The Big Oil-Painting Thread

[Seedling]

There is a lot of information about oil-paints scattered about ConceptArt.org. I kept thinking that it would be cool to have it all in one place. . . so here it is! The big thread on oil-painting.

If you have information to add, add it! If you know of a link that should be on this list, let me know! If I have made a mistake, correct me!

Enjoy!


ConceptArt.org threads about oil painting

Oils- Avoiding Gloss? (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=97676) Info about varnish.
When to varnish an oil painting? (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=98576)
Making my own masonite boards - tips? (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=81878) All about supports.
Paper vs. Canvas (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=96833) About different surfaces.
Painting Surface (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=98554) Working large and with mixed media.
ghetto easel (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=97733) Build your own easel.
Question about oil paint fumes. (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=96622) Info on fumes and safety.
Does it really matter which black I use? (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=96392) The black and white discussion has many shades of grey.
Oil Palette Colors: Which are "warm", which are "cool"? (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=90046)
oil question: warm white? (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=83935)
Acrylic painting questions (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=97340) Some info on how acrylics and oils compare.
Gouache (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=93281) Mostly about gouache, but with some talk of oils as a comparison.
new to watercolor, what should I look into? (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=84522) Just on watercolors, but useful when researching mediums.
undrepaintings as explained by Ilaekae and JasonManley

Books on Oil Painting

[url=http://www.richardschmid.com/book.html]Alla Prima; Everything I Know About Oil Painting (http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=64674) by Richard Schmid. Every artist should read this book.

Web Resources and Inspiration

k4pka’s blog on learning to paint. ( http://figuresandmusings.blogspot.com)
Nick Jainschigg (http://www.nickjainschigg.org/APaintingADay_New_Main.html) 18 months of daily paintings can be educational!
Duane Keiser ( http://duanekeiser.blogspot.com/) The original painting-a-day artist. Watch his videos!

[Seedling]

Written with help from k4pka – thanks!

There are already lots and lots of references out there for oil-painters of all levels. It’s rather overwhelming. I’ve had a few people ask me what I am using, or what I would recommend for someone who is just starting out. So. . .

First you need a place to work that has good ventilation. You shouldn’t use this stuff in your bedroom or somewhere where small children will get their fingers into it. Your studio space also has to be protected from paint, if you care about the furniture. Use a drop-cloth if you are working on the kitchen table.

You will need some means to prop up your painting. An easel with small table next to it is one possible setup. Easels are expensive, however, so instead I have a wooden box that came loaded with a beginner’s set of oils, to which I clip my painting while I work. (The box and my studio setup are below.) I often pack up the box and take it outside, where I work sitting on the ground. At any rate, you will need some way to prop your painting up in front of you – something stable, because a painting face-down on the carpet is a sad, sad thing.

Another useful trick is to use a second chair. Have it facing you and lean the canvas at your preferred angle on the chair in front.

You will need some place to put wet paintings. A bulletin board is good for this, if it’s stable. What I have is a sheet of homosote (a sort of cork-board material) that I bought at Home Depot. I had them chop it into pieces small enough to get into my car, and I painted them white with house paint to look pretty. But you don’t need to get even this fancy. Just prop up your finished painting against a wall where people and pets won’t run into it. Don’t leave wet paintings laying flat, however, because dust will settle on the painting and become a part of it as the surface dries.

Back to the supplies. . . I started by buying a beginner’s set. It contained fairly good materials, but they were 50 years old! The jar of oil had turned into jelly, among other annoyances. If you buy a set, just be aware that some of it may have to be replaced due to bad quality, and the paints will likely be student-grade, which means less pigment in the paint.

If you want to buy just the bits and pieces, you will to find an art supply store and fill your cart with the following.

A palette. Almost any non-absorbent flat surface will do. You can wrap tinfoil around cardboard if you want. However, I suggest at the beginning getting either a disposable palette tablet, or a sheet of masonite or a masonite palette. Later you can upgrade to something more fancy like a wooden palette or a sheet of glass. What is most important is that you have lots of room to mix colors.

A palette knife. It should look like a little trowel and it should have a bend in the neck between the trowel-part and the handle. Don’t get the kind that looks like a butter knife.

Paint solvent. Either turpentine, turpenoid, or some other equivalent such as mineral spirits (also known as white spirits). (In the UK there is a substance called Turps Substitute. This should be avoided at all costs, as for oil painting, it is no substitute at all, and smells absolutely horrendous.) Buy a small can. This stuff is to oil paints as water is to watercolour. You can use it to thin down the paints so much that they even look like watercolours if you want. Keep in mind that even if you get something “odourless”, it still emits nasty fumes.

Something to put the solvent in. The cheapest option is to use jelly jars with lids. Pour a little solvent into the bottom of one jar. Use it to thin your paints and clean your brushes (which isn’t necessary all that often, if you wipe the paint out of the brushes between colors). Put a lid on it when not in use. When that solvent gets yucky, pout it into the second jar. Let the gunk settle to the bottom, and pour off the reasonably clear stuff back into your first jar to use again.

Alternatively, art stores often carry glass jars with a spring in them. Fill that to just above the spring. Wipe your brush on the spring to clean it, and the gunk will settle below the spring. The only problem is I’m not sure how to remove the gunk from the jar – I just dropped off a full spring-jar at our neighbourhood recycling day to get rid of it.

Absolutely do not pour your solvent down the drain! It will poison the water supply if you do that. You will need to save your dirty solvent and take it to your neighbourhood dump when they have a special household waste disposal day. Your town hall should be able to provide you with information on this.

Rags or paper-towels. You will want a decent supply on hand. An old phone book can be used, too, along with a few rags. These are for wiping paint off of hands, brushes, palette knife, palette; they can be used to dispose of the leftover paint that is scraped from your palette, and they can be used to wipe away parts of your painting like another brush. When they are full, they go in the trash. Landfills can absorb the small amount of heavy metals from the paint that get thrown away. Rags can be bought in various quantities from places that sell house-paint; or you can rip up an old shirt.

Oil paint travels. If you get some onto your elbow, it’ll rub off on your shirt, your wall, your sofa, your kids. Its slower drying time can mean it travels quite some distance! So get in the habit of keeping a tidy workplace. I recommend that you pick up latex gloves to work in, to keep the solvents and heavy metals off of your skin. They also help to prevent the paint from being transferred around your house. If the phone rings, you can strip off the gloves. Latex gloves can be reused for a while if you powder your hands before putting them on. Having a designated set of painting clothes is also a good idea, because oil paints won’t wash out.

A small amount of paint can be removed from clothes/carpet/any material if it is still wet, using small amounts of clean solvent along with clean rags. The clothes/carpet/any material will then require a quick wash in the machine, or with soap and warm water to get rid of any solvent remaining on it.

Brushes! There are many kinds. I’ll just tell you what you need to start with. Get four bristle (hog-hair) brushes with chisel-shaped bristles. (The ones with the long bristles are called “flats” and the shorter ones are called “brights”.) Two of those should be larger, and two smaller; say three-fourths inch and quarter inch. When you paint, one of each will be for light colors, and one of each will be for dark colors. That will allow you to go for longer periods without opening the jar of solvent.

A decent quality chisel-brush will let you make wide marks in one direction and thin lines in the other. Wipe them on a rag to remove paint when changing similar colors; swish in solvent and then wipe on a rag when changing between colors that are rather different. When you are done painting for the day, gently scrub them in the sink with a white bar of soap and work out the soap with your fingers. You will want to have a designated oil-paint soap-bar, and (if at all possible) a designated oil-paint sink. Don’t use the kitchen sink. This stuff should stay as far as possible away from food.

Let the brushes dry on their sides – not upright or leaning against the bristles. This will help the brushes to keep their shape. Just like with colors, supplement your brush collection with new brushes one or two at a time to try out some of the other shapes that are available.

Painting surfaces! There are so many choices. Personally I loathe prefabricated canvasses and canvas-boards, but they get the job done. For ease, you can’t beat rectangles of masonite. Masonite is wood-pulp board used in the parts of furniture that are hidden. It can be bought cheaply in giant sheets at places like home depot, but, as I recently learned, they will charge you an alarming rate to cut it up. The easiest solution is to buy the pre-cut boards offered at many art stores, or order a bunch from an online supplier like Dick Blick.

Illustration board is another option. It will be stored in drawers somewhere at the art supply store. Ask an employee to show it to you. It comes in various thicknesses and surfaces (hot and cold press) – but those things don’t matter much. If they have small sheets in the size you want, great; if you decide you really like it as a surface, then you will want to invest in a carpet knife and a big metal straight-edge, so that you can cut it however you like. A note about cutting – don’t do it on hard-wood floors or Persian rugs. The best place to cut the stuff is on top of wall-to-wall carpeting. (But test it out carefully behind the sofa before you really trust me on this.)

You can also stretch and gesso paper, or stretch your own canvas. The former involves soaking a large sheet of paper, taping or stapling it to a board, coating it with gesso, and letting it dry. It’s a little involved, but it makes a surface that’s great for doing oil sketches. Canvasses are just as involved, but more bulky and a lot more expensive. Don’t bother with canvas until you have some experience painting.

