professional Series (green handles)... They're expensive, but they have synthetic bristles with high stiffness and high bristle count (this means they have lots of 'spring' in the stroke while blending colors smoothly and carrying paint very evenly)...Again, preference.

Here, for sizes, you see a Filbert 10, a Filbert 6, a Round 6, a Round 8, and a Flat 8. I don't think I used the flat at all, and I actually also added a Rigger 1/2 at the end (the fine liner brush for branches).

Other:

Palette: as you can see, tin foil...

Beer: Eliot Ness, by GLBC... Needless to say, this tool is not optional. Beer has been supporting creativity for centuries. If its good enough for Ben Franklin, its good enough for me.

Let the games begin!!!

So I started with Cobalt Teal. Basically, the only 2 rules in acrylic landscapes are 1. Paint the background first. and 2. Paint dark to light. In this case the rules were conflicting, as the furthest point back was lightest. In this situation, Further back trumps dark over light. Just a dry whisking motion here- dry canvas, spread the paint, and DON'T WORRY!

Next, I added a bit of gesso to the mix, trying to add white tone areas (you know, just for variety or some technical stuff like that...) I also grabbed some purple and started to flush out the base area (moving to darker and closer in the background.) Wash your brush between each color, and make sure its like 80 percent dry before hitting the canvas again. If you stretch your own canvas, it should be absorbent enough to  keep your paint from thinning, but its best not to test. Remember, the Filbert brush here helps in blending colors smoothly!

                         <---Bad artist. Clean your brush!

Look at them colors whisk!

Here, I began to block my darks in. Really, just some color testing more than anything. Ultramarine blue on the top, with mars black in the corner. 

 Using all of the same colors, I just blended them all into eachother. I switched to a Filbert 10 when I had them all down, then VERY LIGHTLY touching the canvas, whisked them into eachother. the result is a smooth color blend with minimal streaks in the image (they lessen even more as the paint dries too!)

 another pro tip- Acrylic and Oil paint almost always dry a shade DARKER than they go on. This is the OPPOSITE of watercolor, which will dry TWO SHADES LIGHTER on average. I tried to tip the angle of my crappy phone camera to simulate the darker shade.

After letting that sit for a bit (not because I wanted it dry, but because I wanted to see the darker shades for comparison), I put some red and black into the bottom. Same technique as before. Super loose strokes, then smoothed out with a Filbert 10. As you can see perhaps, I took Manganese blue and Ultramarine blue (1:1 ratio) and added a few highlight strokes into the center area. This was done right before it dried, as to allow a blend of colors.

Now, I seriously let the whole thing dry 10 min. T minus 15 min into the painting.

After a little dry time, I switched to a round 6 and went into the whole thing with highlights. Basically, for this procedure, I took every base color I had put onto the canvas before, and mixed a lighter version of it, as well as a darker version of it (by mixing colors into them). I then added some of each to areas I wanted to either be closer or further away to the light. Try to be logical- remember that for this process, you need to be consistent. I constantly ask myself, "Yo, where is your light source?"

 after some highlight and darklights, I also started to see some natural motion in my sky. Boom!

 And more dry!

This struck me as a good time to darken my darks and lighten my lights for contrast (In case you don't know, contrast literally MAKES a painting GREAT!) I used almost strait Mars Black (very little Manganese blue added) to the top and bottom, and for the light sky areas, I used Cobalt Teal and kept mixing more and more Gesso in.

So I like trees, and I wanted them to look creepy in this one. I basically took 3:1 ratio Mars Black and water, then my better point round brush out of the two I own, and put some trees in. One great rule with making trees look real is to remember that although trees never grow strait, they arent completely without angles either! keep lots of broken strait lines as your branches. Also, the base of the tree must always be the fattest part! Physics matters when making paintings look real!!

<-- mmm Beer

Went into the sky next with a point and VERY carefully and slowly put a bunch of stars in. First in Cobalt Teal, then in Gesso as a bit of contrast.

 My foreground was just a black jagged silhouette of the ground, with red and white highlights. Here I am putting them in. Remember to blend them after you put them in.

This painting is BY NO MEANS DONE. My final step will be to take a rigger brush, and add lots of small branches and highlights on the trees, which currently look like crap. However, in 34 minutes and 18 seconds, we have come up with this: Not bad at all! NOW GO PAINT!