Need some help with Glazing / Scrubbing thin layers of color.

[Blue]

I'm really new to glazing in general. I've done a small amount of googling, but I couldn't find much on technique, more of descriptions of the method or history and why it is used.

I'm working on a dry painting at the moment, trying add some faint shadows to a girl's (multicolor) skin, and taking a stab at glazing as I've never done this before. In earlier stages of the painting when the paint was dry in some areas and tacky others I scrubbed paint in with some cloth, but it doesn't take to really changing colors like I am doing now, it worked for cleaning up blemishes. That is what lead to me glazing, but I am a little lost on exactly how to do it.

Right now I'm mixing some refined linseed oil with linseed stand and then blending it with a very small amount of oil paint and attempting to paint this onto my piece. However it doesn't seem to 'stick' and bubbles and blotches appear. I scrubbed it out and tried 2-3 times to get this soft shadow to work but with very little success. As stupid as it sounds, I even started smudging it with my fingers to try to work it in but that isn't helping either.

So, I'm getting kind of frustrated. Is there any DVD's or online resources that can explain how to properly glaze in some detail? Or can anyone explain it to me? Any help would be appreciated.

[Jason Ross]

Whenever I glaze oils I use colors labeled transparent or translucent and thin it down with mineral spirits. It will also dry MUCH faster than using linseed oil. TBH I never heard of using linseed oil to thin down color but rather to improve the pigments volume and viscocity. I do not work very large so I never used linseed oil beyond learning about it in college. I am guessing that that bubbling is either the pigment's unwillingness to mix completely with the linseed oil/stand or the dried paint underneath repelling the newly applied paint in some spots. This happens to me as well when first start to apply paint over gessoed board. It takes a few swipes for the paint to stick to the surface. Hope this helps.

[B u r l]

I'm not sure why it's bubbling (too much medium?), but for a glazing medium to mix with your oil paint, try 1 part stand oil, 1 part dahmer varnish and 5 parts turpentine, which is the standard.

Someone kick me if I got the radios wrong, but I think they're correct.

[Blue]

I think you're right, the bubbles are from the little air pockets the brush is leaving. It works better once i work it into the grooves, and I have just been using a mix of paints, not transparent/translucent ones. Thanks for the tips guys. :)

[Sloas]

I've never been taught to 'glaze' a picture..
What does it do, exactly?
And how do you go about doing it.

[Ilaekae]

It's been 50 years since I tried oils, but in acrylics, there is a glazing medium and sometimes, you can use the clear mediums, most of which are very glossy. In either case, the rule of transparency is good to remember, because the more opaque pigments really are opaque to some degree, no matter how far down you "thin" them. That's why the term scumbling is used rather than glazing, which results in a very transparent, smooth and subtle color change.

[Blue]

Yea i noticed that Ilaekae, no matter how thin i washed down some of these colors, they always looked opaque, and on the canvas they just looked like shit.

[Elwell]

A glaze is not a wash. You can paint thinly without overly thinning the paint.

[Chris Bennett]

However it doesn't seem to 'stick' and bubbles and blotches appear.

Ilaekae and Elwell's advice and clarifications should put this right. It sounds like you are putting a very oil rich medium onto an already glossy and oily painting surface. The only other cause of this is when painting in extremes of temperature like the equatorial desert - but this doesn't happen untill an hour or so later.
Rub the paint on like shoe polish.

This has reminded me of something the English painter Stanley Spencer said when someone pointed out the long term effects a steaming kettle near his canvas might have, he replied:
"If you kiss a vvhore with love you won't get the pox, and if you put the paint on with love it won't fall off".