Whatever surface you use, you will want to cover it in acrylic gesso first to make it non-absorbent. (Called “priming”) So pick up a container of that, and a cheap house painting brush to smear it around. At least two coats will be necessary for most surfaces. This surface can be sanded very smooth, but don’t bother with sanding at the beginning. Newspaper or a drop-cloth is also necessary if you don’t want to get gesso on the floor. I use a large drop-cloth from a hardware store to cover my living-room floor so that I can gesso ten or twenty small boards all at once. Eventually, with more experience, you can experiment with the different types of primer available.

Paints! Oh goodness, there is endless debate over what makes the best basic set of paints. I don’t know what the best basic set is. A traditional inexpensive “student” set is:

yellow ochre
ivory black,
cadmium red
titanium white

Notice that this does not represent a full colour-wheel. The ivory black is essentially a very dark blue, and so you do have the three primary colours, red, yellow and blue along with white. With just these four paints, an astonishing number of colours can be mixed.

Another basic student set is the Double Primary palette:

cadmium yellow
lemon yellow
cadmium red
alizarin crimson
ultramarine blue
cobalt blue
white

This gives a palette with a “warm” and a “cool” version of each primary colour. Again, intermixture between these can yield an incredible amount of colours, more than enough for masterful painting.

One last super-budget paint-combo is this:

Burnt Umber
Payne’s Grey
Titanium White (optional)

This colour combo gives you a monochrome palette but with just enough warms and cools to make it feel colourful. If you use this combination on a white ground, you can get results similar to a charcoal and sanguine drawing. These colours can work well as the first layer of full-colour paintings, too.

Try one of these combinations, and when you find you’re frustrated with the limitations of the colors, go supplement this palette with new colors one or two at a time. Also, there is not much reason to bother using student-grade paint. They are a false economy. They cost less because there are less actual pigment particles in the tube, along with more “fillers” like chalk, wax etc. If you want less pigment, you can buy the artist grade variety and add more oil to your paints.

Pigment names can be very confusing. Anything that has “hue” in the name means that it is a replica of an expensive pigment (for example a cadmium pigment) made using a cheaper pigment. Although they may seem more cost effective, they usually aren’t, because the “hue” is never as strong as the original and so you end up using more of it.

You will want to avoid anything called just “red” or “blue” or anything that has “hue” in the name. You generally want the tubes with names that tell you exactly what chemical or organic compound makes up the colour, such as “cobalt” or “titanium”. If in doubt, it is always a good idea to look up a colour you want on the internet, to find some information about it.

What is paint, anyway? Paint is a colourful substance, ground into dust, and then held together with a binder. In this case, the binder is oil (Generally linseed or safflower). That oil can be thinned out with more oil if you think the tube consistency is a little stiff. You can buy a small bottle of linseed oil while you are out shopping. When you work, pour a little bit into a container and try adding it to your paints with your brush, or pallet-knife. It isn’t necessary to use this stuff, any more than it is necessary to put solvent in your paints. But to learn the sorts of things that oils are capable of, you will want to spend some time working with paint thinned with each so that you get to know how they change the look and feel of the paint.

Mediums: There are all sorts of painting mediums available for oil colours. It is best to start out without using any of these, and so getting used to how the paint handles from the tube, or thinned with either solvent or linseed oil. The idea of mediums is to modify how the paint “handles” (I.e., how it feels, how it flows, how easily it comes off the brush, how fast it dries, how glossy it looks etc) They are only worth investigating once you get used to how the paint behaves straight from the tube, in its most basic form. After all, you need a little experience in order to see what difference the medium is actually making. Many artists don’t use medium whatsoever.


Now, what to do with those paints? Squirt out paint in little worms on your palette. Use the palette knife to cut off chunks of those paints, move those chunks around, and squash them together. You will want to do most of your colour-mixing with the knife like this, so that your brushes don’t get gunky and worn-out. Then dip your brush in the combined colour and paint. Or, dip your brush in linseed oil, then in the paint. Or dip your brush in the solvent first. Or use your rag to scrape paint off the painting, or use the palette knife to apply paint! There are no rules to this, only different things to try.

Cleaning up! Scrape leftover paint onto paper towels or old phone-book pages and toss them in the trash. Heavily soiled rags can go in the trash. If you have a reusable palette, use the palette knife to scrape off as much of the paint as possible, then dip the corner of a rag in some solvent and use that to wipe the surface off. Glass and other hard surfaces can be scraped with a razor-blade if necessary, and wood and masonite palettes do well when rubbed with oil now and then. Brushes get cleaned first with solvent, then with soap. The palette knife gets wiped clean. Dirty solvent gets saved for recycling.

There are various ways that you can save paints from one painting-session to the next, as well:

Plastic wrap. This is good except you lose some paint when you take the wrap off the next session.

Freezer. Oil paints freeze excellently. Put the palette in a big sealable container (a Tupperware box for example) and stick it in the freezer. Let thaw for an hour before resuming.

Another way if you have a designated painting sink, is to half fill the sink with water and submerge the palette over night. Make sure to get as much water off the palette before resuming the next day. (I am squeamish about putting water on my paints, but k4pka says this works.)

That’s it! For now don’t worry about fat-over lean rules or varnishes or which pigments crack in which situations or crazy dangerous things like making your own paints – that can all be learned later if you want to. There is a lot of drudgery and science to oil painting that you do not need to know immediately, or even necessarily at all. You actually now have everything that you need to know to make a complete oil-painting! Experiment and play and, most importantly, have fun.

[Olle Werme]

Thank you Seedling, very much.

[k4pka]

I am squeamish about putting water on my paints, but k4pka says this works.


Water on the oil paints cannot do a thing, what with the oil repelling the water and all, it just beads off.

Getting water on a bristle brush that is being used for oil painting however is absolute hell! The oil and water trying to repel each other inside the brush results in a horrible flabby brush. Its very strange, and cannot be sorted out other than washing the brush in soap and water, and letting it dry thoroughly. This is a real pain when painting outside in the rain!

Seedling, as before mentioned, great idea, great guide, great thread! Ought to get (deservedly) stickied soon!

[Deselect]

Briliant thread. Takes a lot of the pressure and scare factor out of oil painting. 5 stars, my friend.

[Elwell]

Water on the oil paints cannot do a thing, what with the oil repelling the water and all, it just beads off.
I wouldn't go that far. Storing oils under water will slow down drying, but doesn't stop it completely, since there's still some oxygen dissolved in water. Instead of skinning over, the paint tends to thicken until it eventually passes the point of usability.

[chaosrocks]

don't forget the mylar for sketches
and I have been using Computer "vellum" as a frosted mylar
with good results
chaos

[k4pka]

I wouldn't go that far. Storing oils under water will slow down drying, but doesn't stop it completely, since there's still some oxygen dissolved in water. Instead of skinning over, the paint tends to thicken until it eventually passes the point of usability.

This is true, I have only ever used this measure over night. Best bet for longer term storage is the freezing.

[Jushra]

thanks for posting this, seedling.

[Seedling]

Jushra - my pleasure. :-)

HEY! If any of you experienced painters feel like posting pictures of your studios, or the way you lay out paints of a palette, or anything else you can think of, I would love to see how other people arrange their spaces and supplies.

[DMickey]

Thanks for the links and information, here's a couple more that i've found. Some repeat what has already been posted though, like about brushes.

Painting Glossary:
http://www.gamblincolors.com/oil.painting.techniques/painting.glossary.html
Color Mixing
http://emptyeasel.com/2006/12/22/how-to-make-better-paintings-tips-and-techniques-for-correctly-mixing-color/
Brushes
http://emptyeasel.com/2007/03/02/an-artist%e2%80%99s-guide-to-oil-painting-brushes-and-the-paintbrush-types-youll-need/ (http://emptyeasel.com/2007/03/02/an-artist%e2%80%99s-guide-to-oil-painting-brushes-and-the-paintbrush-types-youll-need/)
Glossary of the different Oils (linseed, poppy, etc..) and what they do
http://www.cad-red.com/mt2/oil.html#linseed

And generally just the site emptyeasel.com (http://www.emptyeasel.com) I found useful.

[Craig D]

Links to some other oil related threads

varnish problems http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=85184

W Whitaker painting demo http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=83405

W Whitalers link list http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=84992

W Whitaker on palettes http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=82880

W Whitaker- notes on oil painting materials http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=82263

another Whitaker thread http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=26393

Oil on paper, with other discussion on grounds http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=78007

varnishing discussion http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=77502

oils on masonite discussion http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=76298

[dbclemons]

I've never been one for saving paints on my palette from one session to the next. Typically I only lay out a small amount at a time of the colors I plan on using, and clean it all off when I'm done for the day.

[Brendan N]

Seedling, THANK YOU so MUCH for this! I've just 'started' painting in oils, but frankly I'm like a little girl prancing around the pool, not knowing where to jump in.
I've started reading Alla Prima as well and I cannot recommend this book enough. I'm totally saving this thread and most of the links to my HD - again, big thanks for posting!

[ArtznCraphs]

Some tried and true palette configurations. All colors listed are permanent.

The Limited Classical Flesh Palette:
Flake White
Yellow Ochre
Vermillion (can substitue Cad Red Light)
Ivory Black
Burnt or Raw Umber (for monochromatic underpainting/drawing. The dark umber areas will remain uncovered, to act as transparent and deep shadow areas)

This is basically a red(verm.), yellow(ochre), blue(ivory black) configuration. The basic flesh mixture is the white and yellow ochre, with a touch of the red, and a smidgen of black to lower chroma, if desired.

Extended Classical Flesh Palette
Flake White
Naples Yellow
Indian Yellow (glazing)
Vermillion or Cad. Red Light
Red Ochre or Light Red
Rose Madder (A transparent color. Don't buy the any colors with Lake in the name, as they are not permanent)
Burnt Sienna
Terre Verte or Green Earth
Umber
Ivory Black

Classical palettes, idealy, are used in a layered technique, but alla prima is also possible and almost equal in the right hands (Rubens, Hals)

Complete Classical Palette - as listed at

http://www.ncartmuseum.org/monet/revolution1.html

Flake White
Naples Yellow
Indian Yellow
Yellow Ochre
Red Ochre
Vermillion
Rose Madder
Carmine
Burnt Sienna
Brown Madder
Bitumen
Cassel Earth
Ivory Black
Ultramine Blue (traditionally Lapis)
Prussian Blue

Modern Limited Palette (Higher chroma than classical, geared towards opaque, direct painting methods. A very, very basic landscape palette also.)

Flake or Titanium White
Cad. Yellow Light
Yellow Ochre
Cad. Red Light
Alizarin Crimson (trans. It's like a darker Rose Madder)
Cobalt Blue (or Cerulean if you prefer)
Ultramarine Blue (trans.)
Ivory Black

Here you have a high chroma, RYB scheme, with warm and cool variations of each color. Permanent

Extended Modern Palette

Flake or Titanium White
Cad. Yellow Light
Cad. Orange
Yellow Ochre
Raw Sienna
Cad. Red light
Cad. Red Medium
Red Ochre or LIght Red or Indian Red
Alizarin Crimson
French Ultramarine
Cobalt or Cerulean
Veridian
Sap Green
Burnt Sienna
Umber
Ivory Black

The landscape palette (taken from http://www.artrenewal.org/articles/2002/Parkhurst/parkhurst2.asp


'Landscape calls for pitch and vibration. You must have pure color and great luminosity, yet a range of color which will permit of all sorts of effects. The following will serve for everything out-of-doors, and I have seen it with practically no change in the hands of very powerful and exquisite painters. There are no browns and blacks in it because the colors which they would give are to be made by mixing the purer pigments, so as to give more life and vibration to the color. The Blackest note may be gotten with ultramarine and rose madder with a little veridian if too purple; the result will be blacker than black, and have daylight in it. The ochre is needed more particularly to warm the veridian'.

WHITE.
STRONTIAN YELLOW.
ORANGE VERMILION.
CADMIUM YELLOW.
PINK MADDER.
ORANGE CADMIUM.
ROSE MADDER.
YELLOW OCHRE.
COBALT.
ULTRAMARINE.
VERIDIAN.
EMERALD GREEN.

[Dan Bird]

I'm new to oil painting, so it's this kind of good info that I really need right now. <3

I've learnt a lot from this thread. THANK YOU, Seedling.

[Seedling]

Thanks to everyone who has contributed stuff here!

To those of you who have more experience using oils than I do, if you ever feel inclined to show your works-in-progress here, I’m sure you would have an appreciative audience. :-)

[Bowlin]

Hey Seedling... loving this thread.

1) Can you tell me more about tinting strength? I understand that adding white can change a color dramatically so having a chart that shows it changes is useful, but I'm sure there's more to it. What is the significance of weak or strong tinting strength?

2) When I try to clean my brushes with odorless turpanoid, very throughly, squeezing out as much of the turp I can, then washing with soap and water later... I still end up with a stiff brush the next day. They aren't nearly as soft as when I started.

3)I'm having a hard time finding any resources on how to "apply the paint" to the surface, techniques. Trying to paint realism by working wet into wet, making gradual value shifts by painting on top of another layer of paint without mixing the two. In other words, a lot of the artist works that I admire they paint a lot of value shifts by layering the paint on top of another without letting it dry (wet on wet). It looks almost like a paint by number but the different values are layered on top of another without mixing with the paint beneath. Like painting different values on extremely tiny leaves with a #2 filbert brush. Again, it's done wet on wet, but has to be something extremely simplistic that I'm simply over thinking, over looking.

[Elwell]

Hey Seedling... loving this thread.

1) Can you tell me more about tinting strength? I understand that adding white can change a color dramatically so having a chart that shows it changes is useful, but I'm sure there's more to it. What is the significance of weak or strong tinting strength?

2) When I try to clean my brushes with odorless turpanoid, very throughly, squeezing out as much of the turp I can, then washing with soap and water later... I still end up with a stiff brush the next day. They aren't nearly as soft as when I started.

3)I'm having a hard time finding any resources on how to "apply the paint" to the surface, techniques. Trying to paint realism by working wet into wet, making gradual value shifts by painting on top of another layer of paint without mixing the two. In other words, a lot of the artist works that I admire they paint a lot of value shifts by layering the paint on top of another without letting it dry (wet on wet). It looks almost like a paint by number but the different values are layered on top of another without mixing with the paint beneath. Like painting different values on extremely tiny leaves with a #2 filbert brush. Again, it's done wet on wet, but has to be something extremely simplistic that I'm simply over thinking, over looking.
1) Tinting strength is how powerful a particular paint is in a mixture. It is a function of both the chemical characteristics of a pigment (for instance, pthalo colors are notoriously strong tinters) and the amount of pigment in a particular formulation (so student paints, which have fillers in place of pigment, have less tinting strength). Some beginners have a hard time controlling mixtures with high tinting strength colors (again, pthalos are a good example). Sometimes weak tinting strength can be an advantage. For instance, cerulean blue is a popular color with some portrait painters precisely because it can be used to neutralize flesh tones without overwhelming them.

2) You're either not cleaning thoroughly enough or not completely rinsing the soap from the brush.

3) You want your initial layers to be very thin. Try scrubbing your shadows in with brights to establish the form, then switch to long flats or filberts for the lights. You also want a paint that's not too oily, especially in the early stages.

[shou']

2) When I try to clean my brushes with odorless turpanoid, very throughly, squeezing out as much of the turp I can, then washing with soap and water later... I still end up with a stiff brush the next day. They aren't nearly as soft as when I started.


I'm not Seedling, but there are many approaches on how to clean your brush from oil paint. One of the more effective ways in which I have been taught (and still apply to this day) is to first rinse it out with some form of mineral spirits. Wipe it off with a towel, an unwanted t-shirt, rag, etc then dip it in Canola Oil (any brand will do) to clean any excess residue and in addition to help keep the hairs wet, moist, and ready to go for another application.

In the past I've used to clean my brushes with mineral spirits and then wash with cold water and a little bit of soap. I've discovered over time it will make the hair rougher, jagged, and difficult to use with every new use. Occasionally, I was forced to dip it in vegetable oil to loosen the hairs. From my own trials and supported with my teacher's experience washing it in water and soap is unnecessary if you plan to get rid of the oil paint. Mineral spirits combined with Canola Oil is more than enough. Now if you're attempting to mask away or erase the stains of a brush from whatever oil paint then you'll spend an awfully great deal of effort with varying success.

And if it is in your budget I'd strongly recommend using Synthetic Sable brushes over Bristle unless you need a very large paint brush to lay in some background or you require some added texture which only a hard edge (and poorly taken care) Bristle could best a Sable.

[Bowlin]

1) Are you saying that tinting strength comes down to how intense the chroma stays after being mixed with another color (not just white)? So Ultramarine blue in oils are usually strong tinting strength?

2) Shou - I forgot that Elwell had mentioned using vegetable oil also. I'll try the mineral spirits with canola oil (I don't recall canola oil at the art store). Is it 1 part mineral spirits, 1 part canola oil?

3) I was doing exactly what you were describing right before you posted, Elwell. I was thinking it to myself as

Dark to light (values)
and at the same time...
Thin to Thick layers of paint.

But I haven't tried scrubbing the darks in. That's is proably it! I've always had a hard time having to refine my darks by layer it on top of each other after they dry. I believe I can make the oils in the dark shadow areas with a soft filbert to cover the light valued boards (tinted or not) in a slower precise process.

Thank you very much for your input Elwell. I always appreciate it.

Plus I wanted to include this link about brushes.
http://painting.about.com/od/artsupplies/ig/Intro-to-Art-Paint-Brushes/brushes-filbert.htm

[arttorney]

You can deaden the chroma on a high tinting strength color by what you mix it with. Instead the high tinting strength is about how much of it you are going to need. If you want to make green using phthalocyanine blue and a yellow then just put in a speck of the blue (Ease in the blue in a very gingerly fashion. A little dab'll do you). The same is true if you make your black by putting phthalo blue into burnt umber. In other words the colors with a high tinting strength can outcolor the other colors, gram for gram.

It might help the cleaning if you put a cleaning step of automotive hand cleaner (Goop, Gojo) in between the solvent (or oil) step and the final soap and water stage.

[Seedling]

I'm not Seedling. . .

Haha! :-) I’m just the thread starter. Most of the oil-painters around here know the medium better than I do. . . and hopefully they’ll keep sharing their knowledge so that I can learn more. (Oops, did I just leak my grand scheme? Heehe.)

[shou']

2) Shou - I forgot that Elwell had mentioned using vegetable oil also. I'll try the mineral spirits with canola oil (I don't recall canola oil at the art store).


You can purchase Canola Oil at any grocery story, Walmart, Target, Walgreens, and possibly a Gas Station. I would question (and be extremely suspicious) any Art store's motives of why they would normally stock Canola Oil. Any manufacturer of Canola Oil will be sufficient unless it is from a not so well received source.



Is it 1 part mineral spirits, 1 part canola oil?

No. Sorry for the confusion. You do not mix them together (or at least try not to).

First you rinse out the oil paint in Mineral spirits and wipe it down with a cloth. Second you take the brush (if it still has some oil paint or mineral spirits it is fine) to dab it into Canola Oil, swoosh it around similar to what you did with Mineral Spirits. From there you have two options of a) allowing it to soak in there for a while or b) immediately take it out and clear out any excess Canola Oil that may be dripping. Afterwards for best results (if I am remembering this correctly) when taking the brush out it is recommended to hold the end of the brush (pointy wooden side) and place it bottom to top down as it hangs vertically. By doing so it allows any liquid to gradually fall while helping the brush to naturally shift the weight of the hairs to the original position it was at when you bought it.

Note: I'd advise to grab separate bowls/cups for each and do not use any plastic -- they do not hold well against those mediums. My teacher recommended to use glass.

[Elwell]

I, on the other hand, would never recommend storing brushes wet with a non-drying oii like canola. Firstly because soaking bristle brushes in oil makes them limp and unresponsive, and secondly because any non-drying oil left in the brush can contaminate paint when it's next used and lead to drying problems.

Vegetable oil (canola, soybean, etc) can be used to clean brushes if you want to avoid solvents altogether, but I would always follow that up with a soap-and-water cleaning.

[Elwell]

1) Are you saying that tinting strength comes down to how intense the chroma stays after being mixed with another color (not just white)? So Ultramarine blue in oils are usually strong tinting strength?Tinting strength is more about value than chroma. For instance, mars violet is a strong tinter, but loses chroma dramatically with even a little white.
Try this: Take ivory black, mars black, titanium white, and zinc white (preferably all the same brand, to minimize variables). Mix each of the blacks with each of the whites in 1:1 proportions and notice the difference in the resulting grays.

[arttorney]

I was thinking that mixing practice and making swatches might answer some of people's questions through the valuable medium of experience. I went home this afternoon and made this as something people might try with their own palettes. Phthalo blue has high tinting strength, but look at the difference in chroma between 1 and 10 which were both mixed with phthalo blue. (or 1 and 2 for that matter)
1. phthalocyanine blue plus lemon yellow
2. phthalocyanine blue plus cadmium yellow deep hue
3. Ultramarine plus lemon yellow
4. ultramarine plus cadmium yellow deep hue
5. cadmium red hue plus lemon yellow
6. cadmium red hue plus cadmium yellow deep hue
7. permanent rose plus lemon yellow
8. permanent rose plus cadmium yellow deep hue
9. phthalocyanine blue plus permanent rose
10. phthalocyanine blue plus cadmium red hue
11. ultramarine plus permanent rose
12. ultramarine plus cadmium red hue

above the numbers is increasing amounts of lamp black
below the numbers is increasing amounts of titanium white
As you can see, you don't need to add much black before your painting becomes a mud pie.

[Bowlin]

TINTING STRENGTH: This is the ability of a colour to change the character of another colour. We determine this by adding the same amount of Titanium White to each colour and observing the resulting strength of the colour mixture. Weaker tinting colours create light pastel mixtures. Stronger tinting colours create darker mixtures.

Try scrubbing your shadows in with brights to establish the form, then switch to long flats or filberts for the lights.
Somehow I completely missed the different brushes you suggested in this sentence. Makes sense.

Try this: Take ivory black, mars black, titanium white, and zinc white (preferably all the same brand, to minimize variables). Mix each of the blacks with each of the whites in 1:1 proportions and notice the difference in the resulting grays.

[arttorney]

179976Here is some more development of the earlier color swatch. I am featuring subtleties of brown and gray. The numbers on here can be shifted without addition of a third color. (e.g. To make #1 bluer, just add more Phthalo blue. To make it yellower just add more lemon yellow.)

To make gray, many people might be tempted to go straight to lamp black plus titanium white as shown at A. To make brown it is tempting to go with burnt umber, possibly with more or less titanium white (see right column third from top).

Other combinations include:
B is #12 shifted toward red plus some lemon yellow
C is #12 shifted toward blue with some lemon yellow
D is #3 shifted toward yellow plus some permanent rose
E is #3 shifted toward blue plus some permanent rose
F is #7 shifted toward yellow with some phthalo blue
G is #7 shifted toward red with some phthalo blue
H is #10 shifted toward blue plus some cad yellow deep hue
I is #10 shifted toward red plus some cad yellow deep hue
J is burnt umber plus phthalo blue
K is J plus some titanium white (see also Y)
L is burnt sienna plus some phthalo blue and I lightened a corner with titanium white
M is L with titanium white
N is #9 shifted toward blue with some cad yellow deep hue
O is #9 shifted toward red plus some cad yellow deep
P is #1 shifted toward blue with some cad red medium hue and titanium white
Q is #1 shifted toward yellow with some cad red medium hue (no white)
R is #6 shifted toward red with some phthalo blue
S is #6 shifted toward yellow with some phthalo blue
T is burnt sienna plus yellow ochre
U is T plus titanium white
V is burnt umber plus lots of yellow ochre
W is V except with more burnt umber
X is U plus K (or Y)
Y is J plus titanium white (see also K)
Z is W plus titanium white

As a bonus I put titanium white tints of straight tube color on the right hand column. Top to bottom they are dioxazine purple, viridian, burnt umber, cad red med hue, permanent rose, phthalocyanine blue (Georgian above and Graham below), ultramarine, lemon yellow, cad yellow deep hue, yellow ochre, and burnt sienna (Georgian above and Graham below).

[timpaatkins]

Hmm, im sure it was a valid exercise for you, but it just confuses the hell out of me!

Ive done the Richard Schmidt's Alla Prima color swatch exercise, and I can highly recommend it. If I were you I would redo the exercise above, (if you felt you gained alot from it) but make them proper swatches, gridded out with masking tape, for an easier overview, and clearer and more defined areas of color. right now they are difficult to compare to each other. but that may just be the graphic design nazi in me reading too much muller brockman...

[arttorney]

Don't lose any sleep over it. It's just an empirical showing of how with the double primary type palette mentioned way above by Seedling, you can dispense with the earth tones, black, gray, secondary, and tertiary colors if you wish.

And I mainly posted it because I thought this thread could use a bump.

[the_allejo05]

just contributing..these are my colors from right to left:
Titanium white
Naples yellow light ---
Cad Yellow Pale Hue
Yellow Ochre ---
SAp green ---
Oxide Of Chromium ----
Cyan Blue ----
Ultramarien Blue ---
Charcoal Grey ----
Dioxazine Purple ---
Magenta ---
Bright red ---
Transparent Brown Oxide
Burnt Sienna ---
Lamp Black






http://byfiles.storage.live.com/y1pNpenVJa77zlc0hWY6IHXmE7DG5Cz_Ppxan1y6CTaNdbE2Iu 2MOuHBlqBAus55CNfwchTPb0xPfA

[Serpian]

When I bought a small canvas to do some practice on in my local art shop, the woman in the shop said canvas was the way to go, I can't use paper. Also she recommended spirits or turpentine or whatever the swedish 'terpentin' translates into, instead of medium (although on this point shecould just have meant that it's fine for beginners..)

Does she not know what she is talking about, or is it just a matter of taste?

Also, could anybody describe more precisely what this frosted mylar is, so I can describe it to this person in swedish, as i don't think the english word will help me!

[grenogs]

This quite a good thread, some realy good advise. But theres no mention about Grythin Alkyds in here, basicly its a very fast drying oil paint supplied by WINSOR&NEWTON. I'm always supprised how many people have never hered of it, probably due to the fact that for some strange reason, most art shops don't stock it. So if you love using oil colours but dont like the long drying time, check them out. I've been an illustrator for 10 years, and they have never caused me any problems. If you want to use them for very fine detailed work, i recomend you try them out on watercolour board, the old CS2 not board, was perfect. Also try not priming your board as you normally do in oils, but i do advise you to put base colours down first, watercolour ar an opaque paint like gouage works best. Also Experiment with Acrylics as your base colour, this has the effect of slowing down the drying process for the Alkyds, very handy when doing detailed cloud work.

[grenogs]

serpian its a matter of taste, for high detailed work and when you need a faster drying time, i always go for watercolour art board, but if im doing something with a lot less detail, such as portaiture, and where a customer like that traditional look, and has the strange idea that oils MUST be painted on canvas, then i'll choose canvas. Also beware of artshops telling you what is and what is not the best medium or materials to use, because at the end of the day, an art shop is a business and its there quite simply to make money, plus they don't always know everything. You could have the the so called best art kit in the world, but that doesnt mean your going to be the greatest artist that ever lived. Some of the best pieces of art i've seen was created with burnt pieces of wood, and some of the best skulptures i ever saw was made from sand.
But to your answer about oils, use either turpentine or white spirits as a thinners for oil colours, i dont see any differance, though some purists may disagree with me here. Also check out linseed oil to mix in with your oils, this will give it extra fluidity and protection to your colours, especialy usefull if your glazing and you've used lots of turpintine to thin the paint. But basicly best advise i can give you is to experiment, and you'll soon discover whats good and whats not good for your particuler style.

[dbclemons]

...said canvas was the way to go, I can't use paper.

Paper would be a good choice for practicing, certainly more convenient and less expensive than canvas. Use a thick high quality paper (100% rag, acid-free) it will hold up better than regular wood pulp paper.

...Also she recommended spirits or turpentine... instead of medium ...

For what? If it's for cleaning, mineral spirits will do fine, but it's not the best thing to use for painting. Turpentine is wasted for just cleaning. When painting you don't want to dilute the paint too thin, even for the initial layer. I almost never dilute my oils, but when I do I add a small amount of extra medium as well. In most cases, all you really need is just the paint.

...Also, could anybody describe more precisely what this frosted mylar is...

The company Grafix Plastics has information about mylar:
http://grafixplastics.com/mylar_what.asp

[Jushra]

information is awesome. i picked up this book (http://www.amazon.com/Oil-Painters-Bible-Essential-Practicing/dp/0785819428/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-8166533-3511248?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1188591652&sr=8-1) at a Half Price Bookstore and it also had some good information in it.

[dashinvaine]

What are the best colours to use in shadow areas of (European) flesh tone? I know that shadow areas should appear cooler as well as darker, but mixing blues and greys with browns and yellows often makes a mucky mess when I try it. I also have problems blending shadow areas into mid tones, which are naturally warmer. Any tips in this region? How do you portray shadow on a cheek, say, without it appearing to be smeared in dirt?
(I normally arrive at flesh tone by mixing a bit of burnt umber with naples yellow and white but going into shadow is problematic)

Another question, any tips on painting particularly pale people? What colours to put in pale flesh, especially where it goes into shadow, and how can you make someone look pale but not spotlit or luminous?

[alesoun]

try burnt sienna instead of burnt umber; it's warmer

[Seedling]

I've got a free 57 page tutorial on Oil Painting . . .

“Do not spread butter with a palette knife.”

*rolling* . . .best. . . advice . . . ever!

Thanks for the link, Artlover. The first half is good standard supplies basics. The second half is on the creation of landscape paintings, and lays out a few guidelines that are rather along the lines of what Bob Ross would say. (Such as “with oil painting it is generally considered that we work from back to front and usually top to bottom,” or “a professional looking oil painting is one where the paint is thick and raised where it needs to be.”) I recommend against using any such formulas unless you really want to paint the exact same sorts of subject matter in exactly the same style.

[Elwell]

I've removed Artlover's post (and Artlover, for that manner) as the whole thing strikes me as HIGHLY suspicious. An "I promise not to spam you" notice doesn't really cut it when you are asking for extensive personal information, and following the links eventually leads to a "make money with your art" scam. For those dying of curiosity, the same info can be found online here (http://www.andrewwhyte.com/painting/tutorials.htm) (for what it's worth) without having to give anyone your email etc.

[Seedling]

Thanks for keeping this corner of the Wild West safe, sheriff Elwell. :)

[FoxinShocks]

Thanks for all this great advice guys! This thread is a lifesaver. I'm a total oil-painting n00b, but one thing I've heard from my painting teacher that I didn't notice in here is that you can use baby-oil as a solvent. He said that it keeps the brushes in better condition than turps and doesn't fume, which appears to work as far as I've tested it, my brushes have lasted far longer using baby oil than turps. If you don't wipe the oil off thoroughly enough though it makes the paint kind of greasy and it doesn't cling to the surface as well.

[Elwell]

I would never use mineral oil, or any non-drying oil, during painting for fear of contamination and drying problems. Using it for end-of-session cleanup might be okay, but only if you follow up with a thorough soap and water wash.

[chaosrocks]

mineral oil or mineral spirits? (white spirit in france) we use mineral spirits for cleanup in the printshhop. Ive never used it on my oil brushes, which are over 30 years old (I inhereted them). i clean em with turp and dish detergent... period


to address the Frosted mylar question. Ive been using the inkjet "vellum" from staples to do quick studies on, its a fun surface and dries really fast. I don't know that I would do anything I really cared about on it as I really don't know anything about its stability over time. but the ones I painted as an experiment just Before the last WS (SFO) after reading Mr Whitakers advice, are still stable and un cracked... for what thats worth. Its inexpensive and doesn't need to be primed
chaos

[Elwell]

Mineral spirits are fine. I was referring to FoxinShocks' mention of baby oil, which is mineral oil + perfume.

[FoxinShocks]

mineral oil + perfume.

Oh wow, I didn't even notice. The brand I have doesn't smell at all but appears to have fragrance in it :P maybe I just have no sense of smell...
So you're saying I should use some other oil without added fragrance, or just go back to turps/spirits? as long as I wipe the brushes and don't use too much it seems to work ok. I haven't noticed any drying problems, the last couple of paintings I've done have dried in a day and a half, and it's not that warm here yet *shrug*.

I wouldn't mention it except that my teacher is a pro and says it works fine for him.

[drd]

Hey guys. I just started oil-painting, and this painting is my first oil painting on my own. All I used was a beginners' set by Daler-Rowney, pallete knife, and some 'low-odor thinner', also from DR.

I started with a sketch of the apple, then made an outline of it in paint, and then I mixed up some of the thinner with some burnt umber to make a value wash. Then I went it with red wash in there, then put some semi-opaque reds in there, and some yellows, and did a whole lot of pushing thinned out paint around, I guess that was my mistake, too much thinner...

Any tips for a beginner here?

It's on canvas primed with white acrylic paint, if that matters. I didn't have any gesso so I figured that would work fine.

[Elwell]

Good. Now let it dry, and then get some paint on it. It's not watercolor, you know.

[drd]

Good. Now let it dry, and then get some paint on it. It's not watercolor, you know.

Will do sir

[Seedling]

Looking good drd!

[drd]

Thanks Seedling;

I made 2 more paintings since the first one is still wet, I don't know what will happen if I go into it anymore; I think I'll just keep painting until I feel more confident.

I am getting a small boost though, because these are some much better than my acrylic paintings. Oils feel even better than I thought they would.

And even though I know they suck, I keep telling myself to look at Seedling's Oil-painting-a-day thread, huge inspiration for me


So here's another 2; Pathetic, but whatever

Greatly appreciating anything helpful

EDIT: Also, sorry about the terrible image quality; There's a lot more green tinges in the background on the apple one and more blue on the kiwi, but my camera really sucks. I don't know how Seedling gets such clear pictures, and I can't scan wet paintings. =(

[Seedling]

Not pathetic! Wonderful! :) Keep going. (And thanks for the compliment!)

[drd]

Not pathetic! Wonderful! :) Keep going. (And thanks for the compliment!)

Not a problem.

And thanks very much Seedling, it means a lot to me

[chaosrocks]

drd your elegance and grace is a fine tribute to the medium
these are really nice

and ,as mr elwell said
you are usingthem as watercolours to tint your matrix
you need to think of them as more substantial
I am also guilty of this (actually seedling mistook an oil of mine for a Watercolor not to long ago) Mr Hawthorne says (and ifyou haven;'t read hawthorne , you should . it more about thinking about paint than instructions on how to paint) that you should be extravagant in your paint use, little spots of color make little paintings. he reminescese about his classes and going around to his students and splorching out great worms of paint....
I know its expensive
but,,,

with great courage,,,comes great art

chaos

[drd]

drd your elegance and grace is a fine tribute to the medium
these are really nice

and ,as mr elwell said
you are usingthem as watercolours to tint your matrix
you need to think of them as more substantial
I am also guilty of this (actually seedling mistook an oil of mine for a Watercolor not to long ago) Mr Hawthorne says (and ifyou haven;'t read hawthorne , you should . it more about thinking about paint than instructions on how to paint) that you should be extravagant in your paint use, little spots of color make little paintings. he reminescese about his classes and going around to his students and splorching out great worms of paint....
I know its expensive
but,,,

with great courage,,,comes great art

chaos


Thank you so much for that post
It was very informative;
I'll definitely check out Hawthorne

By the way, what do you guys think of Harold Speed? I've heard a lot about him and I've heard about some of his books on oil painting, what are they like, if any of you have them?

[Elwell]

Speed is EXCELLENT, but can be tough going for a beginner. His writing style is dated (lots of complicated sentences with many sub-clauses), as is much of the technical material about pigments, mediums, etc. Never the less, there's so much good stuff in his books, and the Dover editions are so cheap, that they're worth picking up. They're the sort of books that you can keep going back to as your knowledge increases and always find something new.

[k4pka]

Agreed with Elwell wholeheartedly. They will serve you well right from being a beginner all the way up to being a professional. For me however, his writing style is marvellous. Throws you right back to a time when the English language was used so elegantly. None of this shorthand txt spk to start fouling the prose.

[chaosrocks]

elwelll ... a very good simulation of the writing style in question... made me laugh

I only write like that when Im irritated.

Schmid is ok, also very dated... theres been a big surge of interest inthe allaPrima book. also nearly any thread here on CA with William WHitaker in it it full of great advice. But I would also advocate that you don't get too tied up in technique and reading about it etc.. Just get in there and PAINT!

<takes own advice
chaos

[drd]

Alright, oil number 4...I like it better than my others, any crits? I know I made the reflected light way too large...

[chaosrocks]

my pleinair set up. just for amusement.....
yes those are brushes in my hair... yes they are wet
and yes thats my attendant art critic Roxie the Corgi
http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e181/chaosrocks/bleh2.jpg

drd- working a still life over the same color BG is difficult to get value I know you are working with color, but color has value (light and dark) as well as Hue and intensity (also called saturation). your colors are super saturated but nearly all the same value. Just to see this, you can tak eyou photo of you image and put it in greyscale

[timpaatkins]

nice chaos!I did my first plein air painting today, and had such a blast! Union squar ein nyc. Good tip about greyscale. what i do is I have a pretty nifty 3.2 mgpx cameraphone, so i just set that to b/w, and then i simply check the viewfinder. If you wanna go analog, get yourself a red sheet of acetate, that will flatten everything and you can see the values very clearly. This works great from life too.

[drd]

Thanks Chaosrocks, even if I don't fully understand it, um...

By saturated, you mean that they're pure colour? To make it less saturated, I would make it more of a gray, right?

I dunno, it's just that it looks to me like it was the right value, since it went from bright, to dark.

Eh...Are there any good threads on this subject?

[chaosrocks]

well your light isn;t very light and your dark isnt very dark, I took the sliders and move the dark one down till it was black and the light one up218034

see the difference....

shall we talk about composition? no this is an oil painting thread..lets not

[drd]

well your light isn;t very light and your dark isnt very dark, I took the sliders and move the dark one down till it was black and the light one up218034

see the difference....

shall we talk about composition? no this is an oil painting thread..lets not

Really? My brightest highlight was pure titanium white, and my darkest dark was burnt umber, I think.

How would you suggest getting darker value? Should I use a bit of black mixed with some brown and green?

I'd have to go get black though...Don't have any at the moment

[timpaatkins]

You can mix ultramarine blue with the burnt umber to get a nice black, that then can become grays that lean to cool blue or warmer browns

[chaosrocks]

I have no black either.... never use it. personal preference. have you ever made a value scale? even jumps? do you have Photoe shop? I wanna show you something
.... and I'll do it in screen shots if you cant look
or here... if you squint at your image it becomes a grey blur there isn't much varioution in the middle values. there is a tiny spot of pure white and a little curve of sort of dark but the structure of all the ranges in between is such that your piece looses visual clarity.

[drd]

What exactly do you mean by structure? You mean, like they way the strokes are applied, or how everything is going in the same direction?

Sorry =/

[chaosrocks]

actually I was speaking of the value structure, the stages or stepps of your middle tones, the clear transitions at the edges of the object. edges are really hard to make crisp in oils (I struggle withthat too). your brush work is pretty nice.
chaos

[sweetoblivion314]

shall we talk about composition? no this is an oil painting thread..lets not

should always talk about composition. It is potentially the most important thing to an image. :)


Really? My brightest highlight was pure titanium white, and my darkest dark was burnt umber, I think.

How would you suggest getting darker value? Should I use a bit of black mixed with some brown and green?

I'd have to go get black though...Don't have any at the moment

you shouldn't use straight tube colors for anything really, unless you are going pure impressionism or that is the exact color you need (which rarely if ever happens).

Your whitest white isn't going to be pure titanium white, not even on the highlight. Look closer there will be a little color in there.

Same with the darkest dark. It will have color don't just use burnt umber in there cause its the darkest color you have. Do like Tim said and mix it with ultramarine to get a black whose warms and cools you can control.

By saturated, you mean that they're pure colour? To make it less saturated, I would make it more of a gray, right?

either more grey or more brown. To desaturate a color add its compliment (will brown it) or grey. It all depends on the color you see for which way to go. Do some color matching exercises by getting a paint color swatch thing from the hardware store and try to color match to it.

[Bowlin]

Also, because it's a simple piece of fruit with a flat background, making the background very dark or very light will help give the fruit more depth. With the background and the piece of fruit having so much identical mid-tone values, it flattens everything out.

[drd]

@Oblivion: Thanks for all the help, I really appreciate it. I think i'm starting to get a better hang of colour mixing and stuff now.

@Bowlin: Thanks for this piece of advice (Which I think Chaos also helped me out with) I went on you two's words and made the background darker then the subject by a significant amount (or at least I think so)

Okay, here's my next oil painting, 2 slices of bread. I have two shots. The first shot was done with a flash it has a glare, sorry. The second was done without the flash which unfortunately made it more brown than it really is. There's a lot more blue in there, like in the glared up one.

Can anyone help me out with what I should do to take pictures of my paintings with a digicamera?

[chaosrocks]

I take mine on bright cloudy days. I use a tripod and the self timer. and then adjust the values in PS.

my hands shake and I can't handhold in natural light

chaos

[drd]

I take mine on bright cloudy days. I use a tripod and the self timer. and then adjust the values in PS.

my hands shake and I can't handhold in natural light

chaos

Yeah, that's what I need, a tripod. There's always that slight blurring, I can never keep my hand still. Thanks for the tips.

[timpaatkins]

OR you can use a camera phone like me!

oh yea but they turn out like shit though..

[Elwell]

Take pick from an angle to minimize glare.
In PS, use the crop tool with the "perspective" box checked to remove the keystoning.
Adjust the image size with "constrain proportions" unchecked.

[Justin.]

Also, from what I hear, make sure you are as way far back as possible, with the zoom at maximum. This should eliminate alot of lens distortion, or so I'm told.

[wheezy]

What is your opinion on water soluble oil paints Seedling?

[Seedling]

What is your opinion on water soluble oil paints Seedling?

You'd better ask someone else. I've never tried them, but I find the idea to be irrationally icky.

[wheezy]

You'd better ask someone else. I've never tried them, but I find the idea to be irrationally icky.

More icky than working with chemicals?

[chaosrocks]

I like chemicals
c

[Seedling]

More icky than working with chemicals?

I wouldn't be working with oils if I weren't comfortable with the risks. Just ask Elwell about how paranoid I am.

[Elwell]

What is your opinion on water soluble oil paints Seedling?
Unnecessary. The vast majority of the population can use solvents safely with some basic, common sense precautions, and for those few who can't, there are solvent-free ways of using oils. Water-miscible oils (note that there is no such thing as a "water soluble" oil) simply introduce a new, unnecessary set of problems, like wet/dry color shift, while providing no real advantage.
More icky than working with chemicals?How do you clean your bathroom?

[wheezy]

I wasn't asking to be attacked here, I was just curious about your opinions because I was looking to buy some oils from jerry's artarama and I came across these water oils. Before I purchased anything so that I can participate in this thread I wanted to rule out this option.

Thanks for your insight on what they are and all, my comment about the icky factor on chemicals was not one of ignorance or fear of chemicals, it was a joke really.

[Seedling]

I wasn't asking to be attacked here,

You were attacked?

[dbclemons]

Just to be a bit contrary to chaos's comment about adding contrast to the apple painting, I would suggest that it's not necessarily required that you do so. Making works where the tonal range is very close can be quite interesting and dramatic as well. Not every surface need be bright and shiny or lit with a spotlight. If you don't introduce some color variation, however, it can become rather dull and uninteresting. It depends on what you're after.

The one thing I'd suggest about the apple and something I see in the others, is to consider the directions of how you lay down the brushstrokes, especially in the background. With the strokes around the stem of the apple, it looks like it's stuck in mud. With the planes of the slices of bread, having the strokes go in opposite directions can help separate the forms more clearly.

[chaosrocks]

wheezy luv.... your joke was answered by more jokes and some solid info
don't be so touchy dear

DB
I agree entirely. But for soemone just starting to embrace a minmal value range, would be difficult. I can be very interesting. And I heartily concur on the brush stroke thing. the actual direction ond texture of the brushstrokes is the great joy of oil painting.

chaos

[Bowlin]

drd - I wasn't saying the same thing as chaos. I meant more like this...

[Nyarlathotep]

Hi... i've been around CA for quite some time now. Sorely under devolped artist heh, but i'm working on correcting that. Just started oil painting. Been doing wet on wet landscapes kinda like bob ross. Just getting a feel for oils before i try anything like portraits. But i was curious, i hadnt seen anything on it so thought i would ask. Has anyone heard or a bob ross product called liquid white? He also has liquid clear, black yadda yadda. anyways the real question is if you have heard of this is made using say for liquid white, just white paint and linseed oils mixed a certain way? I didnt feel like buying something that i could just make. If anyone knows what i'm talking about please reply. also i dont recall much wet on wet technique discussions on CA but i could have just over looked em. a point in their direction would be greatly appreciated. If there isnt a discussion perhaps a few ways to make wet on wet apply to painting something other than happy trees :) will eventually post up some of my finished painting got two in the works now. have a good one.

[sweetoblivion314]

I was an avid fan of Bob Ross as a kid i will admit it. However, from what i have read very few people use his wet on wet technique. It certainly isn't what i am being taught in school.
Liquid white is white paint that is much more liquid then your standard tube white. Liquid clear is just a colorless liquid mixture. Both are used for underpainting so that the canvas is wet when you start painting the actual piece.
Also, from what i have heard, Bob Ross products are absolutely horrendous. I would avoid buying them. If you want to paint wet into wet from the beginning, then i would take the color you wish to tone your canvas with, mix it with some turp and brush it on in a nice wash and start painting before it dries.

hope that helps.

[Nyarlathotep]

Ok thanks thats pretty much what i was looking for , just trying to find out if i could make something similar at home. I didnt much want to buy his products, cause i figured that would be easy enough to reproduce with what i had. Oh and i dont really know what i'm doin as far as oil painting materials goes.. so far as paints and paintbrushes. What is linseed oil for? makin paint thinner? or slower drying? off to paint whee !

[sweetoblivion314]

Oh and i dont really know what i'm doin as far as oil painting materials goes.. so far as paints and paintbrushes. What is linseed oil for? makin paint thinner? or slower drying? off to paint whee !

Linseed oil will make the paint thinner but will increase the drying time, but it also keeps it at an oily viscous consistancy. Tuprentine, turpenoid, gamsol, OMS (oderless mineral spirits), mineral spirits (the entire group is usualy refered to as turps) all thin the paint and decrease the drying time, but they will make the paint consistency move more and more watery. Mediums that are sold commercialy like liquin or Neo-meglip do whatever they say on the bottle, some increase some decrease some are liquid some are gel like, read them and play around with them to figure out what ones to use.

Now if you decide to use turps or oils or mediums in your paint you will want to paint fat over lean aka thin to thick. Paints with turp in them are thin or lean. Paints with oil in them are medium and paints with commercial mediums are thick or fat. A good set of initial mediums are Turp, half turp half linseed oil, and liquin. And you would use them in that order as your painting advances with pure tube (no medium) placed in between the half and half mixture and the liquin.

hope that helps.

[Noë]

Wow :) this is such a good thread!
Stevekim recently posted some good info about oil paints as well:
http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=107987

Love
Marleen

[Art_Addict]

Linseed oil will make the paint thinner but will increase the drying time, but it also keeps it at an oily viscous consistancy. Tuprentine, turpenoid, gamsol, OMS (oderless mineral spirits), mineral spirits (the entire group is usualy refered to as turps) all thin the paint and decrease the drying time, but they will make the paint consistency move more and more watery. Mediums that are sold commercialy like liquin or Neo-meglip do whatever they say on the bottle, some increase some decrease some are liquid some are gel like, read them and play around with them to figure out what ones to use.

Now if you decide to use turps or oils or mediums in your paint you will want to paint fat over lean aka thin to thick. Paints with turp in them are thin or lean. Paints with oil in them are medium and paints with commercial mediums are thick or fat. A good set of initial mediums are Turp, half turp half linseed oil, and liquin. And you would use them in that order as your painting advances with pure tube (no medium) placed in between the half and half mixture and the liquin.

hope that helps.

I would like to add that turps is a term that is usually used for solvents wich
are petrol based ( OMS, white spirits, etc.. ). Not for turpentine. And it's good
to make the distinction. Turpentine is a strong natural solvent derived from
pine trees.
About the mediums. It's not true that paint with medium added is the 'fattest' per se.
That depends on the oily structure of the paint itself and the recipe for the
medium. A medium should be seen as something you add to the paint to make
it do things that 'tube paint' can't.
Usually quality paint coming from the tube is just fine. Use of mediums isn't
really necessary for beginners

[Dizon]

I would like to add that turps is a term that is usually used for solvents wich
are petrol based ( OMS, white spirits, etc.. ). Not for turpentine. And it's good
to make the distinction. Turpentine is a strong natural solvent derived from
pine trees.
About the mediums. It's not true that paint with medium added is the 'fattest' per se.
That depends on the oily structure of the paint itself and the recipe for the
medium. A medium should be seen as something you add to the paint to make
it do things that 'tube paint' can't.
Usually quality paint coming from the tube is just fine. Use of mediums isn't
really necessary for beginners

Thanks for making that clear, Art Addict. I always thought artists referred to turpentine as turps! I was also confused because there is also turpenoid. hehe

[Art_Addict]

I always thought artists referred to turpentine as turps!

Well, some do... :)

Turpenoid is just another petrol based mineral spirit. I don't really know why they named it the way they did cause it only confuses people.
Probably to give the impression it is connected with turpentine somehow hinting to better quality.

[Chris Bennett]

Turpentine also has the most marvelous smell.

[chaosrocks]

just like gin!
chaos

[Art_Addict]

Turpentine also has the most marvelous smell.

I agree ! Smells like a fresh forest in the fall :)

On a side note. For people who have allergic reactions with using turpentine or wish to use a product with similar qualities there's also spike oil.

It is made from lavender and has the same pleasant smell as regular lavender oil.
But it's a very powerfull solvent as well. It's expensive though..

[Verdaccio]

I adore oil of spike lavender. It has a beautiful smell, and is more slippery under the brush than turpentine, and is a more aggressive solvent.

Turpentine is a paint thinner, not a paint medium. Using Turps alone in your underpainting will potentially result in your first layer(s) being underbound – too much pigment/filler/stabilizer, not enough oil. If it looks chalky, it is likely underbound. That can cause paint failure down the road. Is it something to worry about? /shrug Opinions vary...

We have all been told that the construction an oil painting is simple – fat over lean. We have all heard that axiom over and over. Oil paints do not dry, they cure, and they cure from the outside in - that is, they blister over the top and then dry down into the center of the layer. The oil converts from a liquid into a solid by oxidation. The traditional wisdom says that the best way to "build" a painting structurally is to start with very lean colors for your underpainting, move to colors with more oil content and/or adding a fatter medium for subsequent layers, and finish with more oily colors/mediums layers as you proceed. The whole point of this again is to ensure that the layers are put down in such a way that the layers will dry in sequence and you will not end up with a layer underneath still drying while a layer on top has skinned and dried - crack!

Now let's add a medium that has a siccatif or drying effect to the paint...this whole fat over lean thing becomes sort of a mute point. The old axiom of fat over lean had to do with the curing rates of oil paints – never put a slow drying paint under a fast drying paint, don’t put a thin layer over a thick layer, etc. Now, you still have to be a bit smart when you use mediums that dry faster and give layers time to cure a bit before applying the next…don’t put thin over thick if it is not fully cured yet, etc. But largely, the worries of fat over lean go out the window when you introduce a medium with a drying agent in it. Drying agents cause the paint layer to dry from the inside out, not skin over and dry from the outside in. This accelerated curing rate means less chance of having wet layers underneath as you paint over top.

Something that bugs me is the attempt by paint manufacturers to make all their paints handle the same. Oil paints cure at a different rate depending on what is in them. AND, oil paint is not just pigment and oil – it has stabilizers and fillers in it. One silly thing paint manufacturers do today is try to make all their paints exactly the same. Raw umber is markedly different than Cad Red, but if you use both of them from Utrecht, they will feel and handle almost the same. I believe this is a mistake – that means that they added more oil and fillers to the Umber, and less oil and more stabilizers to the Cad Red. Most of the major paint manufacturers do this and it drives me crazy. /twitch /rant

For me, all this has come down to three things that I take as truths:

The most stable paintings from the old masters are paintings that had a high pigment to oil ratio. For me, this has meant:

Use good paint. The best that you can afford. Cheap paints have more fillers like alumina hydrate in them. They take the place of the more expensive pigments. Studio Products paints (Cennini), Holbein, Vasarri, M.Graham, etc. are the better brands of paint I can recommend. Pick up a 37ml tube of any one of these in one hand, and then a 150ml tube of Windsor Newton Winton student grade paint in the other…feel the weight of the two. The 150ml Winton will almost always be lighter – those are the cheap fillers taking the place of the pigment.

Use mediums and solvents sparingly. Regardless of what medium you use, use as little of it as you can. It actually takes very little medium to affect handling or drying. Don’t use mediums to dilute your paint, thus reducing the pigment to oil ratio. Use mediums to modify the handling quality, or speed or slow drying. It takes very little to accomplish those goals.

Your mileage may vary...

[sweetoblivion314]

I would like to add that turps is a term that is usually used for solvents wich
are petrol based ( OMS, white spirits, etc.. ). Not for turpentine. And it's good
to make the distinction. Turpentine is a strong natural solvent derived from
pine trees.
About the mediums. It's not true that paint with medium added is the 'fattest' per se.
That depends on the oily structure of the paint itself and the recipe for the
medium. A medium should be seen as something you add to the paint to make
it do things that 'tube paint' can't.
Usually quality paint coming from the tube is just fine. Use of mediums isn't
really necessary for beginners

yea i know it all depends. I was reffering to a generalization of commercially sold mediums like liquin and neo-meglip and galkyd. The actual fat over lean like Verdaccio said (great post by the way, thanks) has to do with curing speed and the percentage of oil in the mixture. The information i was using is on the Gamblin website and they say that all of their mediums should be considered fat.

[BohemianChaos]

What a informative thread. :)

Does anyone have any advice on oil painting on wood (like plywood)? I like to incorporate the grain of the wood into the image itself, so white gesso isn't an option, and clear gesso makes it look "foggy". I'm super new to oils, so I'm not positive of the best way to approach it. I'm definitely loving the blendability of oils over acrylics... there are some examples of what I'm doing on my sb page (linked below), and an artist who also uses oils on wood this way is linked here (http://www.audrey-kawasaki.com), to give you an idea of what I'm going for.

Any and all help would be appreciated!! :bashful:

[That fat kid]

Bohemian, You'll need to "size" the wood, as in apply a layer of glue to seal the pores of the wood so the oil doesn't seep in. This isn't totally archival, as far as I know, but it should get the effect you're after. You can use PVA sizing, rabbit skin glue, or other stuff like that.

[timpaatkins]

Or you could do a shellac/renatured alcohol thing. It will tint it yellow though...

[Elwell]

Or, you could shellac it. (AH! Timpa beat me to it!)
Or, you could oil it with a boiled oil wood finish until it won't absorb any more.
Or, you could use a commercial wood sealer.

[dbclemons]

Beyond just the preparation of the surface, you might consider just buying sheets of wood veneer. Different species of wood gives you more choices of color and grain patterns. You can glue it to a firm surface like MDF or hardboard, and then size it for painting.
http://www.oakwoodveneer.com/samples.html

[arttorney]

Of the commercial wood finish products that are out there I would recommend going for a "PECAN" finish rather than something light like oak or something dark like mahogany color. It looks like the woman in your link is using a pecan finish ground on at least some of those paintings. It makes a nice golden color that is somewhere in the middle and will show up the grains nicely. The boiled linseed oil will make a rich golden yellow color but it will take weeks to dry instead of a day. If you have patience it's nice. It's not as expensive as those little cans of finish and I like the way it smells

You need to sand wood to make sure it's smooth and there is a good tooth but you don't want to overdo sanding so the grind marks are visible. Don't use a radial sander like one of those drill adapters. Hand sanding is strenuous but is cheapest and you probably get the best control. Orbital sanders and belt sanders are better than the radial ones but they cost money. You'll probably want to go over the finish with a really fine grit sandpaper (or steel wool) after it dries because of the tooth thing, and because there are always these little damned bumps all over the place after drying. From what I saw in your sketchbook you have a delicate style and the bumps will probably foul up what you are trying to accomplish during paint application. Wipe your sanding dust off with a damp rag after each sanding/before you apply the next layer of something. Best of luck. Wood and panels rock.

[That fat kid]

If you plan on sanding, hand sanding is hard to keep totally smooth, but it is cheap. Snag a random orbital sander, it's pretty good at keeping things glassy smooth, especially with 320 grit, which is the highest power sanding grit I can find.

Yes, they cost money, but everything either costs time or money. But it's a one time cost of 50 to 75 US dollars or so, and comparing the time saved with handing sanding for 6 hours as opposed to less than one with a power sander over the course of twenty paintings, it's worth it. Besides, if it's worth doing, it's worth doing right.

[t11]

I was hoping anyone who has any information regarding oil paint/solvent allergies could touch on them here (seems to be the place since it is the big oil painting thread as it would be helpful to others as well).
I myself have been painting with oils for eleven years now and never had an adverse reaction until just these past two days when red blotches blew up on the backs of my hands mixed with stiffness. I know allergies can develop over time so I'm wondering if I've finally developed one to oils in general or to a specific thing that I was using which consists of: Grumbacher/Gamblin oils, turpenoid, and I was trying out the galkyd mediums which is new to me so maybe that's it.
Perhaps a way to test for specific allergies?

Thanks in advance and thanks for this thread to begin with :)

[Seedling]

I was hoping anyone who has any information regarding oil paint/solvent allergies could touch on them here . . .

Hi Troy. I’ve never had to deal with a reaction like that, but I can think of a few things you can try.

Pick a spot on your body that is not normally exposed to any of your mediums, such as your leg. Put a tiny dot of each substance on your skin there. (You can use a marker on your skin to note what you put where.) Watch for reactions.

Use latex gloves when you paint.

Good luck figuring it out!

[t11]

I thought about the typical allergen scratch/prick test and I'm gonna give it a few days rest before I try it. I'm hoping all this was just too much of a good thing so to speak as I had been cranking on some stuff for day stretches at a time.

I was of the understanding that petrochemicals disintegrated latex (which is why we don't use baby oil in with condoms for example)

[Seedling]

I was of the understanding that petrochemicals disintegrated latex (which is why we don't use baby oil in with condoms for example)

Hey, maybe that's why my gloves wear out at the fingertips! They last me a few days before tearing, though, especially if I powder my hands before putting them on.

[Rouko]

I have a quick question. I used to oil paint when I was in high school and I havent picked up the brush in more than 5 years. My apartment is small and my roommates hate the fumes. Im planning on painting out on my balcony.

I have two cats. They get into everything, I was wondering if there was a safe way to speed up the drying process. For example if Im going really well and have my background done and I want to let it dry out a little before working on the subject or foreground.

I've heard a hair blow dryer set on "Cool" will work if you dont get too close to the surface or stay in one spot too long. Does anyone know if thats true?

[Seedling]

You are going to get awfully tired of holding up that blow-dryer, Rouko. :) Instead, hang a bulletin board in your room, and thumbtack your art up at a height where your critters won’t bump into it. If you need lots of space, go to Home Depot and buy a big sheet of homosote – it’s a sort of compressed paper product that makes a great bulletin board. You can even coat it in house paint to match your apartment.

[Rouko]

Thanks Seedling, the helps much appreciated :)

[Elwell]

I've heard a hair blow dryer set on "Cool" will work if you dont get too close to the surface or stay in one spot too long. Does anyone know if thats true?

A hair dryer works great for water based paints (watercolor, acrylic, gouache) which dry by evaporation. But oils don't technically dry, they cure; the oil combines chemically with oxygen, turning from it from a liquid to a solid. Heat will speed up this reaction, but it has to be sustained at a low level for an extended period. I've heard of some illustrators using heat lamps, but one has to be very careful to keep them well away from the painting.

[timpaatkins]

You can use Galkyd or Liquin too. That will speed up the drying time. Galkyd can sometimes dry (or get tacky dry) as fast as 3-6 hours(which can also be annoying...). This depends on what kind of paint you are using though, Earth colors tend to dry quicker. Liquin is usually touch dry over night. Walnut alkyd (m. Graham's) is for me the "nicest" fast dry medium, i feel its not as aggressive as the others. To me, they smell like something you'd clean the rims of a car with.

Get some small bottles and experiment a little. I use Galkyd when painting pleine air, and sometimes a like the added "drag" it gives, other times it annoys the hell out of me.

Good luck!

On the subject of drying with heat, i remember Dan (Dos Santos) telling us at the Society of Illustrators about an incident when he managed to burn down a newly rendered Big Ben he had been working on for a super tight deadline. I forget the details, but it was funny as hell.

[Rouko]

Thanks everybody!

[sweetoblivion314]

You are going to get awfully tired of holding up that blow-dryer, Rouko. :) Instead, hang a bulletin board in your room, and thumbtack your art up at a height where your critters won’t bump into it. If you need lots of space, go to Home Depot and buy a big sheet of homosote – it’s a sort of compressed paper product that makes a great bulletin board. You can even coat it in house paint to match your apartment.

so thats what my dorm room is coated in. Its kinda cool but not really cause it doesnt really hold that much weight. Barely holds up my callender.

[thespirals]

I have a question about fine detail and flowyness with oils. I painted in oils for a bit when I was in art school, and one time I...painted a mural...in oils...and haven't used oils ever since, and switched to acrylics. The biggest reason why I stopped using oils is because I learned how to paint using watercolor and gouache, and have a natural knack for controlling water that I seem to not have when using oils. When I paint with a water based medium, I can paint a long, flowy, snake-like brush stroke with ease, but with the thickness of oils this is very difficult for me. I was using thinner to make the paints more flowy, but the pigment was way too thinned out for my taste. Maybe I should premix my paints with some thinner in small containers? What do you do to improve the flow of your oil paints without thinning them so much that they act like a glaze?

Also, the other difficulty I have with oils that I do not have with waterbased mediums is fine detail. It's the same problem as with the flow....the oil is too thick, and when thinned down, too thin. What techniques do you use to get fine detail, especially very long fine lines such as whiskers?

[Chris Bennett]

thespirals: It sounds to me as if you have adjusted to the water based media in that 'body' in the paint is not an issue and are are comfortable with the particular way that pigment behaves in a water based solution.
To answer your question specifically, oil paint will not be more 'moveable' under the brush by addiing oil over and above a certain point - it will only be as viscous as the oil itself and therefore thicker and slower than water in its handling. The only way to make oil paint 'looser' and 'faster' in its handling and resemble the handling of water based mediums is to use turpentine or white spirit as a thinners. It wont be quite the same as water based mediums but it will get pretty close.
To sum up: use spirits as your thinners, not oil.

[Rist]

Great topic. Used it for reference for a while now. I do have a question.

In one of the recommended paint selections you mention Lemon Yellow. Is there an equivalent or a 'close to' for this colour?

These are the yellows I can buy:

Hansa Yellow
Cadmium Yellow Light
Azo Yellow
Cadmium Yellow
Cadmium Yellow Deep
Indian Yellow

[Elwell]

"Lemon yellow" these days usually refers to any light, bright, cool yellow. Either cadmium or hansa are fine, cadmium is more opaque, hansa is cheaper.

[dbclemons]

If you want a yellow that shifts towards green, I'd go with Azo if it's PY74. "Hansa" could be several different ones, depending on the maker.

[Rist]

Thanks guys!

[Almighty Chris]

On the topic of yellows, does anyone know of a good( and possibly relatively cheap) alternative or look alike to " lead tin yellow" used by Vermeer?

[Elwell]

If you just want the hue, cad or arylide yellow plus white, with a little ochre to knock down the chroma.
If you want the real thing (and don't mind the toxicity and expense), it's available here (http://naturalpigments.com/detail.asp?PRODUCT_ID=820-309), among other places.

[Almighty Chris]

Thanks : D